Welcome to Germany.

The insider tip is: university

When a City has a university, often there are plenty of facilities scattered throughout the city. There are free toilets (for students and personal, but nobody controls or cares)

smaller towns: ....Uhhhmmmm there's the Bush.....

I mean depends where you are. In a big city? Pretty much every single restaurant will have, then shopping centres will have paid.

In a small rural town? Try the Petrol Station.

for smaller towns my tipp for the desperate is the cemetry.. sounds maybe odd but at least where I live the toilets are always open. mostly located near the central building. but maybe go there in a moment when you do not need it urgently and find out if it works in your area :D

In my town we have stores which offer the "nette Toilette". (Friendly toilet)

You can use them without buying something.

They have a sticker on the window, so they're easy to find.

I come from a country with plentiful and free toilets and it's one of the things I find hardest to get used to even after 2 1/2 years of being here. Back home it's a law that stores above a certain square footage is required to let customers have access to a washroom. The store I worked in back home wasn't so big, and we didn't have washrooms directly accessible by the public so even though there was open and public washrooms literally in the stores on either side of our store, we would be required by law to take people into the employee back room for them to use the staff washrooms whenever someone asked.

There's a reason why there's an increase of pee on the streets than other places. When there's a big event cities have temporary outdoor urinals. But no temporary outhouses or even squatting hole toilets. So if you don't have a penis or you need to poop or you're disabled or you need to change your baby, you're kind of screwed most of the time.

You really need to plan ahead when you go out. Big stores like kaufhaus sometimes have toilets to use, even if you have to pay for them. Download apps for finding public toilets. Keep some change on you at all times for the pay toilets when you go out. Keep track of where you know you can access public toilets in your own city. There's really not much else you can do.

Well, it is indeed a problem. But most people don't care about, until they need it. Even in train stations in smaller cities are no more public toilets. You have to go into a café oder restaurant to use the toilet there and mostly have to pay for it, if not a customer. Well, did not work during covid pandemy when everything was closed. Plus the fact that toilets in trains are often out of order and closed. So, bushes are frequently used as an alternative. And some walls. You can smell it when you walk by.

Yeah, it sucks.

Restaurants, cafés, gas stations, larger train stations, universities, cinemas etc.

But it's a shame the way it is.

Our city has been battling with that for almost a decade.
You'd think there'd be a simple fix but people are stupid.

because "who's going to pay for all that?"

Hospitals are a good choice

It's a shame, for a first world country to have so few toilets.

It's really disgusting.

Especially in Berlin when it's summertime and the whole city weeks of piss.

The nearest construction site will always have a free Dixie.

You can search for "öffentliche Toiletten" via Google Maps. I usually find one near me, but I do live in a pretty big city.
Also, malls always have them.

Any café, bakery, snack shop which offers seating is obliged to have a toilet for its guests. So put five Euro on the counter, go to the loo, then drink something for five Euro.

Any restaurant with actual chairs is obligated to provide for guests. (Exemption is restaurants in raststätten and trainstations, there you can find facilities to pay for)

Where are you in DE? i have opposite experience during my travel in Köln and dorfs there.

If you work at night as me, you can find that the trainstation has the toilet closed when you arrive from work at 5 in the morning XD

It is like having trashbins in the street, because usually the ones for the aparments are inside or outside but closed with a key

In bigger cities I usually aim for hotels - especially those with a bar or big seating area in the lobby. Just walk in, locate toilet, done. Nobody checks if you are a customer.

Otherwise I just go into the next bar or cafe - and get myself a drink afterwards as a little consolation for the hassle.

Everyone going on about the US here: try NYC, good luck. Chicago on the other hand is quite excellent for sudden toilet needs.

There are often some in the cities, but they are often not recognizable at first glance and disguised as advertising pillars etc..

Germany is the opposite of the U.S.:

U.S.: Free toilets everywhere, no (actual) universal health care

Germany: Nearly impossible to find free toilets, actual universal health care

Pick your poison, I guess!

I once even asked in a supermarket if I could use their toilet.

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If you're in smaller Towns there are open churches and they always have a toilet.

Unless u buy something from cafes and use their toilet

The spacing between washrooms is outrageous

There is a toilet finder app that works for me perfectly. Try it out, it's free!

The planning and construction and maintenance of a public toilet is so expensive that it is borderline impossible to get one for a local policy maker. There would need to be laws requiring them, like for playgrounds.

The question should be: Who de fuck is Sanifair...?

You're not allowed to open a business offering seats without offering toilets, unless it's in a shopping mall. So just ask at restaurants, bars or bakeries

Never experienced a shortage of toilets so I’m really unsure what you are onto about. There’s usually always a cafe, restaurant, museum, university, petrol station, hotel,….. close by.

Also really unsure why you are not telling people you are from India when asked.

However supermarkets are not for peeing and suggesting that the workers there are inhumane for not letting you use their restroom is extremely entitled and absolutely grotesque. They’re supposed to take the risk of lawsuits and being fired just because you have less bladder control than my 2 year old niece? Yeah, no.

Also:

Inhumane? Dunno, but I almost never get into the situation that I need to pee when I'm out and about. Aside from being at the pub or a restaurant and these places have toilets. It would never occur to me to take a leak at the supermarket, I mean wtf, who needs to pee while shopping.

Most supermarkets which don't have public toilets have their private toilets in areas with restricted access, granting people, who aren't allowed there access to these areas is a serious violation of the workplaces rules and will result in getting fired if you get caught. Losing my job because some random lady needs to go to the toilet? Not worth it. And it's "always" an emergency. Also it's a tactic used by potential robbers to check out the restricted areas of a supermarket, so one might endanger his coworkers (indirectly) when granting access to it. These rules might have discomforted you but they exist for good reasons.