Tax Lab · Compliance, risk and behaviour
EFRIS adoption
Who has joined Uganda's e-invoicing system, who actually uses it, and who issues the invoices. This page does not measure VAT leakage.
- 112,382
- registered by 2 June 2026
- 84,636
- have ever issued an invoice, to 30 June 2025
- 43,244
- using it in FY2024/25
Registered is not the same as using
The chart plays through the years. Stop it, or drag to any year.
FY2020/21
- Registered so far
- 36,622
- Using it this year
- 15,374
- New this year
- 36,622
- 1 January 2021: VAT-registered firms must start issuing e-invoices, after six months' extension
A gap is not non-compliance. The register includes non-VAT firms, many not required to issue, and firms that have closed. “Registered so far” is our running total of the note's yearly figures. It reaches 62,320 at June 2023 against URA's count of 62,266 used further down, and 112,319 against the note's total of 112,382 at 2 June 2026. We have not reconciled these small differences.
A few firms issue almost all the invoices
Each block's area is its share. Flip the view and watch the map turn over.
- Users
- 4,257
- Invoices, to June 2024
- 486 million
- Suits
- High transaction volumes and a computerised system
- Cost
- Paid by the firm. No published figure
How far apart they are
Invoices per user is our arithmetic from the note's Table 1.
What does “usage” mean?
URA's own count of the register at June 2023. Choose what to divide by, and see which firms that leaves in.
96%
22,667 of 23,525. URA's headline usage figure: VAT firms issuing, against those active or filing.
Hover, tap or tab along a ribbon to read it.
The FY2024/25 budget report gives 78.4% against a target of 80%, without saying what it divides by. This count of firms issuing, 34,367, differs from the 29,884 using in FY2022/23 in the technical note: one looks at June 2023 and the other at the year, and the sources do not reconcile them. URA prints 67% for the VAT register; its stated figures give 65%.
The device that barely happened
The fiscal device was the plan for shops and traders. Plan and purchases are at 30 June 2023; use is a year later.
At UGX 1,100,000 each, taxpayers had paid about UGX 2.9 bn by 30 June 2023. Most small firms took the free portal instead.
Which one fits a business?
Answer for any business, real or imagined. Nothing is saved or sent.
URA's guidance points to
Web portal, app, or a fiscal device
You meet the portal's limits, and it is free. A device suits a busy counter, at UGX 1.1m, which is deductible.
- Web portal: Free
- Fiscal device: UGX 1.1m, VAT inclusive, with installation
A plain reading of URA's EFRIS page, not advice or a ruling. URA can direct a firm to a platform, as it did with about 5,000 firms in April 2022.
The figures as tables
| Year | New | Registered so far | Using |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2020/21 | 36,622 | 36,622 | 15,374 |
| 2021/22 | 14,744 | 51,366 | 23,860 |
| 2022/23 | 10,954 | 62,320 | 29,884 |
| 2023/24 | 15,360 | 77,680 | 35,315 |
| 2024/25 | 14,418 | 92,098 | 43,244 |
| 2025/26 | 20,221 | 112,319 | not yet published |
| Platform, June 2024 | Users | Invoices | Per user | Cost |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| System-to-system | 4,257 | 486m | 114,165 | Paid by the firm. No published figure |
| Web portal | 25,391 | 26m | 1,024 | Free |
| Fiscal device | 1,623 | 5m | 3,081 | UGX 1.1m, VAT inclusive, with installation |
| Desktop software | 324 | 343,000 | 1,059 | Free |
| Dispenser controller | 450 | 28,000 | 62 | Paid by the firm. No published figure |
| The register, June 2023 | Firms |
|---|---|
| Register to VAT-registered | 35,021 |
| Register to not VAT-registered | 27,245 |
| VAT firms issuing | 22,667 |
| VAT firms filing, not issuing | 858 |
| VAT firms neither filing nor issuing | 11,496 |
| Non-VAT firms issuing | 11,700 |
| Non-VAT firms not issuing | 15,545 |
What this cannot tell you
- This is adoption, not compliance. A firm can invoice through EFRIS and still under-declare.
- The note's yearly registrations sum to within 0.1% of URA's register of 62,266 at June 2023, and of its total for June 2026. “Using” for FY2025/26 is not yet published.
- Platform counts are for one point in time and come from URA's internal reports, as cited in the note. Invoices per user is our arithmetic.
- No leakage model has been built here. One would need a sector and district panel of EFRIS transactions, and it would flag what looks unusual, not evasion.
Sources: Lees, Jouste, Kalyowa, Musoke and Okello (2026), The Uganda Revenue Authority Electronic Fiscal Receipting and Invoicing System (EFRIS) data, WIDER Technical Note 2026/4, Tables 1 and 2 (three authors are at URA). URA Annual Revenue Performance Report FY2022/23, sections 6.10 and 6.10.2. URA's EFRIS page and EFRIS Handbook 2024/25. Lees, Jouste, Musoke and Okello (2025), WIDER Working Paper 2025/112. Read the note.