Hungary introduces e-cash registers and e-receipts; online cash registers allowed until 1 July 2028

What changed in detail

Decree 8/2025. (III. 31.) NGM rendelet of the Minister for National Economy, published on 31 March 2025 and in force from 1 April 2025, sets the rules for selling and operating e-cash registers (e-pénztárgép) and the requirements for issuing e-receipts (e-nyugta).

NAV approves e-cash register types itself and tests that each one issues e-receipts correctly and sends them to its central receipt store (nyugtatár), which keeps the data for ten years. NAV-approved e-cash registers may be put into service from July 2025, in two forms: a cloud-based register, in practice an app on a smartphone, and a hardware-based register with a fiscal unit keeping a continuous data link to NAV. Receipts are issued electronically, with a simple printer for paper copies when a customer asks for one.

Businesses currently obliged to use an online cash register may, from July 2025, either keep using it or switch to a hardware-based e-cash register. To allow a smooth transition, online cash registers may be used until 1 July 2028. Compared with online registers, e-cash registers need servicing only on the operator’s request rather than once a year, and their users are released from the duty to retain receipt copies. NAV announced it would provide a free e-cash register app.

What it means

The decree is in force, and the 1 July 2028 end date for online cash registers is the deadline that matters: any business still running one should plan the replacement before then. A separate obligation, to report receipt data to NAV for handwritten and computer-generated receipts, applies from 1 September 2026 (Hungary requires receipt-level data reporting to NAV). Businesses still issuing receipts from pads should weigh a cloud-based e-cash register, which NAV promoted as the replacement for the receipt pad, against setting up that reporting.