Double materiality assessment under the CSRD – step by step

The double materiality assessment is at the core of CSRD reporting. It determines which sustainability topics your company must report on — and it is done in two directions at once.

Read more about the directive itself in our guide: What is the CSRD?

What does "double" mean in double materiality?

The word "double" refers to the analysis being done from two separate perspectives — and both must be assessed:

A topic can be material from one, the other, or both perspectives — and must then be included in your CSRD reporting. In other words, it is enough for a topic to be material in one of the perspectives to trigger reporting requirements.

Step-by-step process

1. Map the value chain — Identify your own operations, upstream activities (suppliers, raw materials) and downstream activities (distribution, use, recycling). The whole chain must be assessed, not just your own office space.
2. Identify potential sustainability topics — Map relevant topic areas against the ESRS standards (environment, social responsibility, governance) and determine which could apply to your business at all.
3. Assess impact materiality — For each topic, evaluate the scale, severity and likelihood of negative impact — both actual and potential.
4. Assess financial materiality — Analyse how sustainability topics can create financial risks or opportunities for the company, now and over time.
5. Set thresholds and determine material topics — Define clear assessment criteria, apply them consistently and list the topics that pass the threshold in either or both dimensions.
6. Document and anchor — The result must withstand external review. Present it to management and the board, document the methodology and make sure there is an audit trail.

Common mistakes in the materiality assessment

• Only internal stakeholders are consulted. The CSRD requires you to also involve external stakeholders — customers, suppliers, local communities and financial actors. An analysis based solely on internal opinions is not enough.
• The assessment criteria are not documented. Listing material topics is not enough — you must be able to show how you arrived at them. Auditors need a traceable, well-reasoned basis.
• The analysis is done once and then forgotten. The materiality assessment should be updated annually or when the business changes materially. It is a living process, not a one-off document.
• Jumping to reporting too quickly. Many companies underestimate the time a proper analysis takes and try to rush past the step. That causes trouble when the auditor digs into the decision basis.

How Wellfish automates the materiality assessment

Wellfish structures the entire materiality process in the platform — from stakeholder mapping and assessment matrices to documentation that withstands external review. Instead of manual workshops in Excel, your sustainability or finance lead gets a digital workflow where every assessment is logged, versioned and linked directly to your ESRS reporting.

It saves weeks of work and makes it easy to update the analysis year after year. See the Wellfish materiality module →