Duesseldorfer Tabelle 2026: How German Child Support Is Calculated

German child support for a minor is not set by a judge picking a number. It is read off a chart: the Düsseldorfer Tabelle, published by the Oberlandesgericht (Higher Regional Court) Düsseldorf and updated on 1 January most years. Type in a net income and a childs age band and the chart gives a starting figure that almost every family court in Germany uses as its benchmark.

That simplicity is also where most do it yourself calculations go wrong. The chart amount is not what gets paid. Child benefit (Kindergeld) is deducted from it, the paying parents own protected minimum can reduce it further, and when one parent owes support to several children at once the whole thing can be recalculated proportionally. This page reproduces the full 2026 table, then walks through each of those adjustments with worked numbers.

Information last verified on 19 July 2026. This page provides general legal information and does not constitute legal advice in an individual case.

What the table is, and what it is not

The Düsseldorfer Tabelle is not a law passed by the Bundestag. It is a set of guidelines (Leitlinien) that one regional appeals court, the OLG Düsseldorf, drafts together with the other Oberlandesgerichte and the family court associations, and updates when the underlying figures move. Family courts across Germany treat it as the default reference because it produces predictable, comparable outcomes, and appellate practice has hardened around it, but a court is not bound to follow it in an unusual case.

The actual statutory obligation comes from § 1601 BGB, which obliges relatives in a direct line, including parents and children, to support each other, and § 1610 BGB, which defines the scope of that support (Bedarf) by the childs living standard. The table exists to turn those two open ended provisions into a number a caseworker or parent can look up. For the surrounding rules on who owes support and how the obligors own means are protected, see child support and Selbstbehalt.

The minimum figure for a minor child specifically is fixed by § 1612a BGB and the Mindestunterhaltsverordnung (MinUhV), the ordinance that sets the Mindestunterhalt for each age band. The Düsseldorfer Tabelles group 1 row for a minor child is required to match that statutory minimum exactly. Every group above group 1 is the courts own guideline addition, not a separate statutory figure.

The 2026 Düsseldorfer Tabelle in full

The table below is transcribed from the official Oberlandesgericht Düsseldorf publication, Stand 01.01.2026, in force since 1 January 2026. All amounts are monthly, in euros. Nettoeinkommen means the paying parents adjusted net income (bereinigtes Nettoeinkommen), explained in the next section, not raw gross salary.

*Group 1 is a special case. Every other group in that last column shows a Bedarfskontrollbetrag, a control figure used to check whether an obligor who has just crossed into a higher group is actually left with more disposable income than in the group below. Group 1 instead shows the notwendiger Eigenbedarf split, 1.200 if the obligor is not employed and 1.450 if employed, which is simply the Selbstbehalt figure discussed below rather than a true control amount. That is a genuine quirk of the official table, not a transcription error, and it trips up people reading the chart for the first time.

Above group 15, at net income beyond EUR 11,200 a month, the table stops and a court sets support on the individual facts of the case (the highest groups amount is not automatically extended).

How to read the columns

Nettoeinkommen is not the payslip figure. It is bereinigtes Nettoeinkommen: net salary after deducting items the courts recognize as necessary, most commonly work related costs, certain debt repayments, and contributions toward legally required retirement provision beyond the state pension. Two people with the same gross salary can land in different income groups once this adjustment is applied, so the group a parent falls into is itself often the most contested part of a calculation, not the age band.

The four age columns (0-5, 6-11, 12-17, ab 18) are read off using the childs age as of the date support is being calculated, not the age when the case started. A child who turns 12 partway through the year moves into the higher band from that point on, and the paying parent (or the parent collecting on the childs behalf) should expect the figure to step up automatically.

The percentage column shows each groups Bedarfssatz as a percentage of group 1, which is fixed at 100 percent. It is a reference, not something used directly to calculate a specific childs support.

The Bedarfskontrollbetrag exists so that moving into a higher income group never leaves an obligor with less money after paying support than they would have had one group down. If the check shows that outcome, the obligor is kept in the lower group instead for that calculation only, and the difference is normally distributed among the children.

The Kindergeld deduction: half for a minor, full for an adult child

The number in the table is the childs Bedarf (need), not the sum the paying parent actually transfers, called the Zahlbetrag (payable amount). § 1612b BGB requires Kindergeld, EUR 259 a month at the 2026 rate, to be credited against that need before the Zahlbetrag is set. The size of the credit depends on the childs status, and this is the step most self made calculations get wrong.

For a minor child living with the other parent, only half of the Kindergeld is deducted, because the parent the child lives with is treated as covering the other half of the childs needs directly through housing, food and care rather than through cash. Half of EUR 259 is EUR 129.50.

