Reporting period:
This section provides statistics on the implementation of Single Market directives and considers all transposition notifications made by 5 December 2025 for directives with a transposition deadline on or before 30 November 2025. As many as 1 022 Single Market directives* were in force on that date. All comparisons are with the figures for 5 December 2024, the previous reporting date.
* This figure includes 5 regulations that require transposition measures. For the sake of simplicity, the term “directives” is used.
Transposition and the Single Market – why does it matter?
Single Market legislation can only achieve its intended effects if all the obligations under the relevant directives are implemented in Member States’ national law on time (within the set deadlines), completely and correctly.
The European Commission's infringement action tackles late or wrong transposition, but also instances of bad application, when there is a systemic breach of EU law. Infringement proceedings start when the Commission sends a letter of formal notice to the Member State concerned. However, only the Court of Justice of the European Union can rule definitively that a breach of EU law has occurred.
Monitoring transposition helps make the Single Market work by ensuring that Member States implement its rules properly.
This monitoring shows the transposition deficit (the gap between the number of Single Market directives adopted by the EU and the number of those transposed by each Member State) and the conformity deficit (the percentage of those directives incorrectly transposed). It also highlights what Member States are doing to ensure that Single Market law is implemented correctly and, by doing so, encourages them to improve their performance.
Recent developments
On 11 February 2025, the Commission adopted the Communication on implementation and simplification, A simpler and faster Europe, outlining that simplification must go hand in hand with stronger implementation of EU law. This includes closer cooperation with Member States to ensure correct and timely transposition through implementation strategies for major legal acts, more detailed explanations provided to Member States and common transposition roadmaps, better administrative capacity and use of digital tools, clearer guidance for authorities and stakeholders, and systematic feedback from businesses and citizens through implementation dialogues. Where voluntary compliance fails, the Commission relies on infringement procedures to guarantee proper and uniform implementation and enforcement across the Single Market, as highlighted by the Single Market Strategy.
Building on this, the Commission issued the 2025 Overview Report on Simplification, Implementation and Enforcement on 21 October 2025. The report summarises the main results of the Commission’s work across the 3 key components of the new drive to achieve a simpler and faster Europe.
Additionally, each member of the body of Commissioners has prepared an Annual Progress Report on Simplification, Implementation, and Enforcement under their portfolio, for the period from 1 January to 31 July 2025. These reports inform on the adoption of key initiatives, the results of stress tests and reality checks, implementation dialogues, and enforcement actions. They also showcase key achievements and identify challenges that hinder effective implementation.
More about Simplification and implementation.
Key messages
- On transposing Single Market directives (all indicators combined), 18 Member States have an average or above-average performance (same as last year). 6 Member States have improved on their December 2024 overall performance, but the situation has deteriorated for 4 others. Overall, the situation has improved, in comparison to the previous year (11 green cards against 6 last year).
- The Single Market transposition deficit has started to rise again (1.1%, up from 0.8% last year), with only half of the Member States in line with the European Council’s target to not exceed 1%. At 1.1%, the Single Market conformity deficit mirrored the trend in the transposition deficit.
- 9 Member States (Bulgaria, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Hungary, the Netherlands, Austria and Poland) combine both a high transposition deficit and a high conformity deficit.
- Transposition delays of Single Market directives decreased in most Member States. Outstanding directives are now 9.7 months late on average (down from 11.9 months a year ago). This decrease is due to Member States reducing the number of their long-overdue directives, combined with a significant number of directives with transposition dates close to the end of the reporting period (resulting in shorter delays for those directives).
- The indicative target to either close cases on non-communication of transposition measures or refer them to the Court of Justice is 12 months. In December 2025, the average duration of non-communication cases related to Single Market directives was 15.2 months. When Member States fail to ensure timely notifications, the Commission launches infringement proceedings as soon as possible. However, once the transposition is complete, the infringement case should be closed promptly.
- 51 out of the 1 022 Single Market directives due to be transposed by 30 November 2025 have not been transposed in at least one Member State. This means that the Single Market’s legal framework runs at 95% of its potential.
Overall performance
Map legend
A Member State’s performance across all transposition indicators is calculated by scoring each of the 6 indicators listed in the Performance indicators table below as follows:
RED = -1, YELLOW = 0 and GREEN = +1.
