Until 2025, a $300 box of product samples from a Chinese factory entered the US duty-free. Today the same box pays $37.50 in duty if it holds playing cards and $123.60 if it holds steel kitchen tools, plus an entry fee. The $800 de minimis exemption that let it through has been suspended since 29 August 2025, CBP has written that suspension into its own regulations "indefinitely", and a statute passed in July 2025 repeals the exemption for commercial shipments on 1 July 2027. This page sets out what ended, when, what a small shipment costs now, and what it means for a small brand that imports, using products from the businesses we track.
Will de minimis come back?
Not under current law. Three separate measures now stand in the way, and each would have to go:
- A statute. Section 70531(b) of the One Big Beautiful Bill Act (Public Law 119-21), signed on 4 July 2025, repeals the commercial-shipment part of the exemption, effective 1 July 2027. Bringing it back after that date would take a new act of Congress.
- CBP's own rules. On 24 June 2026 CBP published two interim final rules (Federal Register documents 2026-12670 and 2026-12669) that suspend the exemption "indefinitely": for courier, freight and every other mode except the post from 24 June 2026, and for international mail from 24 July 2026. CBP says the suspension lasts until it decides the exemption no longer jeopardises revenue or helps unlawful imports, and that any change will be announced in the Federal Register.
- An executive order. Executive Order 14324 suspended de minimis for all countries from 29 August 2025, and Executive Order 14388 continued that suspension on 20 February 2026.
The Supreme Court ruling of 20 February 2026 in Learning Resources, Inc. v. Trump, which ended the tariffs imposed under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, did not touch de minimis. CBP's rule says so in terms: the decision "did not address the suspension of the de minimis administrative exemption". CBP also states that its rule is meant to stay in force even if the executive order is withdrawn before the statute takes effect.
Two smaller exemptions in the same section of law are not affected: bona fide gifts of $100 or less sent from abroad, and personal or household articles of $200 or less carried by a traveller. Neither covers goods bought for resale.
What de minimis was
Section 321 of the Tariff Act of 1930 let CBP waive duty and taxes on goods worth $800 or less imported by one person on one day. CBP's own explanation is that collecting trivial amounts was not worth the customs officers' time. Such shipments could be released on a bill of lading or a manifest line, with little data about what was inside, and paid nothing.
The volume grew enormously. CBP's rule records over 1.36 billion de minimis shipments in fiscal year 2024, almost ten times the 139 million it processed in 2015. With electronic entry making duty cheap to collect, CBP concluded the original justification no longer held.
How it ended: the dates
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| 2 May 2025 | De minimis suspended for low-value imports from China (Executive Order 14256) |
| 4 July 2025 | One Big Beautiful Bill Act signed: commercial de minimis repealed from 1 July 2027 |
| 29 August 2025 | Suspended for all countries (Executive Order 14324) |
| 20 February 2026 | Supreme Court ends IEEPA tariffs; Executive Order 14388 keeps de minimis suspended the same day |
| 24 June 2026 | CBP interim final rule: indefinite suspension for every mode except the post (2026-12670) |
| 24 July 2026 | CBP interim final rule for mail takes effect, with a new postal entry process (2026-12669) |
| 8 October 2026 | CBP proposes tighter rules for every entry of $2,500 or less (2026-20650); comments close 7 December 2026 |
| 1 July 2027 | The statutory repeal takes effect |
For an importer, nothing changed at the border in June or July 2026. Small parcels have been paying duty since August 2025, and since May 2025 if they came from China. The 2026 rules change the legal basis, not the practice.
What a small shipment goes through now
A shipment that would once have claimed de minimis now needs an entry like any other import.
- Up to $2,500: an informal entry, which CBP says is now mainly entry type 11. It needs much more data than the old manifest release.
- Over $2,500: a formal entry, as for any larger shipment.
- Through the post: since 24 July 2026, a postal informal entry filed monthly by a party entitled to make entry, such as a licensed customs broker, with a filer code, a bond number, a 10-digit tariff classification for each item and a description. From February to July 2026, mail paid a flat 10% rate; now it pays every duty that applies to the product and its origin.
Every one of these pays the full duty: the base rate for the product's HTS code, plus any extra duty for its country of origin. For goods from China in November 2026 that usually means the Section 301 China lists and the 12.5% duty in heading 9903.05.31; goods from Vietnam pay the same 12.5% under 9903.05.84. How that stack is built, product by product, is in how much tariffs add to Amazon products.
On top of duty comes CBP's merchandise processing fee. On CBP's user fee table, last updated 9 October 2026, an informal entry pays $2.77 if filed electronically and not prepared by CBP, and $8.30 or $12.45 if manual. A formal entry pays 0.3464% of value, at least $34.58 and at most $670.86. Postal entries are exempt from the processing fee. Brokers and couriers charge their own fees for filing, which are not government charges and which we have no first-party figures for.
How much does this add up to across all small parcels? CBP's analysis for the postal rule took 392,312 type 11 entries from September to November 2025 and found that duties, taxes and fees other than the IEEPA tariffs came to 8.62% of the goods' value. Applying that rate to mail, it estimated an extra $316 million a year in duty on postal shipments.
What it costs on real products
Most Amazon brands bring their stock in by the container, in shipments far above $800, so their main inventory never used de minimis. What changes for them is the small stuff: samples, small first orders and urgent restocks sent by express.
