One question reaches us every week in different wording: “Are we in scope for ZATCA integration, and when is our date?” The answer is not a judgement call. It is a figure from your VAT returns measured against a published threshold, and a date that follows from it. This article is about exactly that: how to find your wave, where the numbers come from, and the one point most writing on the subject gets wrong. Preparing the accounting system itself is a separate job, covered in our step-by-step guide to preparing your accounting system for e-invoicing, and we do not repeat it here.
Waves belong to Phase 2 only
E-invoicing in Saudi Arabia has two phases. Phase 1 (generation and archiving) started on 4 December 2021 and applied to every VAT-registered taxpayer at once — no waves, no revenue thresholds. You issue a compliant electronic invoice and store it digitally. Phase 2 (integration) is the one rolled out in batches, and it is the only thing the word “wave” refers to.
This is not a semantic detail. A small business that hears “e-invoicing has been mandatory since 2021” and concludes it is four years late is usually already meeting Phase 1 and has simply not reached its integration turn. The reverse error is more common now: anyone still assuming waves are “for large companies” is plainly wrong once the threshold has fallen below SAR 200,000. What Phase 2 requires technically — certificates, clearance, reporting — is set out on our ZATCA e-invoicing and Phase 2 integration page.
The current wave: are you in it?
Wave 25 is the wave currently announced. Its criterion: VAT-subject revenues above SAR 187,500 in 2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025, with integration by 1 February 2027. Read that sentence again slowly, because three of its words are usually skimmed:
- “VAT-subject” — not total sales and not profit. The taxable revenue as filed, not the income-statement line.
- “Above” — the threshold itself is not included; what counts is exceeding it.
- “Or” — any one of the four years is enough. Crossing the threshold in 2022 brings you into scope even if revenue then fell for three consecutive years.
In practice, SAR 187,500 a year is about SAR 15,600 a month of taxable revenue. Any genuinely trading business — a small restaurant, a clinic, a services office, a shop — clears that by a wide margin. The honest description of Wave 25 is not “another wave” but close to the end of the road: after it, the only businesses left outside integration are those below the voluntary VAT registration threshold in the first place.
The full wave table
This is the sequence from the first wave to the current one, with the figures as ZATCA announced them in its own releases rather than as vendor blogs repeat them:
| Wave | VAT-subject revenue threshold, and the years measured | Integration date |
|---|---|---|
| Wave 1 | above SAR 3 billion in 2021 | from 1 Jan 2023 |
| Wave 2 | above SAR 500 million in 2021 | from 1 Jul 2023 |
| Wave 3 | above SAR 250 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Oct 2023 |
| Wave 4 | above SAR 150 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Nov 2023 |
| Wave 5 | above SAR 100 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Dec 2023 |
| Wave 6 | above SAR 70 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Jan 2024 |
| Wave 7 | above SAR 50 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Feb 2024 |
| Wave 8 | above SAR 40 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Mar 2024 |
| Wave 9 | above SAR 30 million in 2021 or 2022 | from 1 Jun 2024 |
| Wave 10 | above SAR 25 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Oct 2024 |
| Wave 11 | above SAR 15 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Nov 2024 |
| Wave 12 | above SAR 10 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Dec 2024 |
| Wave 13 | above SAR 7 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Jan 2025 |
| Wave 14 | above SAR 5 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Feb 2025 |
| Wave 15 | above SAR 4 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Mar 2025 |
| Wave 16 | above SAR 3 million in 2022 or 2023 | from 1 Apr 2025 |
| Wave 17 | above SAR 2.5 million in 2022 or 2023 | by 31 Jul 2025 |
| Wave 18 | above SAR 2 million in 2022 or 2023 | by 31 Aug 2025 |
| Wave 19 | above SAR 1.75 million in 2022 or 2023 | by 30 Sep 2025 |
| Wave 20 | above SAR 1.5 million in 2022 or 2023 | by 31 Oct 2025 |
| Wave 21 | above SAR 1.25 million in 2022, 2023 or 2024 | by 30 Nov 2025 |
| Wave 22 | above SAR 1 million in 2022, 2023 or 2024 | by 31 Dec 2025 |
| Wave 23 | above SAR 750,000 in 2022, 2023 or 2024 | by 31 Mar 2026 |
| Wave 24 | above SAR 375,000 in 2022, 2023 or 2024 | by 30 Jun 2026 |
| Wave 25 — current | above SAR 187,500 in 2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025 | by 1 Feb 2027 |
We keep this table current on our ZATCA waves, thresholds and deadlines page, together with the date it was last checked and the source behind each figure. If you are reading this article months after publication, check the last two rows first — ZATCA has been announcing a new wave every few months.
“From” is not “by”
Notice how the last column changes at Wave 17. Waves 1 to 16 were announced as a start date: integration begins on 1 January 2024. From Wave 17 onward the wording in ZATCA's own releases became a deadline: by 31 July 2025.
