d-you: Germany's State-Run Answer to the EUDI Wallet

On September 9, 2026, Germany's Federal Ministry for Digital Affairs and State Modernization named the country's national EUDI Wallet: d-you, set to launch on January 2, 2027. The name blends "digital," "Deutschland," and "you," reflecting the idea that people hold and control their own data themselves. The logo shows a hand holding a wallet, matching the ministry's own line for the project: it is your data, in your hand.

Use will be free and voluntary. Once installed, the app is meant to store official documents such as a national ID card or driver's license directly on the phone, encrypted locally on the device, so people can present them wherever proof is needed, from a bank counter to an online age check to a government portal. Around 40 partners from business, research, and public administration plan to roll out their own services on top of the wallet right from launch, though the ministry expects only a handful of core features to be ready at the start, with more added over time.

d-you follows the EU's eIDAS 2.0 regulation, in force since 2024, which requires every member state to offer citizens a digital identity wallet. The same day the d-you name was unveiled, the German cabinet also passed the Digitale-Identitätengesetz, the domestic law that puts eIDAS 2.0 into practice and gives the ministry, under Minister Dr. Karsten Wildberger, the authority to build, certify, and run it. The deadlines behind this aren't just aspirational: every member state must offer at least one compliant wallet, and from late 2027 relying parties such as banks will be required to accept it.

What makes the launch notable is a change of course. Starting in 2023, the innovation agency SPRIND funded several independent teams, including Ubique's "Heidi," Lissi, and the wwWallet consortium, to build their own EUDI Wallet prototypes in an open competition, explicitly to avoid one company owning the market. For the actual national rollout, though, the government settled on a single, state-run wallet instead. Private companies can still bring their own certified EUDI Wallets to market, just not until twelve months after d-you goes live.

For organizations issuing digital certificates and badges, d-you does not cover professional credentials yet, its scope at launch is limited to official documents like ID cards and driver's licenses. Virtualbadge.io's Digital Wallet Cards already let recipients add their certificates and badges to Apple Wallet and Google Wallet today, built on open, cryptographically signed formats such as Open Badges and W3C Verifiable Credentials, the same family of standards underpinning eIDAS 2.0. Organizations that move to this kind of verifiable, standards-based issuance now will be better placed once wallet-based identity becomes the default across Europe. See how it works with a free demo.