Can Zapier create ZUGFeRD invoices?

Yes. The ZUGFeRD & XRechnung by InvoiceXML app adds a Create ZUGFeRD Invoice action to any Zap: map your trigger's fields (a new row, a paid order, a CRM deal) to the invoice fields, and the action returns a validated ZUGFeRD PDF/A-3b that downstream steps can email, store in Drive or Dropbox, or attach to a record.

Which Zapier app handles XRechnung and the Leitweg-ID?

ZUGFeRD & XRechnung by InvoiceXML. Its Create XRechnung Invoice action produces XRechnung-compliant CII XML and takes the buyer's Leitweg-ID as an input field; German public buyers assign that identifier during onboarding, so store it on the customer record your trigger reads from. The app also validates XRechnung files and renders them as readable PDFs for approvals.

Do I need to write any code to use the InvoiceXML Zapier apps?

No. Every operation is a standard Zapier action with mapped fields: pick a trigger, add the InvoiceXML action, map columns or record fields to invoice fields, and connect your API key once as a Zapier connection. The compliance machinery (EN 16931 rules, KoSIT and FeRD artifacts, PDF/A-3 conformance) runs server-side on every call.

How is usage billed when actions run inside Zaps?

Each action run makes one API call and uses credits from your InvoiceXML account, exactly as a direct API call would. A new account starts with a 30-day free trial including 100 credits and no credit card, which is enough to build and test a complete Zap before choosing a plan. Zapier's own task pricing applies separately, as with any Zapier app.

Can Zapier read incoming e-invoices into my tools?

Yes. All three apps include an Extract Invoice JSON action: feed it a file from an email-attachment trigger and it returns structured invoice fields, reading the embedded XML of hybrids and standalone XML deterministically, with AI extraction as the fallback for plain PDFs. Map the output to new rows, records, or accounting entries; for AI-extracted documents, review before posting.

Do the three apps share one account and API?

Yes. They are format-scoped front ends on the same InvoiceXML REST API, so one account and one API key connect all three, credits draw from the same balance, and documents produced in a Zap are identical to documents produced by a direct API call, validated against the current official rule sets on every run.

ZUGFeRD, Factur-X & UBL in Zapier: No-Code E-Invoicing

A lot of real invoicing automation lives in Zapier, and none of it wants to move because a mandate arrived. Since January 2025 every German business must accept structured e-invoices and issuance becomes mandatory from 2027; France switches on in September; Belgium already runs on Peppol. The documents these regimes want (ZUGFeRD and Factur-X hybrids, XRechnung XML, UBL) are not something a PDF-generation step produces, and until now closing that gap meant leaving the no-code world.

It no longer does. InvoiceXML ships three apps on Zapier, deliberately split by format so a German team, a French team, and a Peppol integrator each install a small, focused set of actions rather than one sprawling app. All three are front ends on the same API: one account, one API key connection, one credit balance, and every document validated against the current official rule sets server-side.

Which app do you need?

You invoice	Install	Formats covered
German businesses or German public buyers	ZUGFeRD & XRechnung by InvoiceXML	ZUGFeRD PDF/A-3b, XRechnung CII XML
French customers (September 2026 mandate)	Factur-X by InvoiceXML	Factur-X PDF/A-3, CII and UBL conversion
Across Peppol, or you work at the syntax level	CII & UBL by InvoiceXML	CII XML, UBL 2.1 XML, both directions

Installing two or all three is perfectly normal for teams invoicing across borders; the connection and credits are shared. Search for "invoicexml" in the Zapier action picker and all three appear.

ZUGFeRD & XRechnung by InvoiceXML

The German-mandate app, covering both halves of the market: ZUGFeRD for B2B, XRechnung for public buyers.

Action	What it does
Create ZUGFeRD Invoice	Builds a validated ZUGFeRD PDF/A-3b from mapped invoice fields
Create XRechnung Invoice	Builds XRechnung-compliant CII XML, Leitweg-ID as an input field
Validate ZUGFeRD Invoice	Checks a PDF's embedded XML against ZUGFeRD / EN 16931
Validate XRechnung Invoice	Checks CII XML against the XRechnung and EN 16931 rules
Extract Invoice JSON / XML	Reads a received invoice into structured fields or standalone XML
Convert XRechnung to PDF	Renders XRechnung XML as a human-readable PDF for approvals
Transform to ZUGFeRD / XRechnung	AI-converts a plain PDF; review the output before submitting, as the action's own description advises

A worked Zap: new or updated row in Google Sheets (status "Ready") → Create ZUGFeRD Invoice, mapping the buyer, date, currency, and line columns → Gmail: send the returned PDF/A-3b to the customer → Google Drive: file the same attachment in the archive folder → Sheets: write "Issued" back to the status column. Five steps, and the compliance-relevant one is the single InvoiceXML action; everything else is plumbing you already know. For public-sector customers the same Zap swaps in Create XRechnung Invoice and maps a Leitweg-ID column (keep it as text; the identifier's leading zeros and dashes do not survive number formatting).

