Let's be honest: most agency directories are "pay-to-play." The agency that bids the highest gets the #1 spot, regardless of whether it can actually ship working AI.
AIAgencies.eu exists to fix that for one market: AI agencies and consultancies based in Europe.
Since launch we've evaluated 0+ agencies and declined or removed 0 of them. Curation means saying no — a listing here is earned, not bought.
Every agency is reviewed by a named person: Gabor Kiss, founder and curator. He works in enterprise software at SAP and applies the discipline used to vet vendors for production systems — read the published work, check the named clients, ignore the pitch. He also runs UXAgencies.com on the same evidence-first model.
Here is exactly how the register works.
Who Qualifies for a Listing
An agency qualifies when all of the following hold:
- Based in Europe. Headquarters or a substantive office in the EU/EEA, UK, or Switzerland. A mailbox address doesn't count.
- Verifiable AI delivery. At least two engagements we can verify from public sources — a named client plus a published case study with real AI substance — or a demonstrable AI product with an identifiable team behind it.
- Substance over rebranding. Development shops that renamed their old services "AI," and side projects wrapping a single no-code automation, don't qualify. Borderline cases are declined, not waved through.
Every factual claim on a profile must be traceable to public evidence. We describe what is visible and published; we never credit an agency with capabilities it hasn't shown.
The 4 Core Criteria
We don't care about flashy awards or big-name logos (unless the engagement behind them is verifiable). We care about one thing: has this agency shipped AI that works, for real clients?
1. Deployment Evidence (Not Just Demos)
Most AI portfolios are demo reels: a chatbot video, a screenshot of a dashboard, a "we integrated GPT" bullet. That tells us nothing. Anyone can wire up a demo in an afternoon.
We rank agencies higher when they show the deployed part of the work:
- Production systems: Is the thing live, with real users or real throughput?
- Stack specificity: Do they name the models, infrastructure, and integration points, or just say "AI-powered"?
- Measurable outcomes: What number moved — hours saved, tickets deflected, revenue, error rate?
- Delivery rigor: Evaluation, monitoring, and what happened after launch.
The reality: an agency with one plain case study explaining a deployed document-processing pipeline will always outrank an agency with ten polished demo videos and no named client.
Show, Don't Tell: A Comparison
Agency A (ranked lower)
- Portfolio: A show-reel of AI demos and a services page listing every AI buzzword of the season.
- The gap: No named clients, no deployment detail, no numbers.
- Verdict: Might be fine — but nothing here is verifiable, so it can't rank on claims alone.
Agency B (ranked higher)
- Portfolio: Three case studies with named clients (e.g. "Invoice extraction for a logistics operator — 14,000 documents/month in production").
- The evidence: Architecture decisions, evaluation method, what failed in the first iteration, and the measured result.
- Verdict: Ships real systems. A delivery partner, not a demo factory.
We rank Agency B higher every time. This is why our top-ranked agencies aren't always the ones with the flashiest websites.
2. Contextual Expertise
A "top" agency isn't top at everything. An agency ranked #1 for FinTech in Berlin might be #15 for Healthcare — a regulated credit-scoring model and a clinical-documentation tool are different problems with different failure modes. We check portfolios for industry-specific evidence: if they claim healthcare, we expect deployed healthcare work, not a landing page.
3. Business Legitimacy
The AI boom is full of "agencies" that are one person with a template site. Nothing wrong with freelancers — but you shouldn't pay agency rates for one. We verify:
- Legal entity: A registered company.
- Team reality: The people on the About page verifiably work there (we check LinkedIn).
- Physical presence: A verifiable European address.
4. Profile Effort
It sounds minor, but it's a real signal. Agencies that complete their profile — exact services, team size, rate range, case studies — tend to be the ones with their operations in order. Claimed and verified profiles demonstrate engagement, which factors into the evaluation.
What Money Buys Here — and What It Never Buys
One thing can be paid for on AIAgencies.eu: the Pro membership. It is stated in full in the terms; the short version:
Pro Membership (€49/mo founding rate, €99/mo regular, excluding VAT)
Listing is free, and the free submission queue is honest but slow: 60-90 days, reviewed in order. Pro includes an expedited verified review: subscribing at submission starts a 5-business-day review with evidence verification and badge setup.
The subscription pays for priority, labor, and presence — never the outcome. Acceptance stays editorial. Rejection is possible; if a listing is rejected, the subscription ends and the first month is retained as the review fee — the review work happened. If we miss the 5-business-day deadline, that fee is refunded automatically: non-refundability never covers our own failure to deliver.
For accepted listings, Pro adds instant full-detail lead relay, visit analytics, priority placement in featured slots, and an editorial response right.
It does not buy a higher ranking. A free-tier agency with stronger deployed work will always outrank a Pro agency with weaker evidence. If we compromised on this, the directory would be useless to you.
The Link Policy
The followed link from a profile to an agency's site is earned by installing the verification badge — the mechanic that proves the agency controls its domain. It's available on the free path, and it is never sold as a line item. We don't sell links, we don't sell inclusion, and we don't sell rank. Ever.
Freshness: Every Profile Shows Its Date
Stale directories mislead quietly. Ours doesn't:
- Every reviewed profile displays its last review date, visibly.
- Reviews older than six months are flagged internally and re-reviewed on a weekly rota, so the oldest reviews keep moving.
- Every acceptance, removal, or approved change republishes the directory — rankings update with the evidence, not on a marketing calendar.
- Machine-readable dates (dateModified) are computed from the actual review dates, so what crawlers see matches what you see.
Editorial Corrections
If an agency publishes a significant new case study or we find a verified data error, we update the score immediately. These are corrections based on evidence, not favors. You cannot buy, request, or negotiate a manual adjustment.
Ranking Tiers and Badges
Based on city ranking, agencies are eligible for badge tiers:
| Your Rank | Badge |
|---|---|
| #1 in city | "#1 AI Agency in [City] 2026" |
| #2-3 | "Top 3 AI Agency in [City] 2026" |
| #4-10 | "Top 10 AI Agency in [City] 2026" |
| #11-20 | "Top 20 AI Agency in [City] 2026" |
| #21+ | "Featured AI Agency in [City] 2026" |
Badges reflect the live ranking and update when it changes.
Why We Don't Publish the Exact Formula
We publish what we evaluate, not the mathematical weights. This isn't secrecy; it's anti-gaming. The moment we say "case studies are worth 40 points," agencies start manufacturing case studies to hit the number instead of doing the work. We evaluate the whole picture, the same way every time, and we sign it with a name.
For Agencies: How to Rank Higher
- Publish verifiable work. A named client, the deployed system, the measured result. One deep case study beats twenty thumbnails.
- Claim your profile and complete every field — services, team size, rates, description.
- Be specific about your stack. "AI-powered" is noise; "retrieval pipeline on domain documents with human review" is signal.
- Stay current. Recent deployed work outranks a portfolio frozen in 2023.
- Keep your evidence public. We can only credit what we can verify.
Think we got a ranking wrong? Tell us. If you can show better deployed work than the agency ranked above you, send the case study. A person reads every email.
Our Commitment
We built AIAgencies.eu to help companies find European AI partners with real deployed work — not to sell rankings to the highest bidder.
The business model is simple and public: agencies can pay for review speed and for features that help them convert profile visitors into conversations. Inclusion, score, and rank are earned through evidence and are never for sale.
If we ever compromise on this, we lose the trust that makes the register worth citing. We won't.