A restaurant bill in Rome arrives with a small line printed near the bottom: coperto, usually one to three euros per person. That charge is not a tip. It is a cover fee, legally part of the price of sitting down, and it exists whether the service was excellent or indifferent. The distinction matters because tipping across Europe is a patchwork of local custom, legal wage structure, and quiet social pressure, and the rules change the moment a border is crossed. A visitor who tips 20 percent in Lisbon and 20 percent in Tokyo will get two very different reactions, and the European half of that equation is more varied than most travel advice admits.
Service is included by law in much of Western Europe. In France, the service charge is legally incorporated into menu prices, listed as "service compris," and servers are paid a wage that does not depend on gratuities. In Italy, the coperto covers bread and table service, and a separate mancia is optional. In Spain, the menu price includes service, and a few coins left on the table are a courtesy rather than an expectation. The traveler who internalizes one rule and applies it everywhere will overpay in some cities and underpay in others, occasionally causing genuine confusion.
What follows is a country-by-country reference for the settings a visitor actually encounters: a sit-down restaurant, a cafe, a taxi, a hotel. The figures are conventions, not laws, and a good server in a tourist-heavy district will not turn down more. But the baseline is what matters, because the baseline is what keeps the transaction unremarkable.
France: service compris and the small extra
In France, the words "service compris" on a menu mean the 15 percent service charge is already in the price. Nothing further is required. The convention among locals is to leave small change, perhaps one or two euros, or to round up the bill. At a cafe, the tip for a coffee is often nothing at all, or the coins left from paying. At a bistro with a 60 euro bill, leaving 62 or 63 is entirely normal. Leaving a 20 percent tip signals that the diner is a tourist, which is not a crime but is a tell.
Taxis in Paris operate on a similar logic. The meter is the price, and rounding up to the next euro or adding a euro for help with luggage is the polite move. Hotel housekeeping receives a euro or two per night, left on the pillow or in an envelope at the desk.
Italy: the coperto and the optional mancia
The coperto is the defining feature of Italian restaurant bills. It is a per-person cover charge, typically between one and three euros, sometimes more in Venice or Milan, and it is not a tip. It covers bread, table linens, and the cost of service. A mancia, the actual gratuity, is optional and usually modest. Rounding up a 45 euro bill to 50 is generous. Leaving 10 percent is generous. Leaving nothing is acceptable.
One caution: in heavily touristed areas, some restaurants add a "servizio" line of 10 to 15 percent for parties above a certain size. That charge is legitimate when printed on the menu, and it replaces the need for a tip. In cafes, the standing price at the bar is lower than the seated price, and the tip for an espresso at the counter is often just the small change.
Spain: rounding up and the tapa culture
Spanish tipping is restrained. Menu prices include service. At a restaurant, leaving the coins from the change, or rounding a 38 euro bill to 40, is standard. At a bar with a tapa and a beer, a euro or the small change is enough. The exception is a high-end restaurant in Madrid or Barcelona, where 5 percent is a graceful gesture.
Taxis in Spain are often rounded up to the nearest euro or two. Hotel porters receive a euro or two per bag. The overall posture is casual: tipping is a small kindness, not a calculation.
Germany and Austria: rounding to the nearest convenient figure
In Germany, service is included in the price, and the tip is a rounding-up gesture handled at the table. The bill is often paid in cash, and the diner tells the server the total to charge: a 47.50 euro bill becomes "50." That is the whole custom. Ten percent is generous. Five percent is normal. Nothing is unusual for a quick lunch.
Austria follows a similar pattern, with the same rounding convention. In Vienna, a coffeehouse bill of 8.40 euros becomes 9. Taxis are rounded up. Hotel housekeeping receives a euro or two per night.
The United Kingdom: service charge, discretionary and otherwise
London restaurants frequently add a discretionary service charge of 12.5 percent, sometimes 15 percent, to the bill. That charge is the tip, and paying it is the default. Where no service charge appears, 10 to 12.5 percent is the convention at a sit-down restaurant. Pubs are different: at the bar, no tip is expected, and at a pub table with food, rounding up or leaving a pound or two is plenty.
Taxis in the UK are typically rounded up, or 10 percent added. Hotel staff receive a pound or two per bag. The service charge line on a London bill is worth reading, because a few establishments add it and then still present a card machine with a tip prompt, which is the closest thing to a double charge a traveler will encounter in Western Europe.
