As of 28 Oct 2026, the panel rates JTL-Wawi 3.5/5 and Xentral 3/5 in ERP. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 6 of the 6 judges pick JTL-Wawi and 0 pick Xentral. JTL-Wawi scores higher on 6 of 7 criteria (Finance, tax & compliance, Rollout, roles & operations, Pricing transparency, plus 3 more). Xentral scores higher on 1 of 7 criteria (European sovereignty). Provenance — JTL-Wawi: EU-Made; Xentral: EU-Made. Ratings are the AI panel’s opinion, formed from public evidence: how scores are made.
JTL-Wawi holds the higher mean on six of seven criteria, firmest in finance and compliance, 6.8 versus 5.8 with five judges leaning JTL-Wawi and one tie, and rollout and operations, 7.2 versus 6.5 with four leaning JTL-Wawi and two ties. Sovereignty leans the other way, 4.3 versus 4.0 with two judges for Xentral and four ties: Xentral's data residency is listed as EU-only, though its subprocessor exposure is listed as US Cloud Act, while JTL-Wawi's pages state the software remains on JTL's server with no public information on hosting country. Orders and inventory sits at 8.3 versus 8.0, two leans to JTL-Wawi and four ties, Xentral holding a flat 8 on batch, serial and best-before tracking. Weighted totals run 6.1 to 7.3 for JTL-Wawi and 5.8 to 6.8 for Xentral; the leans split by criterion, so no overall winner.
Choose JTL-Wawi if
You need GoBD-conform archiving, ELSTER and One-Stop-Shop transmission from the ERP — finance and compliance leans JTL-Wawi 6.8 to 5.8, five judges to one tie.
Your team sells across Amazon, eBay and 30+ marketplaces and needs automatic order import with real-time stock synchronisation that prevents overselling — orders and inventory runs 8.3 to 8.0.
You want edition prices up front: three editions are publicly priced and pricing transparency leans JTL-Wawi 6.0 to 5.5, while Xentral's pages cannot compute an annual total from the from-prices.
Your rollout and day-to-day operations load matters most — that criterion leans JTL-Wawi 7.2 to 6.5, four judges to two ties.
You file VAT returns directly from the ERP — JTL-Wawi documents ELSTER transmission, while Xentral's pages mark VAT advance returns as a long-term goal or limited to corrections.
Choose Xentral if
Your procurement requires an EU-only data residency listing — Xentral's data residency is listed as EU-only, though its subprocessor exposure is listed as US Cloud Act.
You need batch, serial and best-before tracking across warehouses with scanner goods receipt and batch picking — orders and inventory holds a flat 8 for Xentral, while JTL-Wawi's sharpest judge gap turned on serial-number and recall gaps.
Your data protection review needs a published data processing agreement and an external German data protection officer — both are published for Xentral; JTL-Wawi's pages give no public information on a data processing agreement.
Sovereignty is your deciding criterion — it is the only criterion where judges lean Xentral at all, 4.3 versus 4.0, two judges leaning Xentral and four ties.
Read this comparison as one judge. Each weighs the same scores by what they care about.
The Skeptic
Has watched ERP projects run a year late and twice over budget, the partner's day rate the real price. Reads "ERP" that is an invoicing tool with a stock column, "GoBD-ready" with no procedure documentation, "open API" without a public reference, and a module price list that stops where implementation starts, and asks how the data gets out again.
JTL-Wawi
This judge's pick
Xentral
Criterion by criterion
Finance, tax & compliance
JTL-Wawi
Invoicing, dunning and tax administration are in the system even in the free edition, with a DATEV booking-data export to the accountant, real-time matching of bank and payment-provider receipts, OSS, ELSTER transmission and GoBD-conform, audit-proof archiving of tax-relevant documents. The GoBD claim is 'out-of-the-box' with no procedure documentation behind it, e-invoices are documented only as received and processed in ZUGFeRD and XRechnung, and we found no public information on a general ledger or several companies in one tenant — the ledger side is handed over to DATEV, Lexware or SAP.
