In short
When public buyers in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany award on the best price-quality ratio, price carries a median weight of 35% in the Netherlands and 50% in Belgium and Germany. That is the result of TenderRender's analysis of almost 85,000 contract notices with award criteria published on TED in 2025. Lowest price alone decides 18% of Dutch notices, 33% of Belgian and 64% of German ones. The most common price weighting is 30% in the Netherlands and 50% in Belgium and Germany.
This article is for US companies and other English-speaking proposal teams that bid, or plan to bid, on public contracts in the Netherlands (NL), Belgium (BE) and Germany (DE). In Europe a solicitation is published as a contract notice, and the evaluation factors are called award criteria. It shows how heavily each country weights price, by sector, which weightings buyers pick and which quality criteria they name. It ends with what this means for your bids and what we could not measure.
Where these figures come from
Our earlier analysis, public procurement in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany in numbers, used contract award notices. Those only say whether a contract went on lowest price or on the best price-quality ratio. They do not say how much price counted.
Contract notices, published before the tender, say more. Since the switch to eForms at the end of 2023, every EU-wide contract notice lists the award criteria per lot: the type (price, cost or quality), the name and the weight. We downloaded every contract notice published in 2025 by buyers in the three countries through the TED search API and read these fields. EU institutions and agencies are excluded.
| 2025 contract notices | Netherlands | Belgium | Germany |
|---|---|---|---|
| Contract notices | 10,212 | 12,288 | 86,001 |
| With award criteria in the notice | 8,224 (81%) | 8,103 (66%) | 68,352 (79%) |
| Price or cost only | 17.7% | 32.7% | 63.6% |
| Price and quality, weighted in points or % | 67.3% | 53.5% | 29.9% |
| Price and quality, weights blank or zero | 9.3% | 12.3% | 5.7% |
| Price without a points weight | 5.0% | 0.2% | 0.3% |
| No price criterion (e.g. fixed price) | 0.6% | 1.2% | 0.4% |
The price-only shares match the award notices of earlier years closely: 19.9% (NL), 31.7% (BE) and 67.2% (DE) of lots in 2019–2023. The new fields are filled in reliably.
How much does price weigh in a best price-quality award?
For notices with quality criteria and weights in points or percentages, we calculated the share of all points that goes to price and cost.
| Price weighting, best price-quality ratio (2025) | Netherlands | Belgium | Germany |
|---|---|---|---|
| Notices with measurable weights | 5,536 | 4,338 | 20,467 |
| Median price weight | 35% | 50% | 50% |
| Middle half (25th–75th percentile) | 30–50% | 40–65% | 30–60% |
| Price weighs 30% or less | 45.9% | 11.0% | 27.8% |
| Price weighs 31–50% | 39.7% | 42.2% | 37.5% |
| Price weighs more than 50% | 14.4% | 46.9% | 34.8% |
| Most common price weight | 30% | 50% | 50% |
| Second most common | 40% | 60% | 30% |
Almost half of Dutch quality-based notices give price 30% or less. In Belgium nearly half give price more than 50%, so price outweighs all quality criteria together. Germany is the most spread out: price-only for most contracts, but when quality counts, a wide range from 30% to 60%.
Two checks on the German figure: notices with a single lot have a median price weight of 40%, not 50%. Multi-lot notices, common in construction and supplies, weight price more heavily. For the Netherlands and Belgium the single-lot median is the same as the overall one.
By sector
Sectors follow the main CPV code of the notice: construction is CPV 45, IT is CPV 48 and 72, and the rest follows the contract type.
Price only (share of notices with award criteria)
| Sector (2025) | Netherlands | Belgium | Germany |
|---|---|---|---|
| Construction (CPV 45) | 24.2% | 68.7% | 95.1% |
| IT (CPV 48 and 72) | 6.7% | 22.9% | 40.6% |
| Other services | 20.3% | 30.7% | 34.2% |
| Other supplies | 14.9% | 21.9% | 55.8% |
Median price weight when quality also counts
| Sector (2025) | Netherlands | Belgium | Germany |
|---|---|---|---|
| Construction (CPV 45) | 50% | 65% | 70% |
| IT (CPV 48 and 72) | 30% | 40% | 50% |
| Other services | 33% | 50% | 40% |
| Other supplies | 40% | 50% | 50% |
The pattern is the same in every sector: the Netherlands weights price least, then Belgium, then Germany. The gap is widest in construction. A Dutch construction notice goes on price alone in a quarter of cases; a German one in 95%.
Dutch IT stands out at the other end. Only 7% of Dutch IT notices are price-only, and 70% of the rest give price 30% or less.
One Dutch detail: in 26% of Dutch construction notices the quality criteria are listed with weight zero, and in another 7% price has a weight of 0 or 1 while quality has points. This points to methods where quality is converted into a money value, such as a notional discount ("fictieve korting") or "gunnen op waarde" (awarding on value), a name that appears in the criteria. The actual method is then only in the tender documents.
Which quality criteria are named?