Scandinavia and the Netherlands: service included, tips modest
In Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and the Netherlands, service is included in prices, and wages are high. Tipping is a rounding-up gesture at most. A Copenhagen restaurant bill of 380 kroner might become 400. A Stockholm cafe bill is paid to the exact figure. In Amsterdam, rounding up at a cafe or leaving 5 percent at dinner is generous.
This is the region where an American-style 20 percent tip is most likely to be met with mild puzzlement. The server will accept it, but the gesture reads as foreign, and the local convention is quieter.
Switzerland: high prices, small tips
Swiss restaurant prices already reflect high wages, and service is included. The tip is a rounding-up move, usually to the nearest five or ten francs. A 92 franc bill becomes 95 or 100. Ten percent is at the upper end of normal. The country's price level makes the small tip feel even smaller, but the convention holds.
Portugal, Greece, and Ireland: the rounding belt
Portugal runs on rounding up. A 23 euro bill becomes 25. A cafe bill is paid with the small change left behind. Greece follows a similar pattern, with a euro or two left at a taverna table and the bill rounded up. Ireland sits between the UK and the continent: 10 percent at a restaurant is standard, rounding up at a pub is normal, and the service charge on a Dublin bill, when present, is the tip.
Eastern Europe: the growing tip
In Poland, the Czech Republic, and Hungary, tipping has become more established than it was a generation ago, particularly in cities. Ten percent at a sit-down restaurant is now standard in Warsaw, Prague, and Budapest. At a cafe, rounding up is enough. Taxis are rounded up. The convention is younger than in Western Europe, and the range of what locals leave is wider.
In the Baltic states, the pattern is similar: 10 percent at a restaurant, rounding up elsewhere. In Romania and Bulgaria, 10 percent at a restaurant is a common standard, and smaller amounts elsewhere.
The settings that follow different rules
Taxis across Europe generally follow the rounding-up convention, with the exception of the UK, where 10 percent is normal, and parts of Eastern Europe, where rounding up to the next euro or two suffices. Ride-hailing apps often prompt for a tip in-app; the local convention still applies, and a small round-up is enough.
Hotel housekeeping receives a euro or two per night in most of Western Europe, left on the pillow or handed to the desk. Porters receive a euro or two per bag. In Scandinavia and Switzerland, these amounts are smaller, sometimes a single coin.
Cafes are the setting where the gap between American habit and European convention is widest. A coffee at a counter in Italy, Spain, or Portugal is a transaction of a euro or two, and the tip is the small change, if anything. Sitting down raises the price through the coperto or the table charge, and the tip remains small.
Card machines, service charges, and the double-prompt problem
The shift to card payment has introduced a new wrinkle. In the UK, Ireland, and increasingly in the Netherlands and Scandinavia, a card machine may present a tip screen after a service charge has already been added to the bill. The correct move is to check the printed bill first. If a 12.5 percent service charge is already there, the tip screen is asking for a second gratuity, and declining it is not rude. If no service charge appears, the screen is the tip.
In France, Italy, Spain, and Germany, card machines rarely prompt for a tip, and the custom is handled in cash or by telling the server the total. Carrying a few coins and small notes solves most of the problem, and it keeps the transaction in the local idiom.
When a service charge is not a tip
The coperto in Italy, the cover charge in parts of Germany, and the bread charge in some Spanish restaurants are not gratuities. They are fees for the table, and they appear on the bill regardless of service. The distinction is worth knowing because a traveler who mistakes a coperto for a tip may leave nothing extra and feel stingy, or leave a full tip on top and overpay. Reading the bill, and asking the server what a line item means when it is unclear, resolves the ambiguity in seconds.
A final note on the places where the rule is genuinely different: in much of Eastern Europe and the Balkans, a tip left in cash is preferred to one added to a card, because the cash reaches the server directly. In Scandinavia, a tip is welcome but small. In Switzerland, the rounding-up convention is so ingrained that a 100 franc note for a 92 franc bill is the whole gesture, and the server will bring back the change unless told otherwise.
The bill in Rome still arrives with its coperto printed near the bottom, and the mancia is still optional, and the small change left on the table is still the quiet, correct move. The continent has not changed its mind about tipping. It has simply never agreed on a single number, and the traveler who reads the bill and rounds up will get it right almost everywhere.