You are running a check on a Belgian supplier before signing, or trying to find out who actually runs that Swiss prospect. If you work with French companies the reflex is automatic: open societe.com, type the name. And then nothing — the company is not French. The reflex breaks the moment a border appears, and the question that follows is always the same: what is the equivalent of societe.com in this country?
Why societe.com has no single equivalent abroad
Because societe.com is not a register. It is a private service that republishes French public data — sourced from the commercial register and from statutory legal notices — inside a readable interface. Abroad, that single function splits in two: the country's official register, and the private aggregator that dresses it up.
In short: France has no single "Companies House". The role is split between three distinct things that are often confused — societe.com is a private site that republishes public data, Infogreffe is the official portal of the commercial court registries, and the Kbis is a document (the registration certificate issued by a registry), not a database. The closest structural equivalent to Companies House is the combination of the RNE and Sirene registers, both published as open data.
The official register carries legal weight but its interface is austere; the private aggregator offers the comfort societe.com got you used to, while remaining a commercial layer sitting on top of public data. Legal proof or quick lookup: you will not go to the same place — just as in France, where open data sources feed every company data service.
societe.com, Infogreffe, Kbis: three things people confuse, three different equivalents
The French confusion travels abroad unchanged, and it explains why the same search returns answers that have nothing to do with each other. Three distinct objects sit under one question.
Infogreffe is the online service of the commercial court clerks: this is the register side, the one that maintains the trade and companies register. The Kbis extract is not a website but a document — the registration certificate issued by the court clerk. A company director can obtain the K or Kbis extract of their own company free of charge through MonIdenum or the Annuaire des entreprises, whereas requesting it for a third-party company remains a paid service. And societe.com is neither of those: it is the private service that republishes the data in a comfortable interface.
Taken outside France, the question therefore splits three ways. Looking for the Infogreffe equivalent means looking for the body that maintains the country's register. Looking for the Kbis equivalent means looking for the document that register issues — its name, its contents and the way you obtain it change at every border. Looking for the societe.com equivalent means looking for the private aggregator that wraps the register.
It is the same underlying data seen through three doors. Knowing which one you are opening saves you from demanding a document from a site that issues none, or from mistaking a commercial profile for a legally binding certificate.
The equivalent in Belgium, Switzerland and Luxembourg
These three countries are the most frequently asked about, and the most straightforward: each has a single national register, searchable online, listing company name, identification number, registered office, legal form and statutory notices.
In Belgium the reference register is the Crossroads Bank for Enterprises, run by the Federal Public Service Economy, which centralises the data of every registered entity and of their establishment units; its public search engine is called Public Search. Companyweb plays the private aggregator role there.
In Switzerland, Zefix is the public offering of the Federal Office of the Commercial Register: the Swiss register is public, free to consult, and Zefix interconnects all cantons. Moneyhouse occupies the private slot. In Luxembourg the role falls to the Trade and Companies Register, operated by Luxembourg Business Registers.
The equivalent in Spain, Portugal, Italy and Germany
For these four countries the most reliable entry point is not a national site but the European Union's e-Justice portal: its “Find a company” service has interconnected the business registers of all EU countries since 2017. One search, every register.
You can then drill down to the national register: the Handelsregister in Germany; the Registro Imprese in Italy, run by the network of chambers of commerce, where basic identification is open and full documents are paid; the Registro Mercantil and the BORME notices in Spain; the commercial register of the Ministry of Justice in Portugal, doubled by the Racius aggregator. North Data, on the private side, covers Germany and a large part of Europe.
One caveat: data depth varies sharply from one country to the next, particularly on annual accounts and beneficial owners. Do not assume a field available in France exists elsewhere — it pays to know in advance which legal data points are genuinely usable.
In the United States there is no national equivalent at all
This is the case that surprises most. The United States has no federal company register: each state maintains its own through its Secretary of State, and a company only appears in the state where it is incorporated. There is therefore no “American societe.com” in the strict sense.
The federal EDGAR database, run by the SEC, only covers listed companies and registered securities issuers, not private companies. For a US small business the only route is the relevant state register — assuming you know which state that is.
Morocco runs its register on two floors
Morocco is the most searched country of this family outside the European Union, and that is exactly why it catches people out: the e-Justice portal does not cover it, so the European reflex stops working. Its commercial register is organised on two levels. First a local register, held by the clerk of the commercial court where the company is incorporated. Then a central register, which consolidates every registration in the country.
That central register falls under the Moroccan Industrial and Commercial Property Office. Public consultation goes through Directinfo, the OMPIC service that queries the Central Commercial Register. For a legally binding document, however, you go back down to the clerk of the court of incorporation. The central register serves search, the local clerk serves proof: exactly the split that exists in France between the online counter and the court clerk, under different names.
Official register or private aggregator: which to pick
The answer depends on the use case, not on the country. For a pre-contract check, go to the official register: it carries legal weight. For a quick lookup, the private aggregator is faster. To build a list of several hundred companies, neither is designed for it — that is the territory of international company directories.
| Country | Official register | Common private aggregator |
|---|---|---|
| Belgium | Crossroads Bank for Enterprises | Companyweb |
| Switzerland | Zefix | Moneyhouse |
| Luxembourg | RCS Luxembourg | — |
| Germany | Handelsregister | North Data |
| Italy | Registro Imprese | — |
| Spain | Registro Mercantil / BORME | eInforma |
| Portugal | Registo Comercial | Racius |
| United States | Secretary of State (per state) | — |
| Morocco | Central Commercial Register (OMPIC) | Directinfo |
Registers and aggregators are built for record-by-record consultation. A third family, the list builders such as outsend, answers a different need: assembling and exporting a set of establishments across several countries. Three uses not to be confused — the same logic as in our comparison between a company database and a freshly built list.
Frequently asked questions
Is there a single European societe.com?
No, but the European Union's “Find a company” portal comes close: a single entry point into the interconnected registers of EU countries. Switzerland, outside the EU, is not included.
What is the Belgian equivalent of societe.com?
The Crossroads Bank for Enterprises for official data, Companyweb for comfortable consultation. Note that the Belgian enterprise number is not a SIREN: the two systems are independent.
Does Infogreffe have an equivalent in every country?
The function exists almost everywhere, the arrangement never identically. It is sometimes handled by the register itself (Zefix in Switzerland, Handelsregister in Germany), sometimes by a supranational portal (the European “Find a company” service), sometimes by an office separate from the courts (OMPIC in Morocco). No country reproduces the French pairing of court clerks plus a single online counter.
How do you obtain the equivalent of a Kbis extract for a foreign company?
Through the register of the country of incorporation, never through a private aggregator: only the register issues a legally binding document. The name of the document, its format and the way it is delivered all vary — some countries hand it over online immediately, others require a request to the competent court clerk. Check the language too: the extract is not systematically available in English, and a sworn translation is sometimes required by whoever is asking for it.
How do you check an intra-EU VAT number?
The national register is not enough: the validity of a VAT number is checked on the European Commission's VIES service, a separate step often forgotten when enriching a database with legal identifiers.
Can this data be reused for prospecting?
Public availability of a data point is not authorisation to process it. The GDPR applies across the Union, including to directors who are natural persons, and direct marketing rules remain national. See our reference points on data enrichment and compliance.