ECLASS, ETIM and UNSPSC get shortlisted against each other in the same meeting, and they should not be. They do three different jobs. ECLASS describes what a product is made of and how it performs, across every industry there is. ETIM does the same job in more depth for technical products in a narrower set of sectors. UNSPSC puts a code on a line of spend and stops there. When distributors ask us which one to adopt, the answer is usually two of them, for two different reasons.
The short answer: ECLASS, ETIM or UNSPSC
If you sell electrical, HVAC, plumbing or building products in the UK or Europe, ETIM is the one your customers will ask for. If you sell industrial, process or automation products, or you supply large German manufacturers, ECLASS is the one they will ask for. If a procurement team or a public sector buyer asks for classification, they almost always mean UNSPSC. They want it for spend reporting, not for product selection.
Nobody adopts a classification standard because they want to. They adopt it because a customer, a data pool or a regulator has asked. Work out who is asking before you compare anything.
What each standard actually is
ECLASS
ECLASS, historically styled eCl@ss, is a cross-industry data standard for products and services governed by ECLASS e.V. in Cologne. It uses a four level hierarchy with an eight digit code at the classification class level. Properties, values, value lists and units attach to those classes. Every structural element carries an IRDI, an international registration data identifier, which is what makes it usable by machines rather than just by people.
Release 16.0 landed on 28 November 2025. The standard runs to roughly 50,000 classes and around 23,000 properties, published in 31 languages. It also comes in two flavours. ECLASS BASIC is a flat property structure, exported as CSV or XML, used in purchasing and sales. ECLASS ADVANCED adds hierarchical blocks, aspects, cardinality and polymorphism, exports as XML only, and is what engineering and Industry 4.0 work uses.
Cost matters here. ECLASS is not free. Commercial use needs a licence or membership of ECLASS e.V., priced by company size.
ETIM
ETIM is a classification model for technical products, governed by ETIM International with national organisations in 21 countries. Its structure is flatter than ECLASS. Groups exist only to organise classes, and the class is where everything happens. Each class carries its own set of features, and each feature carries its unit or its value list at class level rather than globally.
ETIM 10.0 was released in December 2024 and holds 5,640 classes and 16,728 features. ETIM 11.0 has a final release date of 1 December 2026. The master English model is free under an Open Data Commons Attribution Licence, which is a genuine difference from ECLASS. National language translations usually require membership of that country’s ETIM organisation.
UNSPSC
UNSPSC is the United Nations Standard Products and Services Code. The United Nations Development Programme owns it, having taken over from GS1 US at the start of 2025. It is a four level hierarchy of segment, family, class and commodity, expressed as eight digits, with an optional two digit business function extension. The published codeset is version 26.0801 and contains roughly 158,000 codes. It is free to download.
The thing to understand about UNSPSC is what it does not have. There are no properties, no attributes, no units and no value lists. Printer toner is commodity code 44103103, under class 44103100 in segment 44. That is the entire statement. It tells a finance team what category the spend sits in. It tells a buyer nothing about whether the part fits.
ECLASS vs ETIM vs UNSPSC side by side
| ECLASS | ETIM | UNSPSC | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Governed by | ECLASS e.V., Cologne | ETIM International, plus national bodies in 21 countries | UN Development Programme |
| Current release | 16.0, November 2025 | 10.0, December 2024 (11.0 due 1 December 2026) | Codeset 26.0801 |
| Scale | Around 50,000 classes, around 23,000 properties | 5,640 classes, 16,728 features | Around 158,000 codes |
| Hierarchy | Four levels, eight digit code | Group and class, six digit codes with letter prefixes | Four levels, eight digits, optional business function |
| Attributes | Yes, properties with units, value lists and IRDIs | Yes, features with units and value lists set per class | No |
| Cost | Licence or membership required | Master English model free, translations often membership only | Free |
| Exchange formats | BMEcat, AutomationML, Asset Administration Shell | ETIM xChange (JSON), BMEcat | None defined |
| Best at | Engineering and procurement data across all industries | Technical product selection in a defined set of sectors | Spend analysis and procurement reporting |
Where ECLASS wins
Breadth. ECLASS covers segments that ETIM does not go near, from chemicals to medical to clothing, and it keeps adding them. If your catalogue crosses several industries, ECLASS is the only one of the three that will classify all of it with properties attached.
Machine readability. The IRDI approach, the ISO and IEC alignment and ECLASS ADVANCED all point the same way. ECLASS is the natural fit where product data feeds engineering systems, CAD, digital twins or Asset Administration Shell work. Release 16.0 pushed further into material declaration and carbon footprint data, which is the same direction of travel as digital product passport requirements.
