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New legislation· 7 September 2026
Public procurement: direct award rises to €150,000 for works and €75,000 for services
Decreto-Lei n.º 177/2026 is the most extensive revision of the Código dos Contratos Públicos (Portuguese public procurement code) since 2017 and comes into force on 1 October. Every direct award and prior consultation threshold goes up, companies with tax debt up to €10,000 are no longer automatically excluded, and it becomes possible to propose a contract to the State on your own initiative.
Decreto-Lei n.º 177/2026, de 4 de setembro amends the Código dos Contratos Públicos (Portuguese public procurement code), approved as an annex to Decreto-Lei n.º 18/2008, de 29 de janeiro, and republishes it in full. It runs to 282 pages of Diário da República and is the most extensive revision of the regime since 2017. It comes into force on 1 October 2026 (article 11).
The thresholds rise, and sharply
The change with the most immediate effect for anyone selling to the State is in articles 19, 20 and 21: the values up to which a public body may contract by ajuste direto (direct award, inviting a single company) or by consulta prévia (prior consultation, inviting at least three) go up.
Type of contract
Direct award
Prior consultation
Public works contracts
€30,000 → €150,000
€150,000 → €1,000,000
Leasing and purchase of movable goods, and purchase of services
Articles 19 and 20 of the Código dos Contratos Públicos, as amended by Decreto-Lei n.º 177/2026.
The new figures are taken from the wording of the decree-law itself; the previous ones were read in the consolidated text of the code published by IMPIC.
One brake stays in place. Article 113(2) still prevents the same contracting authority from inviting again a company to which it has already awarded, by direct award or prior consultation under these articles, contracts for the same type of supply whose accumulated price in the current financial year and the two preceding ones reaches those ceilings. The transitional rule (article 7(2)) requires that accumulated total to be counted for procedures started after 1 October as well.
Tax debt up to €10,000 no longer excludes automatically
Article 55(3) now allows contracting authorities to admit economic operators whose tax or social security position is not in order, provided two conditions are met cumulatively:
the debt does not exceed €10,000;
the operator files a sworn declaration that, if it signs the contract, it assigns the claim to Segurança Social (social security) or to the Autoridade Tributária (tax authority), authorising the contracting authority to withhold the amounts owed and pay them over until the debt is settled in full.
This is a power of the contracting authority — the provision says it “may authorise” — not a right of the company.
Contracts reserved for startups
Article 54 now allows procedures to be reserved for startups recognised under article 2 of Lei n.º 21/2023, de 25 de maio, in the leasing or purchase of movable goods and the purchase of services with an estimated value below the European thresholds, and provided they show no certain cross-border interest.
A company may now propose the contract to the State
The new article 35-B creates iniciativas espontâneas (unsolicited proposals): any economic operator may submit to a contracting authority a technical study defining the object of the contract, identifying the public interest to be served and setting out the essential conditions for carrying it out. The authority has 90 days to assess legality, suitability and feasibility; silence counts as rejection.
If the authority uses the study to prepare the procurement documents, the original version must be made available to all candidates or tenderers. And if the author of the proposal takes part in the procedure and its tender is neither excluded nor awarded, it is entitled to reimbursement of the costs demonstrably incurred in preparing the study.
Article 35-C adds the possibility of free, temporary trial periods for information systems and technologies, published on the public contracts portal, lasting up to 30 days, extendable once up to a limit of 90.
Special prior consultation moves from Lei n.º 30/2021 into the code
Articles 2 to 16 of Lei n.º 30/2021, de 21 de maio, are repealed and the procedure now lives inside the code, as consulta prévia especial (articles 127-A to 127-C): a direct invitation to at least five entities, for contracts with an estimated value below the European thresholds and, at the same time, below €2,000,000, in areas such as projects financed by European funds, public or cost-controlled housing, IT equipment and services and digital transformation, and works in the health and social support sectors.
When it applies from
Article 10 is clear: the amendments apply to procedures started after 1 October 2026 and to the performance of contracts arising from them. Only two matters apply immediately to procedures under way and contracts already being performed — objective modification of the contract and alternative resolution of pre-contractual and contractual disputes, an area in which the decree-law establishes a fully voluntary arbitration regime.
