Baden-Württemberg is Germany's largest exporting federal state — EUR 241.4 billion in 2025, ahead of Bavaria's EUR 227.0 billion and North Rhine-Westphalia's EUR 218.1 billion — and it is one of the few European regions that publishes its trade broken down by partner country. Spain took EUR 7.61 billion of that in 2024, its tenth-largest export destination, and the detail is worth noting: the value rose 0.3% while the exported quantity rose 3.8%. More tonnage moved for slightly more money. Stuttgart sits roughly 1,280 km from our Barcelona hub, with LTL groupage at 4-6 working days on three weekly departures.
LTL groupage transit
4-6 days
Corridor departures
3×/week
via the Spain–Germany corridor
Road distance from our Barcelona hub
~1280 km
Border crossing
La Jonquera · Strasbourg
Postal codes covered
The headline industry here is automotive, but the freight does not follow the headline. Motor vehicles and parts is indeed the largest branch by turnover at EUR 139.1 billion across 199 establishments. Machinery is the larger branch by everything a groupage operator actually counts: 987 establishments and 295,738 employees against the car industry's 214,575, on EUR 76.0 billion of turnover with a 64.8% export ratio. Five times as many sites and a third more people. Machinery is where the delivery addresses are.
The Porsche assumption is worth correcting for the same reason. Zuffenhausen in Stuttgart built 66,881 vehicles in fiscal 2025 — the 911 and the Taycan — and that is genuinely the marque's home plant. But the majority of Porsche's output is built elsewhere: Leipzig alone produced 101,910 Macan and Panamera, 39% of group production, and the Cayenne comes out of Bratislava. Audi's Neckarsulm site, by contrast, is unambiguously here, with 15,509 people across roughly a million square metres building the A5, A6, A8 and e-tron GT. Bosch is headquartered at Gerlingen and ran EUR 90.5 billion of group revenue in 2024 with about 129,800 people in Germany, down 3% on the year.
One more figure gets misquoted often enough to be worth pinning down. Baden-Württemberg does lead the EU on research spending — 5.6% of GDP in 2023 — but that ranking holds at NUTS-1, the federal-state level. One tier down, the highest R&D intensity in the EU is Walloon Brabant at 9.3%, with the Stuttgart region second at 7.8%. Both statements are true at their own level; only one of them is usually quoted.
Stuttgart, Mannheim, Karlsruhe, Freiburg, Heidelberg and Ulm cover the state. Stuttgart carries the largest single-city manufacturing workforce at 64,917, Mannheim and Karlsruhe add the Rhine port volume, and Freiburg runs the highest export ratio of the six at 67.1%.
Stuttgart
Mannheim
Karlsruhe
Freiburg
Heidelberg
Ulm
The route into Baden-Württemberg clears La Jonquera into France, runs the A7/A6 north and crosses the Rhine at Strasbourg onto the A5, which puts Karlsruhe, Stuttgart and the whole Neckar valley within a short run of the border — about 1,280 km from our Barcelona hub, closer than North Rhine-Westphalia. The state's inland ports are a real alternative mode rather than a decoration: they moved 24.9 million tonnes in 2025, which the state statistics office calculates as taking 1,245,000 lorry loads off the roads. Karlsruhe is the largest at 6.70 million tonnes across 300 hectares, around 200 port companies, two container terminals and 14 km of rail-served quay — more cargo than Mannheim's 5.80 million, which is not the order most people expect. Kehl adds 12 km of quay and 42 km of rail track. Air freight is not the channel here: Stuttgart handled 34,596 tonnes in 2025, and its air mail collapsed from 6,879 tonnes in 2023 to under a tonne after night mail flights ended in March 2024. Two scheduling constraints bracket delivery. Section 30(3) StVO bans lorries over 7.5 tonnes on Sundays and public holidays from 00:00 to 22:00, and the holiday list is state-specific, so Baden-Württemberg's banned days are not the same as its neighbours'. The Ferienreiseverordnung adds every Saturday from 1 July to 31 August on named motorway sections. Stuttgart's diesel traffic restrictions were retained rather than lifted in January 2025 despite compliant NO2 readings, and we check the current rule against the delivery address rather than assume how it applies.
Get a quote →The machinery base across the state maps to our industrial-machinery service, the Stuttgart, Neckarsulm and Sindelfingen vehicle plants and their supplier ring to automotive, and the Rhine valley chemical and pharmaceutical corridor to chemicals and pharmaceuticals. Technology, construction materials, furniture and e-commerce restocking run throughout.
Stuttgart sits roughly 1,280 km from our Barcelona hub and LTL groupage delivers in 4-6 working days on three departures a week, crossing the Rhine at Strasbourg onto the A5. The band is stated in working days because it already absorbs the German Sunday and public-holiday driving ban.
EUR 7.61 billion of exports in 2024, making Spain its tenth-largest destination. This is one of the few European regions where genuine bilateral data exists at regional level rather than only nationally. Worth noting that in 2024 the value grew 0.3% while the exported quantity grew 3.8% — more tonnage for barely more money.
By turnover yes, by freight addresses no. Machinery has 987 establishments and 295,738 employees against the vehicle industry's 199 sites and 214,575 people. Cars turn over nearly twice as much, but machinery is where the collection and delivery points are, and our consolidations reflect that.
PLZ prefixes 70 through 79 plus 88 and 89 — Stuttgart, Karlsruhe, Freiburg, Tübingen and the Ulm and Ravensburg areas. Any postcode under those prefixes prices as standard Baden-Württemberg coverage.
Binding quote in about 15 minutes during business hours, valid for 24 hours.