National designs were not allowed to change until the end of 2008, unless a monarch (whose portrait usually appears on the coins) died or abdicated.

National designs have seen some changes, as they are now required to include the name of the issuing country: previously neither Finland nor Belgium showed this.

As of 2010[update], Austria, Germany and Greece are obliged to change their designs due this requirement in the future.

As the EU's membership has since expanded in 2004 and 2007, with further expansions envisaged, the common face of all euro coins of values of 10 cents and above were redesigned in 2007 to show a new map.

Since then designs for Cyprus, Malta, Slovakia, Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, and Croatia have been added as each of these states joined the eurozone.

The reverse was designed by Luc Luycx and displays a map of Europe, not including Iceland and cutting off, in a semicircle, at the Bosphorus, north through the middle of Ukraine, then Russia and through northern Scandinavia.

Across the map is the word EURO, and a large number 1 appears to the left hand side of the coin.

The vertical lines running across the rightmost third of the coin are interrupted in the middle to make way for eastern Europe.

All have to include twelve stars (in most cases a circle around the edge), the engraver's initials and the year of issue.

In Austria, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Portugal, San Marino and the Vatican City no €1 coins were minted dated 1999, 2000 and 2001.

In the Vatican, there were coins minted with John Paul II's effigy, and with "Sede Vacante" image in 2005.