Xentral
Invoices with dunning, automated payment reconciliation, OSS readiness, e-invoices sent as ZUGFeRD PDF plus XML with incoming XRechnung read, and a one-click DATEV export to the accountant are all documented — that is the level of a well-automated pre-accounting hand-over, not a ledger. The vendor's own FAQ states that BWA, Saldenliste and UStVA directly from the system are a long-term goal, direct posting is planned mainly for corrections, and the immutable journal and receivables offsetting are marked as coming or in further development. GoBD-compliant invoicing is stated; we found no public information on a procedure documentation or reverse-charge handling.
Purchasing, inventory & order processing
JTL-Wawi
This is the product's spine and it is evidenced end to end: procurement with demand determination, goods receipt and dropshipping, automatic purchase lists from minimum stock, lead times and sales forecasts, multi-warehouse support, mobile barcode picking with batch and best-before capture, marketplace and shop connections with real-time stock synchronisation, automated returns with credit notes, and stock valuation flowing into the books. Serial-number tracking and recall traceability per batch from supplier to customer are the pieces we found no public information on, which keeps this short of the top level.
Xentral
The chain from order through payment, picking, shipping, invoice to posting is documented step by step, purchase orders with scanner-based goods receipt feed the stock, reorder levels with automatic reordering and order proposals exist, and the pages evidence unlimited warehouses with real-time stock, batch, serial and best-before tracking, mobile batch picking with bin scans, carrier and marketplace connections, returns with credit notes and EDI. That is squarely the multi-warehouse, scanning, multi-channel level. We found no public information on drop shipping or restocking of returns, and stock valuation is purchase-price based without depreciation.
Manufacturing, services & projects
JTL-Wawi
For the model the vendor says it serves — production and finishing for online retail — bills of materials with production orders consuming stock, three production types and a touch-guided workbench with multilingual instructions and batch and best-before assignment are documented and priced per station and production type. We found no public information on multi-level bills of materials, routings, work centres or capacity planning, and nothing on projects, time recording or milestone billing for service firms.
Xentral
Two models are served with working cores: bills of materials with production orders and per-order time capture including material consumption, and projects with subprojects, hours booked to the project and invoiced with two clicks, digitally signed service reports and subscription or rental invoicing. The vendor itself states the production fit ends at simple-to-medium requirements and names multi-stage manufacturing, capacity planning, fine scheduling and machine connection as out of scope. We found no public information on project budgets, resource planning or milestone billing.
Integration, API & data portability
JTL-Wawi
The connector layer is genuinely documented — out-of-the-box integrations to 30+ marketplaces, banks via HBCI/FinTS, payment providers, DATEV, an extension store with 700+ add-ons, a vendor migration team, and a local installation as a stated alternative to the cloud. But the REST API appears in the pricing as an Enterprise inclusion marked beta, and we found no public information on a public API reference, webhooks, or a documented full export of master data, documents and postings when the company leaves.
Xentral
A real connector marketplace with individual monthly prices, a 200-plus integration claim, CSV, XML and API bulk import of orders, a document importer for receipts from the previous system and the DATEV export give genuine connectivity. An open API and per-plan API access with maximum rate limits in the top plan are named, but we found no public API reference documentation, no webhooks, and no public information on a documented full export of master data, documents and postings for the day the company leaves. How the data gets out again is the unanswered question here.
Rollout, roles & operations
JTL-Wawi
Three go-live paths are public — self-service with a free guide and forum, vendor installation by support staff, and 280+ certified service partners with an anonymous project exchange — alongside edition-tied support levels with published response times from three business days down to phone callback, user permissions with traceable changes, and a stated availability obligation with status pages for shipping and hosting. We found no public information on typical implementation duration, uptime history or sandbox tenants, and testing the production tools starts with a sales call.
