The lowest "i.G." rank is that of a captain, while the highest is colonel. Generals holding General Staff positions, e.g., the Chief of Staff of a Corps, do not bear the "i.G." after the rank. The German Army and Air Force General Staff officers have special insignia: in the respective German manual the description of General Staff officer insignia reads, "Dull grey embroidery, stitched by hand, on a crimson underground, 2 x 11 small prongs on either side. The angles of the V-shaped embroidery point downwards. The epaulettes have a crimson underlay." General Staff officers who hold positions which are not designated as General Staff positions wear the collar insignia of their branch of service and do not add the "i.G." to their rank. Admiral Staff officers do not have special insignia in the Bundeswehr, and they never had any in the German navies of the past.

German General and Admiral Staff officers form a small group within the Bundeswehr. According to an unclassified source of the Personnel Management Division, 39,242 officers served in the Bundeswehr during the first half of the 1970s: 26,102 regular line officers (Truppenoffiziere), 1,615 medical officers and 11,525 officer specialists (Offiziere des militaerfachlichen Dienstes). Only 1,453 of these officer positions were designated as General Staff or Admiral Staff posts. Two hundred seventy-eight officers temporarily assigned to General Staff and Admiral Staff posts had not been trained as General Staff officers. Thus, only 3.8 percent of all officer posts were General Staff and Admiral Staff positions. A subdivision into the branches resulted in the following figures, which have not changed very much over time: with its 20,167 officers, the Army had available a total of 820 General Staff posts. The Navy has 3,337 officers, with 188 posts for Admiral Staff officers. Twelve thousand two hundred twenty-seven officers served in the Air Force. Four hundred and forty-five of the posts were designated as General Staff positions.

In the middle of the 1980s there were 1,523 trained General Staff and Admiral Staff officers in the Bundeswehr. Twenty percent of them were assigned to posts that were not marked as General Staff or Admiral Staff posts. They were mainly employed as commanding officers. Bundeswehr General and Admiral Staff officers are found throughout in the Ministry of Defense, in high-level aide-de-camp positions, in NATO, as attachés, in major formations of the Army and the Air Force, as well as in the Navy staffs.

  • The brigade is the first level where General Staff officers can be found. The G3, who is the first General Staff officer of a brigade, has the position of Chief of Staff. He may be compared to the Wehrmacht's division Ia officer, who was the first General Staff officer, functioning as the Chief of Staff. The Bundeswehr brigade is, as was the Wehrmacht division, the lowest unit level that can fight the combined arms battle. The brigade's 2nd General Staff officer is the G4. In contrast to other western armies conducting General Staff officer training, the remaining heads of staff sections of a brigade are not trained as General Staff officers.
  • In a Bundeswehr division there are five General Staff officers: the Chief of Staff, the G1, G2, G3, and G4. Divisions with special tasks have an additional General Staff officer, a G3 Operation's Officer (Ops) who deals with operational matters. In a German Army corps, the Chief of Staff, holding Brigadier General rank, oversees nine General Staff officers: the G1, G2, G2 Ops, the G3, G3 Planning and Exercises, the G3 Ops 1 and Ops 2, the G4 and the G4 Ops. Currently, the employment of a G6 officer at division and corps level is being evaluated in troop tests. This General Staff officer is envisaged to head a newly formed command, control, and communications section.
  • At HQ AFCENT (Allied Forces, Central Europe) in Brunssum, Netherlands, for example, there are about 100 German officers. Only 17 of them are General Staff officers.

In contrast to the situation in many other armies, the Bundeswehr does not grant rapid career advancements only to General Staff officers. At the beginning of the 1980s, for example, 40 of the 202 German generals and admirals were not specifically trained as General Staff officers; that represents nearly 20 percent of the general officer corps. Additionally, 52.2 percent of the 1,087 Bundeswehr colonels and navy captains were not trained as General or Admiral Staff officers.