Outputs on the topic Harmonized Indices of Consumer Prices (Harmonized Inflation):

Changes from January 2026:

• Inflation measured by the Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices (HICP) - European methodology; and inflation measured by the national Consumer Price Index (CPI) - national methodology are published according to the new European Classification of Individual Consumption by Purpose, version 2 (ECOICOP ver.2), which is aligned with the UN classification COICOP 2018. Goods and services are in this classification organized into 13 divisions instead of 12 divisions in the previous classification. The names and content of some divisions, groups and classes have changed.
• The Statistical Office of the Slovak Republic introduced a new basis for calculating of basic index - common for both HICP and CPI, which is the average of the year 2025 = 100. Until December 2025, the base period for the HICP was the average of the year 2015 = 100, for the CPI the base period was December 2000 = 100.
• As every year, the weights of representative items of consumer basket are updated according to the final household consumption calculated within the statistical outputs of the national accounts for 2024 and current household budget survey or other external and administrative sources. At the same time, from January 2026, Games of chance are included in both the CPI and HICP as part of recreational services within the division "09 Recreation, sports and culture".
• More in the methodology for Consumer prices and prices of production statistics.

Consumer price survey

The Statistical Office of the SR processes price outputs for Food and non-alcoholic beverages division (from January 2024) and for Alcoholic beverages and tobacco division (from January 2025) from a new data source - from scanner data, i.e. from the transaction data of retails chains, which replaced the traditional field survey. These changes significantly expanded inputs on consumer prices in the mentioned divisions. The use of scanner data is an important part of the modernization of price statistics while maintaining and increasing its quality.

Harmonised inflation in the EU (HICP)

Inflation measured by Harmonized Indices of Consumer Prices (HICP) or, in short, harmonized inflation is calculated according to a common methodology EU for comparability of inflation across countries. Annual average rate of change measured by the Harmonized Index of Consumer Prices, is an important indicator of price stability in a country and its level is assessed as one of the four so-called Maastricht criteria before a country enters the euro area. The Statistical Office publishes data on the Harmonized Indices of Consumer Prices and HICP inflation monthly, on the day of publication of the data by Eurostat - in accordance with the First release calendar in the DATAcube database chapter 2. 3. 3 - Harmonized Indices of Consumer Prices (HICP inflation).

HICP inflation is published usually a few days after the publication of inflation calculated according to the national methodology (CPI inflation). The consumer baskets of HICP and CPI differ slightly from each other; HICP, unlike CPI, does not include the item "Imputed rent" and selected items related to major household repairs and maintenance, which results in some differences in the weights of other items.