The aim of this environmental label is to provide private customers, large institutional consumers, and public institutions with reliable guidance for environmentally conscious purchasing.

Any products and services that claim to have environmentally friendly aspects. This can be:

• Household/drugstore
• Living/textiles
• IT/Household Appliances
• Construction products
• Heating/Energy
• Paper/Stationary
• Vehicles/Mobility
• Services/Municipality

More than 20,000 products and services from more than 1,600 companies have now been awarded the Blue Angel label.

The Basic Award Criteria List has been set up in order to achieve the Environmental Label “Der Blaue Engel”. The list contains over 100 product groups or services that can be labelled with the Blue Angel label.

The permission to use this label may be granted to all products or services, only if they comply with the requirements found in these documents.

Each label specifies that the product or service focuses on one of four different protection goals: health, climate, water, and resources.

The following aspects are analysed during the development of the criteria:

• Resource-conserving production (water, energy, (recycled) materials)
• Sustainable production of raw materials
• Avoidance of pollutants in products
• Reduced emissions of harmful substances into the soil, air, water, and indoor spaces
• Reduction of noise and electromagnetic radiation
• Efficient use and products that use a low level of energy or water
• Durability, repairability,, and recyclability
• Good fitness for use
• Observance of international standards for occupational safety
• Return systems and services that enable the common use of products such as car-sharing

The products that want this label must avoid using words such as “Natural”, “Eco” and “Bio” in their names since this can be misleading to customers.