The European Diabetes Leadership Forum – which took place on 25–26 April 2012 in Copenhagen highlighted many good practices and initiatives to improve the prevention, detection and management of diabetes across Europe.The Copenhagen Catalogue of good practices in diabetes collects such good practice examples, identified both during and post the Forum. In a context of fiscal and financial constraints, sharing knowledge of good practices will help making the most of available resources by pointing to existing, new or innovative solutions to improve prevention, detection and management of diabetes.