Notgeld auctions: German emergency money, searched at once

Notgeld, emergency money issued locally by German and Austrian towns, businesses and regions when official currency ran short, spans small WWI-era necessity issues through spectacular 1923 hyperinflation notes with denominations running into the billions, plus the elaborately illustrated Serienschein notes produced purely for collectors. It's one of the most affordable and visually rewarding corners of world paper money.

Why Notgeld lots get missed

Because thousands of different German towns issued their own Notgeld, a seller often just writes "German banknotes" or "old German money" without naming the issuing town or series, so a scarce silk or linen Notgeld note can sit unnoticed inside a vague general lot.

One search across every platform: including a numismatic specialist

Auction Bid Assistant's free browser extension searches the-saleroom, EasyLive, Bidspotter, Invaluable, NumisBids, iCollector and LiveAuctionWorld simultaneously, alongside eBay. NumisBids is itself a platform dedicated entirely to coin and banknote auctions worldwide, so a single search here already reaches specialist numismatic sales as well as the general auction houses where mis-catalogued lots hide. Search a town name, "hyperinflation," "Notgeld," or "Weimar emergency money" and results return across all of them, with images, estimates, current bids where shown, and sale countdowns, sorted by platform in tabs.

Real results for "Notgeld": genuine German emergency money including a 1921 Bielefeld silk note and bulk lots of hyperinflation-era notes, found in one search.

It works by searching from inside your own browser, the same as opening and searching each site yourself, just done in seconds. Nothing is stored on our servers, permissions are minimal, and the extension never places a bid on your behalf.

Alerts: across thousands of local issuers

With so many towns and series to track, save a search (a town name, "Notgeld," or "hyperinflation banknote") and get emailed the moment a new lot matches it, across all covered platforms including eBay and NumisBids, rather than relying on remembering to check each one.

Want to try before installing?

The same search box works on this website with no install at all for eBay, iCollector, LiveAuctionWorld and Featured Auction catalogues, a quick way to see matching Notgeld lots before adding the rest of the platforms via the extension.

Built for how Notgeld collectors actually work

Save any lot with one click from search results, export your shortlist as a printable PDF or CSV before a sale, and on the day itself the optional live bridge feeds the auctioneer's asking price into the free bid calculator, so your maximum (with buyer's premium and any applicable taxes included) is always in front of you.

Common questions