The colours on the map represent the sum of these scores:
- green: 2 or higher = above average
- yellow: -1, 0 or 1 = average
- red: -2 or lower = below average
- The results are better than last year. 6 Member States managed to improve their overall performance (Ireland, Greece, Croatia, Italy, Slovakia and Sweden) against 4 in 2024, and the situation deteriorated for only 4 of them (against 11 in 2024).
- There are 11 green cards, against 6 last year (while the number of red cards remains stable, at 9). Greece, Croatia and Slovakia have significantly improved their situation, moving up from below-average performance last year to above-average performance this year.
- All Member States with a green card met the 1% Single Market transposition deficit target set at the March 2007 European Council. They also had an average or above-average Single Market conformity deficit.
- Conversely, the 9 Member States that received red cards had a Single Market transposition deficit above the 1% threshold. Regarding the Single Market conformity deficit, 7 out of these 9 Member States performed worse than the 1.1% EU average (except Latvia and Luxembourg).
Performance indicators
| Indicator values | green | yellow | red |
|---|---|---|---|
| [1] Single Market transposition deficit → Target set at the European Council, Brussels 8-9 March 2007 | ≤ 1% | / | > 1% |
| [2] Change over the last 12 months (change in the number of outstanding Single Market directives) | decrease | no change | increase |
| [3] Number of long-overdue Single Market directives (2 years or more) → Target set at the European Council, Barcelona 15-16 March 2002 | 0 | / | > 0 |
| [4] Transposition delay for overdue Single Market directives (in months) [5] Single Market conformity deficit | < average -10% | average ±10% | > average +10% |
| [6] Duration of infringement proceedings for late transposition of Single Market directives (in months) | ≤ 12 months | > 12 months ≤ 18 months | > 18 months |
This table combines the most relevant indicators to provide a better overview of Member States' compliance in transposing the Single Market directives. The table shows that a good result on the transposition deficit – which is seen as a key indicator – does not necessarily reflect the overall performance. This year, this is particularly the case for Czechia and Denmark, which have a good transposition deficit but whose performance is average or below the EU average for most other indicators.
Indicator [1]: Single Market transposition deficit
The transposition deficit is the percentage of Single Market directives not yet completely notified to the Commission out of the total number of directives that should have been notified by the deadline. The European Council of March 2007 set a 1% target . Both the Single Market Act adopted in April 2011 and the March 2023 Communication The Single Market at 30 revised that target, reducing it to 0.5%.
The average EU transposition deficit of Single Market directives is rising again and has reached 1.1%. It has returned to its December 2022 level, during the post-COVID-19 period (see also “Changes in the average transposition deficit” chart in the Trends section).
Detailed comments
- Only 13 Member States are in line with the 1% target, compared to 22 last year. 9 Member States that met the target last year now exceed it. Some of them are even seeing a worrying rise: Italy (160%), France and Hungary (120%), Portugal (100%) and Belgium (70%). These significant increases are also found among the Member States that met the target: Sweden (125%), Greece and Lithuania (100%), Ireland (75%).
- The goal is that Member States transpose all Single Market directives by the agreed deadlines. Transposition is an ongoing process and any let-up can result in a quick rise in the deficit. As anticipated last year, most of the Member States that were close to reaching the 1% threshold have now exceeded it. This has affected the average deficit, which increased from 0.8% to 1.1%.
Indicator [2]: Change over the last 12 months
The Single Market transposition deficit is of concern and due to the fact that almost all Member States have a larger backlog than last year.
Detailed comments
- Compared to a year ago, only 4 Member States reduced or equalled their number of outstanding Single Market directives (down from 13), while the number rose in 23 Member States (up from 14). An average of 3 directives was added to the backlog in 2025 (against an average of 1 directive added in 2024).
- Slovakia reversed the negative trend of the previous year and reduced its number of outstanding Single Market directives. Bulgaria continued the progress made last year.
- 12 of the 14 Member States that had added to their backlog last year continued along this negative path, in particular Portugal and Spain. Germany added only 1 directive to its backlog but this has been enough to stop it reaching the threshold this year.