Many notices give the quality criterion a generic name such as "Kwaliteit" or "Qualität". Where a theme can be read from the name, these are the most common (share of notices with named quality criteria):
| Theme in the criterion name | Netherlands | Germany |
|---|---|---|
| Approach, method, concept, project organization | 19.1% | 30.6% |
| Team, staff, qualifications, experience, references | 5.0% | 22.8% |
| Sustainability, CO2, environment | 15.7% | 4.8% |
| Presentation, demo, interview, test | 9.3% | 5.4% |
| Implementation or transition | 8.8% | 0.3% |
| Technical merit, functionality, requirements | 4.6% | 10.9% |
| Service, maintenance, SLA, warranty | 6.8% | 4.3% |
| Delivery time, schedule | 2.9% | 3.6% |
| Social return | 2.8% | 0.3% |
| Generic name only | 56.9% | 47.8% |
| Notices with named quality criteria | 6,725 | 21,476 |
Two differences stand out. Dutch buyers name sustainability three times as often as German buyers. German buyers name the project team and its experience more than four times as often; German law (VgV section 58) explicitly allows the organization, qualifications and experience of the staff as an award criterion. Belgium is missing from this table because Belgian notices rarely name their criteria: only about 200 of more than 5,800 Belgian notices with quality criteria did.
The keyword matching undercounts: a criterion called "Quality" may cover a method statement in the documents.
What this means for your bids
Read the weighting before you decide to bid. The same service can be decided with 30% price in Utrecht and 60% in Antwerp or Munich. With price at 30%, a higher-priced bid can still win on quality. With price at 70%, it rarely does. Our bid/no-bid guide shows how to put this into a decision.
In the Netherlands, invest in the quality sections. Method statements, sustainability and presentations together outweigh price in most Dutch tenders. Read win government bids on quality, not only on price.
In Belgium and German construction, price first. With a median price weight of 50% to 70%, your price has to be close before quality can make the difference.
In Germany, prepare your team pages. The project team, CVs and references are named in almost a quarter of German notices with named quality criteria.
Expect sub-criteria behind "Quality". A single criterion in the notice usually hides several sub-criteria with their own points in the documents.
TenderRender extracts the award criteria and their weighting from the tender documents, with a source reference to the page they come from, in Dutch, German or French documents. The review step then scores your text per (sub)criterion, with weaknesses ranked by severity and a concrete suggestion for each. The score is a guide, not a prediction of the evaluation panel.
What we could not measure
- Weights only in the tender documents. 19% (NL), 34% (BE) and 21% (DE) of notices list no award criteria, and a further 6–12% list them with blank or zero weights. EU law still requires the weighting in the procurement documents (Directive 2014/24/EU, Article 67(5)).
- Scoring formulas. How price points are calculated, and notional-discount methods, are not in the notice. They can change the real effect of price a lot.
- Lots with different criteria. A notice with several lots counts once, with all its criteria pooled.
- Contracts below the EU thresholds. These are mostly published only on national portals.
- Effect on outcomes. These fields do not tell us whether a lower price weight attracts more bidders or different winners.
About these figures
- Source: TED (Tenders Electronic Daily, ted.europa.eu), retrieved through the TED search API (api.ted.europa.eu) on October 15, 2026. Analysis by TenderRender.
- Selection: contract notices (eForms type "cn-standard") published in 2025 by buyers based in the Netherlands, Belgium or Germany. EU institutions and agencies are excluded with the same name filter as in our other data articles.
- Unit: one notice (TED publication number).
- Price weight: points for price and cost divided by all points, only where weights are given in points or percentages. Ranges and order-of-importance rankings are excluded from the median.
- Themes: keywords in the criterion name, not checked notice by notice.
- Comparison with awards: price-only shares for 2019–2023 come from our earlier analysis of TED contract award notices (shares of lots).
Frequently asked questions
How much does price weigh in Dutch, Belgian and German tenders?
In 2025 contract notices awarded on best price-quality ratio, the median price weight was 35% in the Netherlands and 50% in Belgium and Germany.
How often is a contract awarded on lowest price alone?
In 17.7% of Dutch, 32.7% of Belgian and 63.6% of German contract notices with award criteria in 2025. In German construction the share is 95.1%.
What is the most common price-quality split?
30/70 in the Netherlands, used in a quarter of Dutch quality-based notices. In Belgium and Germany it is 50/50.
Which quality criteria are most common?
The approach or method statement in both the Netherlands (19.1% of notices with named criteria) and Germany (30.6%). Dutch buyers often add sustainability (15.7%); German buyers often score the project team and its experience (22.8%).
Where do I find the weighting of a tender?
Usually in the contract notice, under the award criteria for each lot. If it is missing or set to zero, it must be in the procurement documents.
Is a European price-quality award like US best value?
The idea is similar: the buyer weighs price against non-price factors. The difference is that in EU tenders the weighting is usually stated as fixed points or percentages in the notice or documents, so you can see in advance how much price counts.
Further reading
- Public procurement in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany in numbers (2026)
- Win government bids on quality, not only on price
- Review and score government bids with AI before submission
- Bid/No-Bid decision: criteria, scoring template and software
Sources
- TED, Tenders Electronic Daily: https://ted.europa.eu
- TED Search API: https://api.ted.europa.eu
- Directive 2014/24/EU, Article 67: https://eur-lex.europa.eu/legal-content/EN/TXT/?uri=CELEX:32014L0024
- Netherlands, Aanbestedingswet 2012, Article 2.114: https://wetten.overheid.nl/BWBR0032203/
- Germany, Vergabeverordnung (VgV), section 58: https://www.gesetze-im-internet.de/vgv_2016/__58.html