Xentral
Typical go-live is stated at 8-12 weeks with named customer examples, 56-plus certified partner agencies in gold, silver and bronze tiers are listed with implementation, first-level support and consulting services, and there is an Academy, help centre, community, helpbot and ticket support with an emergency prioritisation flag; a Premium-SLA appears in the top plan. We found no public information on a role or permission model, on published availability figures or a status page, and the SLA is named but not quantified. The order-level protocol showing who processed what and when is the only audit-trail evidence on the pages.
European sovereignty
JTL-Wawi
The contracting entity is provably German — JTL-Software-GmbH of Hückelhoven, registered at Amtsgericht Mönchengladbach under HRB 12450 — and the module partners named in the terms (countX GmbH Berlin, JERA GmbH, FOC Solutions GmbH, Dealavo in Poland) are European companies with register numbers and addresses. Where the hosted ERP data physically resides is stated only as 'on the server of JTL'; we found no public information on the hosting country, on a subprocessor list, on a data processing agreement or on a certification such as ISO 27001, though a local installation is offered.
Xentral
The contracting entity is proven European — Xentral ERP Software GmbH, Viktoriastraße 3b, 86150 Augsburg, Amtsgericht Augsburg HRB 23930 — a data processing agreement is offered, and an external German data protection officer is named. The privacy policy names Amazon Web Services Inc. of Seattle as the service provider while stating Germany only for the website server, and we found no public information on where the ERP tenants' commercial data is hosted, on the ownership chain, on further subprocessors behind the service, or on a certification. A German entity and a DPA are real, but the residency of the actual ERP data is what matters here and it stays unproven.
Pricing transparency
JTL-Wawi
The core cost is computable to an unusual degree: 'Start 0 € / Monat', 'Advanced ab 99 € / Monat' and 'Pro ab 329 € / Monat' with unlimited users, order packages quoted per additional order ('Ab 0,11 € je weiterem Auftrag' at Pro) and production add-ons at '29 € / Monat', '69 € / Monat' and '125 € / Monat'. But 'Enterprise Preis auf Anfrage' — the tier whose listed inclusions contain the REST API — plus implementation and migration services, minimum term, VAT treatment and the data's fate on cancellation are all unpriced, so the real annual cost for a growing merchant is not derivable from public pages alone.
Xentral
Five editions carry published from-prices — Launch ab 99 €/Monat, Starter ab 349 €/Monat, Business ab 649 €/Monat, Pro ab 849 €/Monat, Scale Auf Anfrage — with per-plan feature matrices, unlimited users at no extra cost, an order-volume cap on the entry plan, and individually priced connectors on the marketplace, which is more public pricing than most ERP vendors show. But the prices themselves are stated to depend on revenue and shipping volume, and we found no public information on implementation or onboarding fees, minimum term, VAT treatment of the plan prices, or the data-return terms on cancellation. The real annual cost is therefore not computable from the pages alone.
Sovereignty, side by side
Dimension
JTL-Wawi
Xentral
Legal entity
Not determined
Not determined
Ownership
Not determined
Not determined
Data residency
Not determined
Not determined
Subprocessors
Not determined
US CLOUD Act reach
Facts, side by side
Only facts both products carry under the same definition — anything else would not be a fair row.
As of 28 Oct 2026, the panel rates JTL-Wawi higher: 3.5/5 against 3/5. Weighted by what each judge cares about, 6 of the 6 judges pick JTL-Wawi and 0 pick Xentral. Which one fits depends on the criteria that matter to you; the table on this page shows both side by side, and each judge’s reading has its own page. Both were scored by the same AI bench under the same rubric, from public evidence only, as the methodology describes.
Is JTL-Wawi or Xentral European?
JTL-Wawi is European (EU-Made). Xentral is European (EU-Made). Provenance is read from each company’s own legal pages: who builds it and who owns it.
Do JTL-Wawi and Xentral have a free plan?
As of 28 Oct 2026, JTL-Wawi’s own pages state a free plan; Xentral’s pages as captured do not. Each product page links the pricing page it was read from.