The 43-year-old woman was cornered by the animal after it found its way through a gate that had not been properly shut and wandered into a nearby storage building, police said.
The woman, who has not yet been named, was mauled and bitten and later died of her wounds in hospital.
The director of Cologne Zoo, Theo Pagel, then shot the tiger dead with a rifle that he aimed from a safe vantage point through the storage building's skylight. It was feared that the tiger had been about to make its way into visitor areas, said police spokesman Stefan Kirchner.
Mr Kirchner said it was unlikely that members of the public had witnessed the incident, which occurred around noon (1000 GMT) on Saturday.
According to the Cologne newspaper Express, the tiger was a male called "Altai." It quoted Mr Pagel, the zoo's director, as saying: "This is the darkest day of my life." A planned late-night opening of the zoo has been canceled.
Altai, a four-year-old, was moved to Cologne Zoo in April last year and was paired with a female from France. He can be seen in YouTube footage posted to the website in 2011.
Cologne Zoo in western Germany, founded in 1860, is one of the oldest and best-known in the country and is home to some 10,000 animals from 700 species.
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