Indicator [3]: Long-overdue Single Market directives (2 years or more)
Long transposition delays seriously impair the proper functioning of the Single Market. The longer the delay, the less legal security there is and the more serious the consequences are for people and businesses. This is why the European Council, meeting in Barcelona in March 2002, set a target of “zero-tolerance” for delays of 2 years or more in transposing directives.
Fewer directives and Member States are concerned, compared to last year.
Detailed comments
- 12 Single Market directives with transposition deadlines of 2 years or more have not been fully notified (down from 19 last year) while 12 Member States have such long-overdue directives (down from 18). Currently, 15 Member States meet the zero-tolerance target compared to 9 in December 2024.
- Slovenia deserves a special mention for having met the target for the 4th consecutive year.
- By December 2026, 10 new long-overdue directives may be added to the list of long-overdue Single Market directives for some Member States.
Indicator [4]: Total transposition delays for overdue Single Market directives
Member States could better anticipate difficulties at an early stage of a directive’s transposition. They should already start planning before the directive is formally adopted. Some of the initiatives, such as implementation strategies, transposition roadmaps or detailed explanations, outlined in the Communication on implementation and simplification, A simpler and faster Europe published by the Commission on 11 February 2025 aim to increase and optimise the Commission’s support to Member States in this respect.
Transposition delays of Single Market directives decreased in most Member States. Outstanding directives are now 9.7 months late on average (down from 11.9 months a year ago).
Detailed comments
- 10 Member States saw an increase in their average delay (up from 4 in December 2024). The increase stayed moderate: from 0.3 months for Finland to 3.2 months for France. Only Hungary’s increase is sharper: 8.1 months.
- Greece had the sharpest decrease this year (15.3 months) and is no longer the Member State with the highest average delay.
- The 7 Member States with the biggest decrease in the transposition delay (Ireland, Estonia, Greece, Croatia, Italy, the Netherlands and Poland) have now transposed all the long-overdue Single Market directives that weighed on their average delay last year (or significantly reduced their number).
Indicator [5]: Single Market Conformity deficit (incorrectly transposed directives)
This indicator was set in the April 2011 Single Market Act, with a proposed threshold of 0.5%. The March 2023 Communication The Single Market at 30 confirmed this threshold. It is also one of the agreed key performance indicators (KPIs) identified in the March 2023 Communication Long-term competitiveness of the EU looking beyond 2030 – the indicator is the second one in the “A Functioning Single Market” driver).
NB – Only the Court of Justice can rule definitively that a directive has not been transposed correctly, and the Commission is still working on the conformity assessment of several notified national measures. This should be kept in mind when interpreting the conformity deficit statistics.
The average conformity deficit of Single Market directives mirrored the trend in the transposition deficit and has climbed back above the symbolic 1% threshold.
Detailed comments
- Only 5 Member States reduced their deficit, down from 20 last year. Only 4 of these 5 met the conformity deficit target of 0.5% or less, down from 7 in December 2024.
- 19 Member States (up from 5 last year) saw an increase in their deficit by between 0.1 and 0.6 percentage points. Among them, Spain had its worst ever result, at 1.4%. Hungary is still the Member State with the highest conformity deficit. It is followed by Italy and Poland, which has replaced Austria in the 3 Member States in the bottom of the ranking.
- The number of ongoing infringement cases that need to be resolved has started to rise again (291 cases on 81 different Single Market directives), after a significant decrease in 2024 (192 cases, compared to 253 cases in 2023 and 292 cases in 2022).
- 9 Member States (Bulgaria, Germany, Spain, France, Italy, Hungary, the Netherlands, Austria and Poland) combine a high Single Market transposition deficit with a high percentage of incorrectly transposed Single Market directives. Improving the cooperative mechanisms and procedures supporting Member States should hopefully result in improved compliance.
Indicator [6]: Duration of infringement proceedings for late transposition of Single Market directives
The Commission and the Member States both have the responsibility to speed up the handling of infringement cases. While Member States must ensure timely notifications, if they do not, the Commission launches infringement proceedings without delay. However, once the transposition is complete, the infringement case should be closed promptly.
Although progress is being made on the average duration of non-communication proceedings for Single Market directives, it still exceeds the 12-month indicative target.
