About Öko-Test

Öko-Test

Öko-Test is Germany's eco-oriented consumer-testing magazine. Published monthly in Frankfurt am Main since 1985, it investigates and rates products and services — from food and cosmetics to children's toys and household goods — for pollutants, ingredients and environmental impact. With around a million magazine readers and more than two million monthly users of its website, it is one of the leading consumer-protection media in Germany, and its test verdicts have repeatedly forced manufacturers to improve products and influenced legislation.

Overview

The magazine's mission, in its own words, is education, transparency and preventive consumer protection. Öko-Test decides what is tested, how and where, independently of industry and politics; it has no party-political alignment and receives no public funding. The method is the laboratory test with teeth: products are bought anonymously, analysed by accredited laboratories, and rated — with a poor verdict capable of triggering sales collapses and forcing recipe changes across entire product categories. The results appear in the monthly magazine and in special publications, in print and online at oekotest.de.

History

The predecessor was Neugier – Illustrierte Zeitschrift mit Öko-Test, published in April/May 1983 by the Berlin-based Neugier-Verlag GmbH. Its founder and publisher was the business journalist Jürgen Räuschel (1936–2005). From the Neugier publishing house emerged the ÖKO-TEST Verlag GmbH & Co. KG; Räuschel was the sole managing director in the founding years, and from January 1985 the first editorial team worked in rooms in Frankfurt-Sachsenhausen. On 17 November 1988 a three-person chief editorship was elected — Regina Sauer, Fritz Arndt and Jürgen Stellpflug; after Sauer's departure and Arndt's exit in January 1990, Stellpflug remained as sole editor-in-chief.

Räuschel's journalistic lodestar, modelled on the old DM consumer magazine, was to make a "magazine for the practical everyday life of people seeking ways to counteract the increasing poisoning of our immediate living conditions". That ambition was to be redeemed not by mere reporting on environmental scandals but by hard facts in the form of tests — and monthly Öko-Test tests have appeared ever since. The founder, the business journalist Jürgen Räuschel (1936–2005), thus translated the investigative energy of the early environmental movement into a durable publishing formula: buy the product, test it in the laboratory, publish the result, and let the market do the rest. It was consumer journalism as a form of environmental activism, conducted with the instruments of the natural sciences rather than those of the demonstration march.

The modern era brought turbulence. In 2000/01 the company fell into financial crisis; to raise capital, the Öko-Test Holding AG was created with share capital of 5,112,900 euros, and the SPD-owned Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft became a capital provider — it now holds 77.97 percent of the shares (as of November 2023). Jürgen Stellpflug — born in August 1956 in Borgentreich, a business-administration and political-science graduate who had worked for the taz and as a freelancer before joining the magazine's first editorial team in 1985 — was editor-in-chief from 1989 and the company's defining figure for three decades. He was dismissed in April 2018 after disputes over digitalisation and a loss-making expansion into China; a first lawsuit against his dismissal succeeded before the Frankfurt labour court, whereupon the publisher issued a further dismissal. In September 2018 Stellpflug founded the consumer association Testwatch – Die VerbraucherNützer e.V. and became its chairman. The magazine itself continued, its fortieth anniversary in 2025 marking four decades of independent product testing.

Content and Concept

A typical issue tests the products of everyday life: food, cosmetics, cleaning agents, textiles, toys, baby products, building materials. The focus is on ingredients and pollutants — what is in the product, and what should not be — evaluated against strict criteria that often go beyond legal requirements. The verdicts are presented with background reporting on health and environmental aspects, giving readers the context to understand why a product failed.

The concept's power lies in its consequences. The publisher reports that countless manufacturers have improved their products following published tests; that Öko-Test has alerted authorities, industry and politics to problems; and that it has repeatedly influenced legislation. The annual Öko-Test Jahrbuch compiles the year's most important test results, findings and analyses for consumers seeking a compact reference: comprehensive product ratings from the previous year, transparent evaluation criteria, current sustainability trends, ecological and social aspects, and recommendations for conscious purchasing decisions. The brand thus operates as both journalism and market intervention: the test is the article, and the article moves the market.

The magazine's sections map the concerns of the eco-conscious household: health and medicines, children and family, cosmetics and fashion, money and law, leisure and technology. For 38 years, the brand's advertising materials note, Öko-Test has informed consumers about the ingredients in everyday products — and through that engagement, manufacturers change recipes, authorities take notice of problems, and readers are advised in their shopping. Whether printed as a magazine, electronic as an e-paper or online, the offering targets critical readers seeking comprehensive background information and orientation for upcoming purchasing decisions.

Coverage and Audience

The publisher cites a reach of around one million readers of the magazine and an average of more than two million monthly users on oekotest.de; industry data (b4p 2023/I) credits the title with 960,000 readers per issue. The print edition's sold circulation was reported at 180,000 copies in 2004. The audience is the critical consumer: predominantly female, quality-conscious, willing to try new products and to pay more for sustainable ones, and accustomed to using test media to validate purchase decisions. The print edition carries the ISSN 0948-2644.

An important distinction: despite the similarity of names, the monthly Öko-Test is not a publication of the Stiftung Warentest but its competitor. The Stiftung Warentest — the state-founded foundation behind the test and Finanztest magazines — finances itself without advertising; the Öko-Test publishing house, by contrast, also carries advertising, and its majority owner is the SPD's publishing holding. The two testing institutions differ in method and philosophy, and German consumers have learned to read both.

Ownership

The editorial operation is housed in the ÖKO-TEST Verlag GmbH & Co. KG of Frankfurt; the ÖKO-TEST AG acts as the parent company, administering the advertising sales and label management and sales departments. The two legally independent companies enshrine in corporate law the separation of the editorial and commercial sides — a structural answer to the perennial question of testing journalism's independence. The majority shareholder of the holding is the Deutsche Druck- und Verlagsgesellschaft (ddvg), the SPD-owned publishing group, with 77.97 percent.

Digital Presence

The website oekotest.de is central to the brand: with more than two million monthly users it reaches roughly twice the magazine's readership, publishing test results, background articles and the special publications in digital form. The magazine is also available as an e-paper, and the brand maintains presences on the major social networks. Whether in print, as e-paper or online, Öko-Test offers its critical readers comprehensive background information and orientation for purchasing and investment decisions — forty years after a Berlin business journalist decided that the way to fight the poisoning of everyday life was not with outrage but with laboratory results. The brand's market promise, in its advertisers' phrase — "die Marke, der Verbraucher vertrauen", the brand consumers trust — rests on those four decades of published results. The title's blend of laboratory testing and consumer advocacy has made it the reference point for Germans who buy with their conscience as well as their wallets.