Validation failures behave the way automation wants: the action errors with the violated rules named in plain language, Zapier surfaces it in the Zap history, and the message says which field to fix. Retrying unchanged data reproduces the error, so there is nothing to babysit.

Factur-X by InvoiceXML

The French-mandate app, and the broadest of the three, because French flows often start from existing artifacts rather than raw data:

Action	What it does
Create Factur-X Invoice	Builds a ready-to-deliver Factur-X PDF/A-3b from mapped fields
Validate Factur-X Invoice	Schema, conformance level, and rule-level findings
Embed XML Into PDF (Factur-X)	Your visual PDF plus your CII XML in, a conformant hybrid out
Convert CII XML / UBL XML to Factur-X	Wraps existing XML in a compliant hybrid with a rendered visual
Convert Factur-X PDF to CII / UBL	Unwraps a hybrid back to standalone XML, either syntax
Extract Invoice JSON / XML	Received invoices into structured fields
Render CII as PDF	A readable visual from bare CII XML

A worked Zap: new paid invoice in your billing tool (Stripe, HubSpot, a webhook from your own app) → Create Factur-X Invoice → email to the customer and archive to Dropbox. And for teams whose billing system already renders a branded PDF, the Embed XML Into PDF action is the interesting one: it takes that PDF plus CII XML and produces the conformant hybrid without discarding your layout, the same last-mile step covered in depth in the embed-endpoint guide.

CII & UBL by InvoiceXML

The syntax-level app, for Peppol work and for anyone bridging the two EN 16931 syntaxes:

Action	What it does
Create CII Invoice / Create UBL Invoice	Standards-compliant XML from mapped billing fields
Convert CII to UBL / UBL to CII	Lossless translation between the two syntaxes
Validate CII Invoice / Validate UBL Invoice	EN 16931 rules plus schema, with a structured report
Extract Invoice JSON	Received XML or hybrids into structured fields
Transform PDF to CII / UBL	AI-reads a plain PDF into XML; review before sending, per the action's description

A worked Zap: a partner system delivers CII by email → Convert CII to UBL → Validate UBL Invoice as a gate → deliver the UBL onward to the system that expects it, with failures routed to a Slack alert instead of a partner mailbox. Conversion plus a validation gate in the same Zap is the pattern worth copying: documents that cross a format boundary get checked on the far side before anyone downstream sees them.

Reading received e-invoices

Reception is the half of the German mandate that is already live for everyone, and it is where Zapier's trigger ecosystem earns its keep. All three apps expose Extract Invoice JSON, so the intake pipeline is one shape regardless of format: new attachment in Gmail or Outlook → Extract Invoice JSON → create a row in Sheets or Airtable, a bill in your accounting tool, or a record in your ERP's Zapier app.

The action reads deterministically when structure exists (the embedded XML of a ZUGFeRD or Factur-X hybrid, or standalone XRechnung, CII, or UBL) and falls back to AI extraction for the suppliers still sending plain PDFs. Treat the two accordingly: structured reads carry exactly what the supplier declared, while AI-extracted results deserve a review step (a filter on the mapped fields, or a human-in-the-loop path) before anything posts to your books.

How credits work in Zaps

Pricing is the same as calling the API directly: each action run is one API call and uses credits from your InvoiceXML balance. The 30-day free trial includes 100 credits with no credit card, enough to build and test a complete Zap end to end before committing to a plan, and the connection is a single API key pasted once into Zapier's connection dialog. Zapier's own task pricing applies on its side, as with any app in a Zap.

Zapier or the API directly?

Both are the same service, so this is a question about your team rather than about capability. If the people who own invoicing automation live in Zapier, the apps are the right interface: triggers from 8,000+ tools, field mapping instead of JSON, Zap history as your audit trail. If an engineering team owns it, the REST API gives them the full surface in their own stack, and the language guides (Node.js, Python, C#, PHP) cover that route.

Either way the part that matters behaves identically: formats and rule sets move on regulators' calendars, and both interfaces are current with every FeRD, KoSIT, and FNFE-MPE release on its effective date, with nothing for you to monitor, update, or redeploy. A Zap built today does not age when XRechnung revs; the action just keeps producing the current version.

Get started

Pick the app for your market from the table at the top, create a free InvoiceXML account → (100 free credits with the 30-day trial, no credit card), paste the API key into the Zapier connection, and your first test Zap can produce a validated e-invoice in the next ten minutes.

Related resources:

InvoiceXML is a REST API for European e-invoice compliance covering ZUGFeRD, XRechnung, Factur-X, Peppol UBL, and CII, available directly or through three format-scoped apps on Zapier. Stateless processing, GDPR compliant by architecture, and the current official rule sets applied on every call.

E-Invoicing in Zapier: Three InvoiceXML Apps for ZUGFeRD, XRechnung, Factur-X, CII and UBL