Detailed comments
- The average duration of proceedings for the late transposition of Single Market directives at the pre-litigation stage has decreased, from around 18 months in 2023 and 2024 to 15.2 months in 2025. The decrease in average duration is mainly due to the significant number of new proceedings (257) that have been launched since the last reporting period (which is directly linked to the higher number of directives to be transposed during the reporting period).
- The national average durations vary significantly from one Member State to another. 3 Member States met the target (up from 1 last year): Lithuania, Finland and Italy. At the other end of the scale, the duration of Hungarian, Croatian and Austrian cases is now almost double the target.
- The total number of cases open for non-communication of Single Market directives also varies among Member States. The average is 21, ranging from 12 cases for Ireland and Sweden to 36 for Bulgaria.
EEA EFTA countries - Transposition deficit of Single Market directives
Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway are also subject to Single Market rules under the EEA Agreement. They are monitored by the EFTA Surveillance Authority.
However, there is a time lag between the adoption or repeal of a legal act in the EU and its addition to or removal from the EEA Agreement. This means that the body of EU law that applies in Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway may differ from that which is in force in the EU. On 1 December 2025, 819 directives and 4 949 regulations were in force to ensure the functioning of the Single Market in the EEA. This should be considered when comparing the Single Market Scoreboard with the EEA Scoreboard.
Average deficit (all 3 countries): 1.0% (down from 1.3% in December 2024) – all 3 EEA EFTA countries exceed the proposed 0.5% target.
- Iceland: 1.5% (down from 2.1%)
- Norway: 0.7% (down from 1.2%)
- Liechtenstein: 0.7% (up from 0.6%)
Total number of late directives: 24 (down from 32 in December 2024)
- Iceland: 12 (down from 17)
- Norway: 6 (down from 10)
- Liechtenstein: 6 (up from 5)
“Zero-tolerance target”: in total the EEA EFTA countries have 4 directives that have been outstanding for 2 or more years (2 for Norway and 1 each for Iceland and Liechtenstein).
Average delay in transposing directives: 22 months (up from 14 months in December 2024)
- Norway: 34.9 months (up from 16.6 months)
- Iceland: 15 months (down from 15.9 months)
- Liechtenstein: 16 months (up from 9.6 months)
Trends (in the EU)
Changes in the average Single Market transposition deficit
The EU average transposition deficit of Single Market directives has risen back above the 1% target to 1.1%.
- From past Scoreboard results, it appears that Member States may have difficulty in transposing directives by the agreed deadline. Over the last 5 years, the average delay was between 7 and 18 months.
- In particular, the number of directives with recent transposition dates (close to the cut-off date for calculating the transposition deficit) can have a negative impact on the Member States’ overall transposition performance. If we only consider the 7 directives with the most recent transposition dates (within the last 3 months, 1 September 2025 to 30 November 2025), the transposition deficit is 61.9% (compared to the 1.1% average deficit for all directives).
- Tackling this issue is among the main objectives of the Commission’s Communication on implementation and simplification, A simpler and faster Europe, of 11 February 2025.
Changes in the average Single Market conformity deficit
See more information in indicator [5]: Conformity deficit (incorrectly transposed directives)
The number of infringement proceedings for incorrect transposition of Single Market directives launched by the Commission has increased. 92 new cases were launched between 1 December 2024 and 30 November 2025, up from 40 the previous year. Nevertheless, this figure remains significantly lower than the 161 cases launched in 2019.
More new cases combine with fewer closed cases (46 closed between 1 December 2024 and 30 November 2025 against 102 the previous year). This trend is the opposite of last year’s situation and explains the increase in the deficit.
Changes in the Single Market incompleteness rate
The Single Market is incomplete when its rules are not applied or the rights derived from them cannot be exercised uniformly. When one or more Member States fail to transpose directives on time, they leave a void in the EU legal framework. Instead of the Single Market covering all Member States, it remains smaller and fragmented. Consequently, the economic interests of all Member States suffer if just one Member State does not deliver.
51 out of 1 022 Single Market directives due to be transposed by 30 November 2025 have not been transposed in at least one Member State (this was 41 out of 1 000 directives in 2024). This 5% incompleteness rate means that the Single Market’s legal framework is still not operating at its full potential.
