Siemens E08 fault codewhat it means and how to fix it
There is too little water in the machine for it to rinse properly, and Siemens’ first suggestion is not a repair at all — it is how you loaded it.
Before you start
Was there a large bowl or pan in the machine?
The right answer depends on what you can see. Pick the one that matches.
Choose the option on the left that matches what your appliance is doing, and the answer for that case appears here.
Yes, and it may have been facing up
This is exactly the situation Siemens describe. The water is still inside the machine, just held in the bowl instead of circulating, and the level sensor is reporting honestly.
Turn everything concave face down and run it again. No parts, no call-out.
No, and it was loaded normally
Then the machine is probably not filling to the level it wants, and the causes are outside the appliance far more often than inside it. A partly closed tap and a silted inlet filter are the two to eliminate.
Work through the tap, the hose and the inlet filter before booking an engineer, since none of those is an appliance fault.
What E08 means
E08 is the most cheerful code Siemens publish, because the answer is frequently free and takes thirty seconds. Their wording is that the dishwasher reports the water level in the rinse bath being too low, and then they suggest something no other manufacturer in this category bothers to mention: check the position of the dishes, because if bowls or pots have tipped over and water has collected in them, there may be too little water in the appliance for the rinsing process. That is worth pausing on, because it explains a mechanism most owners have never considered.
A dishwasher does not fill like a bath. It takes in a fixed and surprisingly small quantity of water — a few litres — and then recirculates it continuously for the whole programme, throwing it up through the spray arms, catching it in the sump and sending it round again. The whole system depends on that small volume staying in circulation. A large mixing bowl or a pan sitting the wrong way up is a reservoir, and it can hold enough of that water out of the circuit for the machine to notice the level has dropped below what it needs. Nothing has broken. The water is in the machine, it is simply in the wrong part of it. This is also why the loading rule every manual states — concave items face downwards — is a functional instruction rather than tidiness.
Siemens add one more loading check: dishes may be covering the water intake opening inside the cabinet so that the flow is restricted, which is the same fault by a different route. Where the load is not the answer, the same code points at the machine genuinely not getting enough water in, and the leading candidates are the ones outside the appliance: a tap that is not fully open, a kinked hose, or a blocked filter in the inlet connector.
What causes it
| Cause | What is actually happening | How likely |
|---|---|---|
| A bowl or pan loaded facing upwards | Siemens’ own first suggestion. Anything concave that has tipped over or been stacked the wrong way holds water out of the circulating volume. | Common |
| Machine overloaded so items shift during the cycle | A load packed too tightly moves when the spray arms hit it, and something that started face down finishes face up. Common where the code appears intermittently. | Common |
| Water supply restricted rather than absent | A part-closed tap or a silted gauze filter in the hose connector lets the machine fill, but not to the level it wants. Enough to run, not enough to rinse. | Occasional |
| Excess foam displacing water from the sump | Washing-up liquid in the detergent compartment generates foam that occupies the volume water should, so the level reads low with the correct amount present. | Occasional |
| Level sensor or pressure switch misreading | The genuine appliance fault, and the one reached after loading and supply have both been ruled out rather than assumed at the start. | Rare |
What to try yourself
Open the door and look at the load before touching anything else. Turn every bowl, cup, pan and plastic container so it faces downwards, and take out anything that has tipped over.
Take some of the load out if it is packed tight. Items that cannot move cannot be reached by the water either, so a lighter load fixes two problems at once.
Run the programme again. If it completes normally, that was it, and there is nothing to repair.
If it recurs on a properly loaded machine, check the water supply. Turn the tap fully off and fully on again rather than judging by the handle, and look along the hose for a kink where it disappears behind the machine.
Close the tap, unscrew the hose at the tap end into a bowl and clean the gauze filter in the connector until light passes through it.
Never cut, shorten or immerse a BSH inlet hose. The plastic housing at the tap end contains an electric valve and the hose contains mains cabling.Check you have not used washing-up liquid in the detergent compartment. If there is foam in the tub, run a rinse programme with nothing in the dispensers to clear it before judging whether the code is real.
Get a qualified appliance engineer to look at your Siemens E08
We do not pass enquiries to a repair firm, so there is no form here. When you book a qualified appliance engineer, tell them the make, the model and the exact code or message on the display, and ask whether they carry parts for this make — that is what turns one visit into a repair rather than a quote.
What it costs to fix
Typical repair cost
£0–£160
Time on site
15 minutes
Usually nothing at all — reloading the machine costs nothing and neither does cleaning an inlet filter. If a level sensor or pressure switch genuinely has failed, expect £90 to £160 fitted.
Typical UK prices including parts and labour, updated September 2026. Your quote may differ.
Own this appliance and had this code? . Nothing is published until a person has read it.
Related Siemens fault codes
- E20Get it checkedThe rinsing circuit has reported a fault, and Siemens point at the circulation pump. This is the pump that drives the spray arms, not the one that empties the machine.Related: spray arms and circulation
- E09Get it checkedA fault in the heating system. On these machines the element is usually built into the pump housing, which is what makes this a bigger job than it sounds.Related: same brand
- E06Get it checkedSiemens report a faulty door sensor or faulty electronics. The door switch is what tells the machine it is safe to throw water about, so nothing runs until it is happy.Related: same brand
- E07Get it checkedA fault in the drying system. Worth knowing what your machine uses to dry before you spend anything, because on BSH machines there are three quite different answers.Related: same brand
Own a Siemens dishwasher? Save it and its codes come first next time.
Related guides
Common questions about Siemens E08
How can the load cause a fault code?
Because a dishwasher recirculates a small fixed volume of water rather than filling up. Only a few litres are in play for the whole programme, so a mixing bowl sitting face up can hold enough of it out of circulation for the machine to see the level drop. Siemens name this as the first thing to check.
Is that why manuals say to load bowls upside down?
Yes, and it is worth knowing that the instruction is functional rather than fussy. Whirlpool put it in almost identical terms in their own manual — concave items must be arranged facing downwards in the rack. It is about the water reaching the surface and about the water getting back out again.
The machine seems to fill normally. Should I believe the code?
Probably, because this code is about level rather than about filling. A machine can take water for the normal length of time and still end up below the level it needs if some of that water is sitting in a pan, or if foam is occupying the space. Watching it fill does not rule this out.
Is this code in my manual?
Almost certainly not. E08 appears on the Siemens website and in none of the BSH manuals, which cover the range it sits in with a single catch-all entry. That is unfortunate here, because this is one of the few codes where the manufacturer offers a genuinely free fix.
Technical review
Not reviewed by an engineer
No engineer has read this page. Severity follows what the manufacturer publishes, and we would rather tell you that than let a byline imply a sign-off.
Sources and how we verified this
We establish the facts from the sources below and then write the explanation ourselves. We do not copy manufacturer wording and we do not host their manuals.
- Manufacturer support portal
- Manufacturer technical and service documentation
This page has not been reviewed by an engineer, and we would rather tell you that than imply otherwise. The severity rating follows what the manufacturer publishes: where they say isolate the appliance and call someone, so do we.