dpa | Despite the renewed price increase from 58 to 63 euros per month Germany ticket For nationwide public transport at the start of the year, most customers remained loyal to the subscription. “We are clearly not seeing a wave of cancellations this year due to the price increase for the Deutschlandticket,” said the President of the Association of German Transport Companies (VDV), Ingo Wortmann.
The churn rate between December and January was around 5.75 percent. This is a normal value at the turn of the year. The price increase the year before was around eight percent.
According to the VDV, around 14.6 million people are currently using the subscription, which allows travel on regional and local public transport buses and trains nationwide. That’s almost a million more subscribers than at the same time last year.
But VDV President Wortmann still sees potential. “If we really want to get people out of their cars, we are talking in the order of over 20 million Germany tickets,” he emphasized. There is still a lot of room for improvement, especially when it comes to job tickets, where employers support subscriptions.
Years of strife
The Deutschlandticket was introduced in May 2023. The federal and state governments argued over financing for years. The subscription, which originally started at a monthly price of 49 euros, has cost 63 euros since January. The price should be from 2027 be determined based on an index that reflects personnel and energy costs and general cost increases. The “political pricing” that caused a lot of controversy should end like this.
According to the VDV, a total of around 9.86 billion passengers traveled on local public transport nationwide last year. This is a slight increase of 0.8 percent compared to the previous year. However, demand is still below the level of the years before the pandemic. In the record year of 2019, the industry had 10.4 billion customers.
While the passenger income of the transport companies, especially after the Introduction of the Deutschlandticket declined, costs rose significantly in recent years. According to preliminary figures, the price of electricity alone increased by more than 40 percent between 2020 and 2025, the VDV said. The price of diesel rose even more, at almost 43 percent. Personnel costs increased by around 19 percent in the same period.
Wortmann warned of reduced offers in the associations as a result of economic pressure. “We are in the process of implementing efficiency projects in the companies, but at some point we will have to respond with cuts in offers,” said the President. “Especially when we don’t get enough money from public budgets.”