Policy areas with highest incompleteness rate
- Energy (including energy efficiency): 47% of directives (7 out of 15) not transposed by all Member States
- Financial information and company law: 14% (3 out of 21)
- Financial services: 13% (10 out of 76)
- Transport: 9% (11 out of 124)
- Social policy: 5% (4 out of 82)
Facts and figures
Single Market directives undergoing completeness checks
The graph below concerns Single Market directives that are the subject of an infringement procedure for non-communication. It shows the number of those directives whose transposition has been declared complete by each Member State and for which the Commission is examining whether the notification process is indeed complete. The outcome will be either a new formal step in the procedure or its closure. Concerning notifications made outside existing infringement proceedings, the verification process may result in the Commission taking the decision to open an infringement case. The directives concerned will then be included in the transposition deficit in the next edition of the Scoreboard.
The Commission is currently examining a very large number of notifications of national measures transposing Single Market directives.
Overdue Single Market directives by sector and Member State
Transposition
This table shows, for each Member State, the total number of Single Market directives not fully notified, broken down by sector, as on 5 December 2025. Sectors in which directives have been fully transposed are included under “Others”. The highlighted figures show the sector(s) with the highest number of overdue directives in each Member State.
(#) = Total number of Single Market directives by sector
| Member State | Connectivity/media /digital society (19) | Consumers and protection of health (41) | Energy incl. energy consumption (15) | Environment (184) | Financial information and company law (21) | Financial services (76) | Free movement of persons & citizenship of Union (14) | Food legislation (47) | Single Market – Principles (2) | Special freedom of movement arrangements (12) | Social policy (82) | Taxation (76) | Transport (124) | Others (309) | TOTAL (316) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Spain | 1 | 2 | 6 | 3 | 2 | 7 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 27 | ||||
| Poland | 1 | 1 | 4 | 4 | 7 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 21 | ||||||
| Portugal | 1 | 5 | 2 | 1 | 6 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 20 | ||||||
| Luxembourg | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 18 | ||||
| Belgium | 1 | 4 | 3 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 17 | ||||||
| Austria | 1 | 1 | 6 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 15 | ||||||
| Netherlands | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 14 | |||||
| Bulgaria | 1 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 2 | 3 | 13 | |||||||
| Estonia | 1 | 1 | 5 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 13 | ||||||||
| Italy | 1 | 4 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 13 | ||||||||
| Latvia | 1 | 6 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 12 | |||||||||
| Germany | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 11 | ||||||||
| France | 1 | 2 | 3 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 11 | ||||||||
| Hungary | 1 | 6 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 11 | ||||||||
| Greece | 1 | 4 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 10 | |||||||||
| Cyprus | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 10 | |||||||
| Romania | 1 | 2 | 1 | 5 | 1 | 10 | |||||||||
| Czechia | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 9 | |||||||
| Croatia | 1 | 4 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 9 | |||||||||
| Sweden | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 9 | ||||||||
| Slovenia | 1 | 3 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 8 | ||||||||
| Ireland | 1 | 1 | 4 | 1 | 7 | ||||||||||
| Lithuania | 1 | 1 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 6 | |||||||||
| Malta | 1 | 3 | 2 | 6 | |||||||||||
| Finland | 1 | 1 | 3 | 1 | 6 | ||||||||||
| Denmark | 1 | 1 | 3 | 5 | |||||||||||
| Slovakia | 1 | 2 | 1 | 1 | 5 |
Problematic sectors for Member States (at least 30% of all cases)
- Financial services – Romania (50%), Lithuania and Poland (33%), Italy (31%), Greece and Portugal (30%)
- Energy – Ireland (57%), Hungary (55%), Latvia, Malta and Finland, (50%), Croatia (44%), Greece, Austria and Slovakia (40%), Estonia and Slovenia (38%), Germany (36%), Sweden (33%), Italy (31%), Cyprus (30%)
- Transport – Denmark (60%)
Clearly, these percentages should be assessed in relation to the total number of overdue directives in each Member State (see “Total” column).
Single Market directives for notification by the next Scoreboard
In addition to today’s transposition deficit, it is also important to look at new directives whose transposition deadline will expire between now and 30 November 2026.
Given the number of directives to be transposed in the coming 12 months and some particularly high backlogs, some Member States, such as Spain, Poland and Portugal, will still miss the 1% target if they do not take decisive and drastic action to speed up the process.