Dutch Non-Compete Clause 2026: Artikel 7:653 BW and the Concurrentiebeding

A non-compete clause (concurrentiebeding) restricts what an employee may do after the contract of employment ends, and Dutch law treats it as valid only under conditions set out in a single article. That article is artikel 7:653 BW, and it has not changed since 2015.

This matters because a reform has been announced loudly enough that many summaries now describe it as though it were in force. It is not. What follows sets out the law as it stands, and then says exactly where the wetsvoorstel had reached.

Information last verified on 21 July 2026. This page provides general legal information about Netherlands law and does not constitute legal advice in an individual case.

The conditions in artikel 7:653 lid 1 BW

Artikel 7:653 lid 1 BW describes the clause functionally rather than by name. It covers any agreement between employer and employee restricting the employee in the power to be active in a certain way after the end of the contract, which is wide enough to catch clauses drafted under other headings.

Such a clause is valid only where three conditions are met together, packed into two lettered onderdelen. The contract of employment must have been entered into for an indefinite period, the clause must have been agreed in writing, and the employee who agreed it must have been an adult (meerderjarig).

All three do real work. The indefinite-term condition is what makes the exception in lid 2 necessary at all, writing means the clause has to be traceable to a document the employee accepted rather than to a handbook mentioned in passing, and the age condition means a clause agreed with a minor is not valid.

Fixed-term contracts need a written motivation

Artikel 7:653 lid 2 BW is the exception to the indefinite-term condition, and it is the provision most often misdescribed. A clause may be included in a fixed-term contract where a written motivation given by the employer with that clause shows that it is necessary because of compelling business or service interests (zwaarwegende bedrijfs- of dienstbelangen).

The motivation has to sit with the clause itself. A general statement that the employer works in a competitive market does not meet the test, because the article asks why this restriction is necessary for this role.

No such motivation is required on an indefinite contract. That asymmetry is deliberate: the fixed-term employee already carries the insecurity of an end date, so the statute demands a reason before adding a post-contract restriction on top.

What a rechter can do with the clause

Artikel 7:653 lid 3 BW gives the court two distinct powers, and the difference between them decides what an employee can realistically ask for.

Under sub a, the rechter may annul the clause in full where a clause of the kind in lid 2, that is one in a fixed-term contract, is not necessary because of zwaarwegende bedrijfs- of dienstbelangen. That is a test of the motivation, and it produces an all-or-nothing outcome.

Under sub b, the rechter may annul the clause wholly or partly where, in relation to the interest of the employer that is to be protected, the employee is unfairly disadvantaged (onbillijk benadeeld) by it. The wholly or partly wording is what makes a middle outcome possible at all: the period can be shortened, the geographic reach narrowed, or the list of restricted activities cut back, without the clause falling away entirely.

How often a rechter takes that middle course rather than annulling in full or leaving the clause standing is not something artikel 7:653 BW settles, and this page does not carry a figure for it.

Artikel 7:653 lid 4 BW removes the clause from the employer's hands altogether in one situation. The employer can derive no rights from it where the ending or the non-continuation of the contract is the result of the employer's own ernstig verwijtbaar handelen of nalaten.

That is a test of conduct rather than of label. An ending that rests on a reasonable ground under artikel 7:669 lid 1 BW does not engage lid 4 by itself, and an ending presented as a reasonable ground is not shielded from lid 4 by that presentation either.

Artikel 7:653 lid 5 BW then adds a money remedy. Where the clause hinders the employee to a significant extent from being active other than in the employer's service, the rechter may always determine that the employer must pay compensation (vergoeding) to the employee for the duration of the restriction.

That vergoeding is fixed by the rechter in fairness, with regard to the circumstances of the case, so the statute gives no formula and no percentage. The last sentence of lid 5 removes it where the ending or non-continuation results from the employee's own ernstig verwijtbaar handelen of nalaten.

The reform is a wetsvoorstel, not law

This is the point on which outdated summaries do the most damage, so it is worth stating flatly. The Wet modernisering concurrentiebeding has not been enacted, and nothing in it applies to a clause today.

Rijksoverheid.nl, checked on 21 July 2026, describes the change as a plan of the cabinet. The wetsvoorstel provides that the clause may last at most one year, that the employer must state in the clause the area to which it applies, and that the employer must pay compensation where it invokes the clause against a departing employee.

The same page records the procedural position: the Raad van State issues advice first, and the expectation is that the cabinet submits the wetsvoorstel to the Tweede Kamer at the end of 2026. A wetsvoorstel at that stage is not law, has no transitional rules yet, and can still change in either chamber.

The 2023 announcement that this page also cites lists two further elements which the question and answer page does not repeat. One is that an employer would have to motivate the zwaarwichtig bedrijfsbelang of the clause in permanent contracts too, a requirement artikel 7:653 lid 2 BW already imposes on fixed-term contracts. The other is that the vergoeding would be a statutory percentage of the last salary earned, and since neither government source names a percentage, none is given here.

