What Estonia's quarterly tax, turnover and employee data shows
Last updated 2026-09-20
The Estonian Tax and Customs Board (Maksu- ja Tolliamet, EMTA) publishes figures for each company every quarter: the taxes it paid, its turnover and its number of employees. The figures come faster than annual reports, so they show what a company has done since its last report.
What EMTA publishes
For every company and every quarter the file has four figures.
- State taxes (riiklikud maksud). The state taxes the company paid in the quarter.
- Labour taxes (tööjõumaksud). The taxes tied to employment, paid by the company in the quarter.
- Turnover (käive). The turnover the company declared to EMTA for the quarter.
- Number of employees (töötajate arv). The employees reported for the quarter.
The board updates the files after each quarter, in the following month, and each row carries an as-of date. The latest quarter in this site's data is2026 Q2, in a file the board last changed on 10 July 2026. Company pages show the quarters back to 2022. Quarters that the board has not published yet are left out, not shown as zero.
How it differs from the annual report
| Annual report | EMTA quarterly data | |
|---|---|---|
| Period | The company's financial year | Calendar quarters |
| Source | Accounts filed with the register | Tax declarations |
| Revenue | Müügitulu | Käive, as declared |
| Headcount | Average FTE over the year | Employees reported for the quarter |
| Delay | Up to six months after the year-end, plus processing | About one month after the quarter |
Why turnover and revenue differ
The company page puts the two side by side. You will rarely see them match, and a gap is not by itself a sign of an error. Several ordinary reasons cause it.
- The periods differ. Four calendar quarters and a financial year from July to June cover different months.
- Tax returns and accounts count some items differently. Sales made abroad, exempt sales and one-off items are examples.
- The annual report can cover a year that the quarterly file does not yet include, or the reverse.
A gap that is large and stays large across several years deserves a question to the company. A single year with a gap, next to a change in the financial year, does not.
Headcount in two versions
The annual report gives the average number of full-time equivalents. EMTA gives the number of employees reported for each quarter, which is a head count and not a full-time equivalent. For a company with many part-time staff the quarterly number is normally higher than the FTE figure. Each is correct for what it measures. The last paragraph of each company's "About this data" section states the two figures side by side.
Three ways to use the quarterly figures
- Check that the company is still trading. A company with taxes paid and turnover in the latest quarter is active. A run of empty quarters after busy ones needs an explanation.
- See a trend before the next annual report. Compare the last four quarters with the four before them. Seasonal businesses need this year-on-year comparison, since a comparison with the previous quarter mixes seasons.
- Check that taxes are being paid. Taxes paid each quarter, in proportion to the headcount and the turnover, point to a company that meets its obligations. The figures show what was paid. They do not show what is owed.
Rankings from the quarterly data
The site ranks the companies by state taxes paid, quarter by quarter. Start atthe rankings page and pick a quarter. A ranking of taxes paid measures the size of the payments. It is not a ranking of profit, and a company that paid a large one-off amount in one quarter can rank high for that quarter only.
What the data leaves out
- Sole proprietors. The tax board's file lists them by name. This site removes those rows and publishes legal persons only.
- Tax arrears. The tax board publishes a list of companies with tax debts. This site does not use it, since a debt can be settled within days and an old entry would misstate the current position.
- Amounts owed, refunds and payment dates within the quarter.
The licence of this file is not stated by the board. It describes the data as open. Thedata sources page records how the site handles that.