Worked example, minor child. A paying parent has a bereinigtes Nettoeinkommen of EUR 3,000 a month and one child aged 8, who lives with the other parent. EUR 3,000 falls into group 4 (2.901 to 3.300), and age 8 sits in the 6-11 band, so the table figure is EUR 642. Subtracting half the 2026 Kindergeld, EUR 129.50, gives a Zahlbetrag of EUR 512.50 a month. The parent keeps EUR 2,487.50 of their own net income after paying it, well above the EUR 1,450 Selbstbehalt for an employed obligor, so there is no shortfall to work through.

For an adult child (from age 18), the full Kindergeld is deducted rather than half, because an adult child is assumed to manage their own household expenses with the cash rather than splitting them informally with a parent who has custody. Using the same group 4 income and the same childs 19th birthday instead, the table figure moves to the ab-18 column, EUR 803, and the full EUR 259 is subtracted rather than EUR 129.50, giving a Zahlbetrag of EUR 544.

Note that support for an adult child who has finished school is, in practice, usually apportioned between both parents in line with each parents own income under § 1606 Abs. 3 BGB, rather than falling on one parent alone the way minor child support typically does. The two figures above illustrate the Kindergeld mechanics in isolation; an actual adult child case usually needs both parents incomes assessed together.

The Selbstbehalt: what the paying parent keeps

Before any child support is owed, the law protects a minimum amount of the paying parents own income, the Selbstbehalt, under § 1603 Abs. 1 BGB. The 2026 figures, unchanged from 2025, are:

A privileged adult child, for the purposes of the lower Selbstbehalt tier, is one who is under 21, unmarried, still living in a parents household, and in general schooling (§ 1603 Abs. 2 BGB). An adult child outside that description is assessed against the higher, EUR 1,750 general minimum instead.

University students living away from home: the flat EUR 990 rate

Where an adult child is enrolled in higher education and no longer lives with either parent, the table stops applying an income group lookup altogether. Instead a flat monthly need of EUR 990 applies, which already factors in housing costs of up to EUR 440 toward Warmmiete (rent including heating). Kindergeld is still deducted in full from that figure under § 1612b BGB, the same rule as for any other adult child.

When there is not enough to go around: the Mangelfall

Every figure above assumes the paying parents income comfortably covers both the Selbstbehalt and every childs Zahlbetrag. When it does not, family law calls this a Mangelfall (shortfall case), and the official Düsseldorfer Tabelle publication sets out its own worked method for handling it: the available amount is distributed among the children in proportion to each childs Zahlbetrag (referred to in the official method as the Einsatzbetrag once Kindergeld has been deducted), rather than paid to the older or younger child first.

Worked example. An obligor is employed with a bereinigtes Nettoeinkommen of EUR 2,200 a month, which falls into group 2 (2.101 to 2.500), and owes support to two children who both live with the other parent: one aged 4 (0-5 band) and one aged 9 (6-11 band).

The table figures are EUR 511 for the younger child and EUR 586 for the older child. After deducting half the 2026 Kindergeld from each (EUR 129.50), the Zahlbetrag figures are EUR 381.50 and EUR 456.50, totaling EUR 838.

The obligor keeps a EUR 1,450 Selbstbehalt as an employed parent, leaving EUR 750 available for support (EUR 2,200 minus EUR 1,450). That is less than the EUR 838 both children need in full, so this is a Mangelfall.

The EUR 750 is then split in proportion to each childs Zahlbetrag rather than split evenly or paid to one child first. The younger childs share of the total need is 381.50 divided by 838, about 45.5 percent, giving roughly EUR 341 a month. The older childs share is about 54.5 percent, giving roughly EUR 409 a month. Together the two figures still total the EUR 750 the obligor actually has available.

A real Mangelfall calculation can also involve a spouse or former spouse with a maintenance claim of their own, and their own Selbstbehalt tier, which changes both the ranking of who is paid first under § 1609 BGB and the arithmetic above. This is the point at which most families benefit from having a family court or a lawyer verify the figures rather than relying on a chart lookup alone.

Why the table changes most Januaries, even though the underlying rule does not

The Mindestunterhalt figures behind group 1 come from the Mindestunterhaltsverordnung, an ordinance the Federal Ministry of Justice amends roughly every two years, currently the seventh amending ordinance of 15 November 2024. What looks like an annual change is actually a single two year ordinance that sets two different figures, one for each of the two years it covers, so the euro amount on the Düsseldorfer Tabelle still moves every January even though the ordinance itself is not rewritten that often. The table as a whole is then republished each January to keep every group, not only group 1, aligned with current cost of living data and court practice.

Because both the table and the underlying ordinance are revised on a fixed schedule, a figure reproduced from an older article, a downloaded PDF, or an aggregator site can be a year or more out of date without any visible warning. Always check the Stand (as of) date printed at the top of the official table before relying on a number for a filing.

For the surrounding law on who is owed support in the first place and how it interacts with the paying parents own protected income, see child support and Selbstbehalt. For support owed to a spouse rather than a child, including during separation, see separation and post divorce spousal maintenance. For the divorce process itself, including the mandatory separation year, see divorce in Germany. For the wider picture of German family law, see the Germany law hub.

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