The urencriterium is the hours test the Belastingdienst (the Dutch tax authority) applies before it grants the biggest deductions for the self-employed. Reach 1225 hours in the calendar year and you qualify; fall short and the deductions are gone, however good the year was. This guide explains which hours count, what the criterion unlocks in 2026 and how to keep a record that holds up.
Time tracking (urenregistratie) is part of Pro: 30 days free, then €9.99 excl. VAT per month. Invoicing stays free.
To be treated as an entrepreneur for income tax - not just someone with some side income - you must spend at least 1225 hours per calendar year on your business. The threshold is per business, not per person: if you run two businesses, you cannot add their hours together. It applies to a zzp'er (a self-employed professional without staff) and to the owner of an eenmanszaak (sole proprietorship) alike; your KVK registration alone does not settle it.
Spread over 46 working weeks, 1225 hours is about 27 hours a week. That sounds like a lot until you count what actually goes in - see the next section. Note that the threshold is a fixed number of hours, not a fraction of the year: starting your business in July does not halve it.
All time spent on or for the business counts, not just the hours you invoice:
What does not count is time that has nothing to do with the business, and time that is not actually spent. Being "available" on a quiet day is not working. Keep the record honest: the Belastingdienst looks at whether the hours are plausible against your turnover, your invoices and your calendar.
There is a second condition: more than 50% of your total working time must go into your business. That rarely matters for a full-time freelancer, but it matters a lot if you combine a business with a job. Thirty hours a week employed plus twenty-five hours in your business gets you past 1225 hours a year - and fails the 50% test.
Starters are exempt from the 50% rule. You count as a starter in your first five years as an entrepreneur. For starters the only test is the 1225 hours, which is one reason the first years are the easiest to qualify in.
The urencriterium is the gate to the ondernemersaftrek, the set of entrepreneur deductions. The two that depend on hours:
Separate from the hours is the mkb-winstvrijstelling (SME profit exemption): 12.7% of your profit after the ondernemersaftrek is exempt from tax. It does not require 1225 hours - every entrepreneur gets it. Amounts change every year and the trend is downward, so check the current figures on belastingdienst.nl or with your accountant before you file.
Profit for 2026: €40,000. You meet the hours criterion and it is your second year, so you take the zelfstandigenaftrek (€1,200) and the startersaftrek (€2,123): €3,323 in total.
€40,000 − €3,323 = €36,677.
mkb-winstvrijstelling: 12.7% of €36,677 = €4,657.98.
Taxable profit: €36,677 − €4,657.98 = €32,019.02.
Without the hours criterion you would only get the mkb-winstvrijstelling: 12.7% of €40,000 = €5,080, taxable profit €34,920. The hours record is worth about €2,900 of taxable profit here; how much tax that saves depends on your rate - your accountant can tell you exactly.
The law does not prescribe a form for the hours record, but an inspector will ask for it, and the record has to be credible. That comes down to four things:
Keep the record with the rest of your administration for seven years. If your business kilometres are part of the proof, keep the mileage log alongside it - the two records support each other.
ProFaktura's urenregistratie keeps the record per day: you enter the hours with a description and, if you like, the client, and the year's total is always visible - so you know in October whether you are on course for 1225 or need to count the admin hours you skipped. The hours sit in the same app as your invoices, expenses and mileage, which makes the "does it all fit together" question easy to answer. When the Belastingdienst or your accountant asks, you export the record as PDF or CSV; an accountant you have invited to your administration can download it directly, together with the rest of the quarter.
Time tracking is part of Pro, next to the receipt scanner for expenses, the GPS mileage log and the VAT dashboard for the btw-aangifte. Invoicing itself stays free.
A rule of thumb for starters: log every hour from the first week, including the hours you spend setting up the business before the first invoice. Starting late is the most common reason a first-year record falls short, not a lack of work.
No. All hours you spend on the business count: administration, invoicing, acquisition, travel to clients, training and building your website, as well as the hours you invoice. That is why most full-time freelancers reach 1225 comfortably - and why the record has to show more than invoiced hours.
Besides 1225 hours, more than half of your total working time must go into your business. If you also have a job, that can be the harder test. Starters - in their first five years as an entrepreneur - are exempt from the 50% rule and only need the 1225 hours.
€1,200 in 2026. It was €2,470 in 2025 and is planned to drop to €900 in 2027. Starters can add the startersaftrek of €2,123, at most three times in the first five years. Check belastingdienst.nl for the current amounts before you file.
No. The mkb-winstvrijstelling exempts 12.7% of your profit after the ondernemersaftrek and applies to every entrepreneur regardless of hours. Only the zelfstandigenaftrek and the startersaftrek depend on the hours criterion.
There is no prescribed form, but it has to be credible: kept as you go, per day, with the activity and where relevant the client, and consistent with your invoices and calendar. A total written down in January for the previous year does not convince anyone. ProFaktura keeps the record per day and exports it as PDF or CSV.
Read next: deductible business expenses · mileage log for the Netherlands · VAT return step by step