The practical consequence is narrow but important. A clause agreed today is judged against artikel 7:653 BW as it now stands, and a duration of eighteen months or a clause with no stated geographic area is not void for that reason, though either can be attacked under lid 3 sub b as an unfair disadvantage.

The relatiebeding and the boetebeding

Two neighbouring clauses show up in the same contracts. A non-solicitation clause (relatiebeding) bars contact with the clients and business relations of the former employer, usually for a fixed period after the ending.

Because artikel 7:653 lid 1 BW is worded around any restriction on being active in a certain way after the contract ends, a relatiebeding is generally read as falling inside the same article rather than beside it. On that reading the written form, the motivation rule for fixed-term contracts and the annulment powers all apply to it. The article never names the relatiebeding, so this rests on the breadth of the lid 1 wording rather than on any provision addressed to it.

The same wording marks a limit on the other side. A clause that only stops a departing employee from recruiting former colleagues, a ronselbeding, restricts dealings with the old employer's staff rather than the employee's own freedom to be active in a certain way, so it is generally regarded as falling outside artikel 7:653 BW and as governed by the general law of contract instead.

A penalty clause (boetebeding) is the enforcement mechanism usually attached to either. One thing has to be said before artikel 7:650 BW is applied to a concurrentiebeding at all.

Artikel 7:650 lid 1 BW is hooked to the overtreding van de voorschriften van de arbeidsovereenkomst, the breach of the requirements of the contract of employment, and the article does not say in terms whether that reaches conduct after the contract has already ended. Whether a penalty on a post-employment restriction is governed by artikel 7:650 BW, or falls instead to be moderated under the general rule in artikel 6:94 BW, is a question the text does not resolve and on which a rechter can go either way.

Artikel 6:94 lid 1 BW is the alternative route. At the debtor's request the rechter may moderate a stipulated penalty where fairness clearly requires it, though not below the damages the creditor would have under the general law, and artikel 6:94 lid 3 BW makes any clause departing from that void. What follows sets out what artikel 7:650 BW provides on its own terms, on the footing that it applies.

Artikel 7:650 lid 1 BW allows a penalty only where the contract of employment names both the rule whose breach is penalised and the amount of the penalty. Artikel 7:650 lid 2 BW requires the agreement stipulating a penalty to be entered into in writing.

Artikel 7:650 lid 3 BW requires the destination of the penalty to be stated precisely, and forbids it accruing, directly or indirectly, to the personal benefit of the employer or of whoever the employer has authorised to impose penalties. Artikel 7:650 lid 4 BW requires every stipulated penalty to be set at a determined amount, expressed in the currency in which the loon is fixed.

Artikel 7:650 lid 5 BW then caps things tightly. No more than half a day of loon in combined penalties may be imposed on the employee in one week, and no single penalty may be set higher than that amount.

Artikel 7:650 lid 8 BW closes an obvious escape route. A penalty stipulated by the employer under artikelen 6:91 tot en met 6:94 BW counts as a boete for the purposes of the article, so drafting the clause as an ordinary contractual penalty does not put it outside these conditions.

Lid 6 begins with nietigheid, not with reduction

The first sentence of artikel 7:650 lid 6 BW is the one summaries leave out, and from the employee's side it is the strongest thing in the article. It reads: Elk beding in strijd met enige bepaling van dit artikel is nietig, that is, every clause conflicting with any provision of this article is void.

The rest of lid 6 then permits a departure, but only from leden 3, 4 and 5, only by written agreement, and only for employees whose loon in money per hour exceeds the minimum wage applying to them. Leden 1 and 2 are therefore not open to departure at all.

The difference that makes is one of kind rather than of degree. A penalty clause that fails to name the rule whose breach is penalised, or fails to state the amount, or was not agreed in writing, conflicts with lid 1 or lid 2 and is void, so it produces nothing at all rather than a smaller figure.

Reduction is the fallback for a clause that is valid but excessive. Where a departure from leden 3, 4 and 5 has been validly agreed, the closing sentence of lid 6 keeps the rechter competent at all times to set the penalty at a smaller sum where the imposed penalty appears excessive (bovenmatig).

Artikel 7:650 lid 7 BW adds a protection tied to the minimum wage figure itself. Where the amount of loon referred to in lid 6 changes, the operation of a clause departing from leden 3, 4 and 5 is suspended against an employee whose loon in money does not exceed the changed minimum wage.

Artikel 7:651 lid 1 BW closes off double recovery. The employer may not both levy a penalty and claim damages in respect of the same fact, and lid 2 makes any clause to the contrary void.

A worked penalty calculation

Take a clause reading that breach of the concurrentiebeding costs EUR 10,000 immediately, plus EUR 500 for each day the breach continues. Suppose the breach runs for twenty days before it stops.

