Selling Digital Products and Courses From Sweden
By CodexierPublished 6 min read
Templates, e-books, software licences, online courses: digital products are attractive because the marginal cost of one more sale is close to zero. The catch is that the rules differ from physical goods in three places, and each one can cost you money if missed: VAT on digital services to consumers in other EU countries, the right of withdrawal on downloads, and the practical question of who can access what you sold.
Platform choices for digital goods
There are three families of platform. Course platforms host the video, the lessons and the student accounts for a cut or a monthly fee. Digital-product marketplaces handle payment, delivery and often VAT for a larger cut, at the cost of owning the customer relationship. A webshop of your own, on Shopify or WooCommerce with a digital-delivery app, gives you the customer data and the brand but leaves VAT and delivery to you. For a business that already has a webshop, the third option usually wins; for a first course with no audience yet, a hosted platform gets you selling faster. Our webshop setup covers the third route.
VAT on digital services in the EU
Downloads, streamed courses without live teaching and software are electronically supplied services under EU VAT rules. Sold to Swedish consumers, they carry Swedish VAT. Sold to consumers in other EU countries, they carry the VAT of the customer's country once your total cross-border sales to EU consumers exceed the EU-wide threshold, which is set in euro and is low enough that a modest course business crosses it. Below the threshold you may keep charging Swedish VAT.
| Customer | VAT to charge | How to report |
|---|---|---|
| Consumer in Sweden | Swedish VAT at the standard rate | Ordinary VAT return |
| Consumer in another EU country, above threshold | That country's rate | Skatteverket's One Stop Shop (OSS) return, quarterly |
| Business in another EU country with a valid VAT number | No Swedish VAT; reverse charge | EC sales list, and a note on the invoice |
| Customer outside the EU | Usually no Swedish VAT | Check destination rules; some countries tax digital imports |
You must collect evidence of the customer's location, such as billing address and IP country, and keep it. A live course taught in real time by a person follows different rules from a recorded one.
The practical consequence: your checkout must apply the right rate per country and your bookkeeping must separate OSS sales from domestic ones. Shopify and WooCommerce can both do this when configured; an unconfigured shop charges Swedish VAT to everyone. Talk to your accountant before the first cross-border sale, not after the first OSS deadline.
Right of withdrawal and downloads
Swedish distance-selling law gives consumers fourteen days to withdraw from an online purchase. For digital content not delivered on a physical medium there is a specific exception: the right is lost once delivery has begun, provided the consumer expressly consented to delivery starting during the withdrawal period and acknowledged that they lose the right by doing so. Both must happen before delivery, and you must be able to prove it.
- Add an unticked checkbox at checkout with wording that says both things: I want immediate access and I understand I lose my right of withdrawal.
- Log the consent with a timestamp and the order number. A screenshot of your checkout page is not proof for a specific customer.
- Send the confirmation of that consent in the order email, as the law requires a confirmation on a durable medium.
Delivery and access control
How you deliver decides how much support you will do and how much of your product ends up shared. A single permanent download link in an email is the simplest and the weakest: it gets forwarded, it cannot be revoked. A link that expires after a set time and number of downloads is the minimum for files. For courses and software, an account is the right unit: access is tied to a login, can be revoked on refund or chargeback, and gives you a place to deliver updates.
Files and templates
Expiring, per-order download links; watermark PDFs with the buyer's email; keep a re-send button in your admin for the inevitable lost-email tickets.
Courses
Accounts with progress tracking; drip lessons if you want to reduce refund abuse; video hosted on a service that supports private, signed playback.
Piracy and licence terms
Some copying will happen and no technical measure stops all of it. The useful defences are legal clarity and low friction for honest buyers. Write licence terms that state, in plain language, whether the purchase is for one person or a team, whether it may be used in client work, whether it may be resold, and what happens on breach. Show a summary before purchase. Then make buying and re-downloading so easy that piracy is more effort than paying.
When you do not need this: if you sell a single PDF a few times a month, a marketplace that handles VAT and delivery for you is more sensible than your own configured shop, and we will tell you so on a free call. When digital products become a real revenue line, with cross-border customers and a course catalogue, the setup above is what we build, priced on the pricing page.
Frequently asked questions
Do I need to register for OSS before I sell anything abroad?
Not until you exceed the EU-wide threshold for cross-border consumer sales, but you can register voluntarily earlier and charge the destination rate from the start. Many sellers do, because switching mid-year complicates pricing and bookkeeping.
Can a customer demand a refund after downloading?
Not under the right of withdrawal, if you obtained the express consent and acknowledgement before delivery and can prove it. They keep their ordinary rights if the product is faulty or not as described. Without the consent step, the fourteen-day right applies in full.
Should I show prices including or excluding VAT?
To consumers, including VAT, as Swedish price-information rules require. To businesses you may show prices excluding VAT if the shop is clearly aimed at businesses. If you sell to both, show inclusive prices and note the excluding amount.
Setting up a shop for downloads or courses?
Tell us what you sell and where your customers are. In fifteen minutes we can map the VAT setup, the withdrawal consent step and the delivery method, and say whether a marketplace would serve you better than your own shop.
Book a free 15-minute call