The difference is not stylistic. A start date means a gate opens and you operate from then on. A deadline means anything after that date is a violation. A business that lived through the early waves and got used to treating the date as an opening may treat today's date with the same flexibility — and that flexibility no longer exists. If you are in Wave 25, 1 February 2027 is a ceiling, not a starting line.
The measurement window widens — and this is where most guides go wrong
If one section here is worth reading twice, it is this one. The thresholds did not fall on their own; the number of years measured grew alongside them. Wave 1 measured a single year (2021). Later waves measured two (2021 or 2022, then 2022 or 2023). From Wave 21 it became three years (2022, 2023 or 2024). Wave 25 measures four (2022, 2023, 2024 or 2025).
The effect is direct. A business with SAR 900,000 of taxable revenue in 2022 that fell to SAR 400,000 in 2023 and 2024 would not have been caught by Wave 22 if only the latest year counted — but it is caught, because 2022 sits inside the measurement window. A business relying on “last year was under the threshold” will find the threshold is measured against a higher year in its history.
The practical rule: do not ask “what is my revenue?” Ask “what is the highest VAT-subject revenue I recorded in any of the years named in my wave?” Most published guidance quotes the threshold and omits the window, which leaves the reader with a wrong answer to the only question that matters: am I in scope at all?
The six-month notice is statutory, not a courtesy
ZATCA notifies each business in a wave at least six months before its integration date. That is not good practice or an administrative promise — it is Clause Sixth of the E-Invoicing Implementation Resolution. Advance notice is your entitlement, not a favour.
Three things follow for planning. First, if no notification has arrived, your likely date is at least six months away, which gives you a real planning window. Second, the notification goes to the contact details registered with ZATCA — an old mailbox or the mobile number of an employee who left two years ago means a notice that arrived and nobody read, and the clock runs either way. Check your registered contact details today, not on the day of the notice. Third, six months is a reasonable span for an organised integration project and a very tight one for a business that discovers at notification that its accounting system cannot integrate at all, and has to replace it, migrate data and test the connection inside the same window.
“ZATCA-approved”: what the Solution Providers Directory actually means
This is the most commercially awkward section of the article, and we write it knowing it serves nobody who sells systems: there is no body issuing “ZATCA accreditation” to an accounting system in the sense that a lot of marketing implies.
What exists is two quite different things. First, the Solution Providers Directory on ZATCA's site — which, by the disclaimer published alongside it, is a reference list to help you search. Listing is not a recommendation, not an accreditation, and not a guarantee that a provider's solution is compliant; verification is the taxpayer's responsibility. Second, the Implementation Resolution permits a provider to self-declare that its solution meets the specifications. Which means the badge you see in an advert or on the cover of a quotation may rest on nothing more than a statement the seller wrote about itself.
So what is actually useful? Not a badge on a website, but three verifiable things: the solution passing in ZATCA's sandbox with the invoice types you actually issue; live integrations at named clients you can call; and a clear answer on who carries the responsibility if your invoices are rejected after go-live. Ask for those three and ignore the rest. And if someone shows you a “certificate of approval”, ask precisely who issued it.
Neither Odoo nor ERPNext is compliant on a fresh install
We say this as a firm that implements both: neither Odoo nor ERPNext comes out of a default installation compliant with Phase 2. Any proposal claiming otherwise is selling you an installation, not compliance.
But the two do not sit in the same position, and fairness requires saying so plainly. Odoo ships a first-party Saudi localisation inside the product itself (the l10n_sa_edi module), so the e-invoicing path is part of the official source and follows its release cycle. ERPNext's ZATCA integration is not in the core repository; it comes from external apps such as KSA Compliance or zatca_erpgulf — decent, widely used projects, but third-party ones with governance and maintenance schedules independent of the ERPNext core.
On this specific point the asymmetry favours Odoo, and we state it as it is. BDC implements both Odoo and ERPNext, is an official partner of neither, and takes a commission from neither. That is exactly why it costs us nothing to say one is better on a given point. One line item does not settle the choice, of course — cost, breadth of applications and the nature of your business weigh more, and we compare them item by item in our Odoo versus ERPNext comparison, with each system detailed on the Odoo implementation and ERPNext implementation pages. What matters here: whichever you choose, budget and schedule the integration as its own line item rather than a free assumption.
Three things to settle this week
- Pull your highest VAT-subject revenue for each year from 2022 to 2025 out of your returns and compare it against the threshold column above. Start from the highest year, not the most recent one.
- Check your contact details in your ZATCA account and make sure the registered email and number reach someone who still works there. The notice goes where it is registered, not where you hope.
- Ask your system provider one specific question: has integration passed in ZATCA's sandbox with the invoice types we issue? A hesitant answer to that question tells you more than any compliance badge.
In summary
Your wave is not a matter of judgement: it is the highest VAT-subject revenue you recorded inside your wave's announced measurement window, measured against a published threshold, on a date that since Wave 17 has been a deadline rather than an opening. Wave 25 at SAR 187,500 with a 1 February 2027 date means the question is no longer whether you will be in scope, but exactly when. And when the notice arrives, six months is enough time for anyone who has started, and tight for anyone who has not.
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