On the face of the clause that produces EUR 10,000 plus twenty times EUR 500, or EUR 20,000 in total. For an employee on a gross monthly loon of EUR 3,500, that is close to six months of pay for a restriction the rechter has not yet examined.

Artikel 7:650 lid 6 BW is what such a clause depends on, because the amount sits far above the half day of loon ceiling in lid 5. The departure from lid 5 is effective only where it was agreed in writing and the employee's loon in money per hour exceeds the minimum wage, and where it is effective the rechter remains competent to reduce a penalty that appears excessive.

The earlier question comes first, and it can end the matter outright. If the clause does not name the rule whose breach is penalised, or does not state the amount, or was not agreed in writing, it conflicts with lid 1 or lid 2 of artikel 7:650 BW, and the first sentence of lid 6 makes it void. Neither the EUR 10,000 nor the EUR 500 per day then arises at all, and there is nothing left for a rechter to reduce.

The side-activities clause runs the other way

One neighbouring clause is built on the opposite presumption, and confusing it with the concurrentiebeding costs people work they could have taken. A clause forbidding or restricting work for others outside the hours worked for this employer is a nevenwerkzaamhedenbeding, and it concerns the period during the contract rather than after it.

Artikel 7:653a lid 1 BW makes such a clause void (nietig) unless it can be justified on an objective ground. That is the reverse of the position under artikel 7:653 BW, where the clause stands unless a condition fails or a rechter cuts it back.

Artikel 7:653a lid 2 BW adds a protection against retaliation. The employer may not disadvantage the employee because the employee has asserted the rights that article confers, in or out of court, has given assistance in doing so, or has complained about it.

Reading a clause against the statute

Most of the questions people bring to this topic can be answered by reading the clause next to artikel 7:653 BW. Five points decide almost everything.

• Was the contract entered into for an indefinite period, is the clause in writing, and did an adult employee agree to it? Artikel 7:653 lid 1 BW makes all three conditions of validity, subject to the fixed-term exception in lid 2.
• Is the contract fixed-term? If so, is there a written motivation with the clause, and does it explain why this role needs the restriction? Artikel 7:653 lid 2 BW requires it, and artikel 7:653 lid 3 sub a BW annuls the clause in full where it does not hold.
• How wide is the restriction in time, geography and activity, measured against what the employer is actually protecting? That is the balance artikel 7:653 lid 3 sub b BW asks about.
• How did the contract end, and did the employer's own conduct cause it? Artikel 7:653 lid 4 BW turns on that.
• Does the clause block ordinary work in this field, rather than one competitor? That is the trigger for compensation under artikel 7:653 lid 5 BW.

A clause taken over unchanged from a template is common, and it is exactly the sort that struggles on the second and third points. That does not make it a nullity, since annulment is something a rechter does rather than something that happens automatically.

How a clause is actually enforced

Disputes here move quickly, because the employer wants the new job stopped rather than damages years later. The usual route is urgent interim relief (kort geding) under artikel 254 Rv, in which the judge gives an immediate provision without deciding the case finally.

The route is not simply there for the asking. Artikel 254 lid 1 Rv gives the voorzieningenrechter the power in alle spoedeisende zaken, all urgent cases, in which an immediate provision is required having regard to the interests of the parties. A party who cannot show an urgent interest (spoedeisend belang) is left with proceedings on the merits.

Artikel 254 lid 5 Rv puts the urgent route within reach of the kantonrechter: in cases decided on the merits by the kantonrechter, the kantonrechter is also competent to give a provision of that kind. Artikel 93 sub c Rv assigns cases about an arbeidsovereenkomst to the kantonrechter whatever the claim is worth, so an employment kort geding stays in that forum.

What each side asks for differs. The employer typically asks for an order to stop the competing activity on pain of a penalty, while the employee typically asks for the clause to be suspended, or for a vergoeding under artikel 7:653 lid 5 BW, or both.

A kort geding decision is provisional. Annulment under artikel 7:653 lid 3 BW belongs to proceedings on the merits, so a suspension obtained quickly can still be followed by a full hearing on whether the clause stands.

Artikel 79 lid 1 Rv allows a party to conduct its own case in person before the kantonrechter, so an advocaat is not required by the procedure itself.

Where this sits in Dutch employment law

The concurrentiebeding is one clause in a wider framework of grounds, routes and payments on ending a contract, mapped on the Netherlands employment law section page. Where the ending itself produces a statutory payment, the formula and the worked examples are on the severance pay (transitievergoeding) page.

A restriction agreed years earlier often surfaces at the same moment as a long absence or a re-integratie file, which is covered on the sick pay (loondoorbetaling bij ziekte) page. The codes, the courts and the professions behind all of it are set out on the Netherlands law overview.