Buyer mandate. In industrial and manufacturing supply chains, particularly German ones, ECLASS is frequently a condition of getting your catalogue accepted at all. That is usually the deciding argument, not the technical merits.
Where ETIM wins
Depth in its sectors. ETIM classes are built by people who sell the product. The features are the ones a buyer filters on, and the value lists are the ones an electrician recognises. For a circuit breaker or a radiator valve, ETIM usually gives you a more usable feature set than ECLASS. That class was written by the trade association whose members sell them.
Distribution infrastructure. The standard arrives with a delivery route attached. In the UK, EDATA is the electrical sector data pool built on ETIM. The Electrical Distributors’ Association has backed it since 2017, with the Builders Merchants Federation joining in 2019. If you supply the electrical or merchanting trade here, that pool is how your data reaches wholesalers.
Cost of entry. The model is free. That removes an argument from the business case that ECLASS cannot remove.
Where UNSPSC wins
Nothing about product data, and everything about procurement. UNSPSC is how a buying organisation rolls up spend across thousands of suppliers into categories it can report on. It is free, stable and universally recognised. Mapping a catalogue to it costs a fraction of an ETIM or ECLASS mapping.
Use it when the request comes from finance, procurement or a public sector tender. Do not use it to power faceted search. We have seen distributors try, and the result is a filter with four options where customers needed twelve.
Decide by sector
This is the table we actually use when a distributor asks.
| Sector | Primary standard | Notes |
|---|---|---|
| Electrical wholesale and electrotechnical | ETIM | Deepest class coverage, and EDATA gives you the UK distribution route |
| HVAC, plumbing and heating | ETIM | Builders Merchants Federation is sector lead in the UK |
| Building materials and merchanting | ETIM | Coverage is newer than electrical, so expect gaps in longer tail ranges |
| Industrial and MRO distribution | ECLASS, or ETIM where the range is heavily electrical | Mixed catalogues often end up carrying both |
| Process, automation and manufacturing | ECLASS | The only realistic option where data feeds engineering systems |
| Automotive aftermarket | None of the three | ACES and PIES in the Americas, TecDoc in Europe |
| Public sector and healthcare procurement | UNSPSC | Because the buyer asked for it, not because it describes anything |
| Grocery and general retail | GS1 GPC | Travels with GTINs through GDSN, structured as segment, family, class and brick |
The automotive row surprises people. Neither ECLASS nor ETIM nor UNSPSC solves parts to vehicle fitment, because none of them models a vehicle. That is a different problem with a different standard, and we have written it up separately in ACES and PIES explained. The Auto Care Association released ACES 5.0 and PIES 8.0 on 2 April 2026. If you are running an older mapping, that is a live piece of work.
ECLASS and ETIM are not mutually exclusive
ETIM and ECLASS have been co-operating since 2001, and all electrotechnical ETIM classes have been mapped to ECLASS. The two organisations widened that agreement internationally in April 2019. So the choice is rarely as binary as the shortlist meeting makes it feel.
In practice most mid-sized distributors we work with end up carrying two classifications. One is the deep technical standard their customers filter on. The other is the procurement code a handful of large accounts insist on. Both sit as coded attributes against the product, both get maintained, and neither is the merchandising structure. Carrying two only works when the attribute model underneath is stable.
The mistake we see most
Somebody adopts a classification standard and then rebuilds the website navigation to match it. It never works. ETIM class names are written for accuracy, not for a shopper scanning a category page. ECLASS segments group products by what they are, not by how anybody buys them.
Classification and merchandising taxonomy are two layers, and the product sits in both. Get the taxonomy and attribution layer right first, then hang the standard off it as a set of coded attributes. That order also makes it far cheaper to add a second standard later, which you probably will. We go into the wider structure in our piece on B2B product classification.
Key takeaways
- ECLASS is broad and property rich, covers every industry, runs at around 50,000 classes and 23,000 properties, and needs a licence or membership.
- ETIM is narrower and deeper, covers electrical, HVAC, plumbing, building and shipbuilding, holds 5,640 classes, and the master English model is free.
- UNSPSC carries no attributes at all. It is a spend code, and it is the right answer only when procurement is asking.
- Automotive aftermarket needs ACES and PIES or TecDoc. Grocery and general retail needs GS1 GPC.
- Most distributors carry two standards rather than one, and that is a reasonable outcome, not a failure of decision making.
- Whichever you pick, keep it as a coded attribute layer sitting underneath your own taxonomy. Never as a replacement for it.
Working out which one you need
The choice usually takes an hour. You need to know who is asking, which customers are pushing hardest, and the state of your attribute model. We run that conversation as a thirty minute discovery call. We look at a sample of your catalogue and give you a straight recommendation, including doing nothing yet.
Book a thirty minute discovery call, or read more about how we handle classification inside PIM and PXM services.