Brønnøysund
The Norwegian central business register (Brønnøysundregistrene, BRREG) that issues 9-digit organization numbers and tracks VAT registration for Norwegian entities.
What it is
Brønnøysundregistrene (BRREG) is Norway's national business register authority, located in the town of Brønnøysund on the Norwegian coast. It operates multiple national registers, including the Register of Business Enterprises (Foretaksregisteret), the Register of Mortgages, and the VAT register (Merverdiavgiftsregisteret). Every Norwegian organization registered in the country receives a 9-digit organization number (organisasjonsnummer) from BRREG.
Where you meet it
You meet BRREG whenever you validate a Norwegian VAT number. Because Norway is a member of the European Economic Area (EEA) but not the EU, Norwegian VAT numbers do not appear in VIES. Validation goes directly to BRREG via its public REST API at data.brreg.no, which is freely accessible and requires no authentication.
The BRREG API returns entity name, address, organization form, and a separate MVA registration flag. The MVA flag is the authoritative indicator of whether an organization is VAT-registered. It is tracked separately from the organization number, because VAT registration is a status the organization can gain or lose, while the organization number is permanent.
How vatverify uses it
When you submit a NO-prefixed number to /v1/validate, vatverify queries data.brreg.no, normalises the response, and returns the standard validation payload including valid, name, address, and vatRegistered. The meta.source field will show brreg to distinguish this from a VIES call.
Common confusions
- Norwegian numbers do not appear in VIES. Do not attempt to validate a Norwegian organization number through the VIES endpoint directly; it will return a negative result even for perfectly valid VAT-registered Norwegian companies.
- The 9-digit organization number is not the same as the VAT number. The VAT-facing identifier is
NOfollowed by the organization number, optionally with the MVA suffix. vatverify accepts all three forms and normalises them.