A box of samples
Our startup estimates set aside $100 to $300 for product samples. At the rates in force on 10 November 2026, a $300 sample box from China pays:
| What is in the box | Example from our case studies | Duty rate | Duty on $300 |
|---|---|---|---|
| Playing cards, jigsaw puzzles, toys | Spite House Games, White Mountain Puzzles | 12.5% | $37.50 |
| Plastic kitchenware | OTOTO's silicone spatula | 15.9% | $47.70 |
| Steel kitchen tools | OTOTO's corkscrew | 41.2% | $123.60 |
| Drinking glasses | LIGHTEN LIFE | 42.5% | $127.50 |
Before May 2025 every row was $0. Add the $2.77 entry fee and whatever the courier charges to file. For a product like Draft Top's can opener, which could be classed as plastic kitchenware or as a steel hand tool, the rate on the samples can be 15.9% or 41.2%. The samples are a cheap place to find out which, before the main order.
A small first order
Our launch estimates are built on small validation tests: 50 units for most products, more where the factory's minimum forces it. Several of those first orders are worth less than $800 and could once have travelled by express without duty:
| Business | First order | Landed cost of the order |
|---|---|---|
| Spite House Games | 100 card decks | $63 |
| Draft Top | 50 can openers | $92 |
| Mount Cleverest | 100 trivia decks | $130 |
| KALOTOYS | 50 personalised name puzzles | $453 |
| White Mountain Puzzles | 200 jigsaw puzzles | $680 |
Our figures already include duty, because we price launches on today's rules. Two worked through: Draft Top's 50 openers at the $1.37 factory price are $68.50 of goods, so $10.89 of duty at 15.9% or $28.22 at 41.2%. White Mountain's 200 puzzles, priced as a new seller would buy them from a Chinese factory at $1.78 each, are $356 of goods and $44.50 of duty at 12.5%. (White Mountain itself makes its puzzles in America.) On orders this size the duty is real but small: the entry and filing fees are a bigger share of a small order than of a container.
Selling straight from a foreign workshop
The model de minimis helped most was shipping single orders from abroad straight to US customers. Each parcel was well under $800 and paid nothing. Now each one is an import that needs an entry and pays duty.
KALOTOYS shows what that model looks like and the way out of it. The founders said in a 2024 startup-competition pitch that about 95% of their products were made in their own Vietnam factory, that freight was about 20% of revenue, and that orders took about 14 days to arrive. They described a planned US workshop that would add the personalised part, so the boards could travel by sea instead of air. Public US import records show five bills of lading for their goods, shipped by sea into Houston and Long Beach between July 2025 and June 2026. A toy from Vietnam pays no base duty but 12.5% under the Section 301 duty, whether it comes as one parcel or one container. What the container saves is one entry, and its fees, per thousand units instead of one per order.
The same logic applies to dropshipping from China, and to buying stock on AliExpress or Temu in small lots. Both are now ordinary imports with duty and fees on every shipment. We compare those prices in Alibaba vs AliExpress and the business models in private label vs wholesale vs dropshipping.
What CBP is proposing next
On 8 October 2026 CBP proposed further changes to every entry of $2,500 or less (Federal Register 2026-20650). The main ones:
- informal entries filed electronically as type 11, on or before the day the goods arrive;
- a customs bond, either single-transaction or continuous, for every type 11 and type 13 filer;
- the final deliver-to party named on the entry if it differs from the consignee;
- a licensed broker acting as importer of record where the consignee, such as a carrier or freight forwarder, does not own the goods;
- goods under extra duties in Chapter 99, such as Section 232, allowed to use informal entry up to $2,500 instead of $250.
It is a proposal, open for comment until 7 December 2026. If it is adopted as written, the cost of a small import will include a bond, which is a cost formal importers already carry.
What a small brand should do now
- Price duty into every sample and small order. Assume no shipment is duty-free. Put the factory price, the HTS code and the country into our tariff calculator, then run the landed cost through the FBA fee calculator.
- Use the samples to settle the classification. The same goods can carry 15.9% or 41.2%. Get the code confirmed by a broker, or ask CBP for a binding ruling, before the main order.
- Consolidate. Each entry carries its own processing fee and filing charge. Five sample boxes in one shipment pay those once.
- Ask how your courier files. Find out who acts as importer of record, who pays the duty and what the filing fee is before you ship, not when the invoice arrives.
- Watch country of origin as well as price. The 2026 Section 301 duty is 12.5% on China, Hong Kong and Vietnam and 10% on a group that includes India and Indonesia.
FAQ
Is the de minimis limit still $800?
The $800 figure is still in the statute and in CBP's regulation, but the exemption is suspended for every mode of transport, so it is not available. From 1 July 2027 the commercial part of it is repealed.
Does the Supreme Court tariff ruling bring de minimis back?
No. The ruling held that IEEPA does not authorise tariffs. CBP's rule notes that it did not address de minimis, and de minimis is now suspended by CBP's own regulations and repealed by statute from July 2027.
Do gifts still enter duty-free?
A bona fide gift of $100 or less sent from abroad still can. Goods bought for resale are not gifts.
Who pays the duty on a small parcel?
The importer of record. In the post, CBP says the filer pays, and that the duty can be passed on to the importer or the supplier. On a courier shipment, agree with your supplier and the courier, before it ships, who acts as importer of record and who pays.
Where these facts come from
Read on 10 November 2026: CBP's interim final rules in the Federal Register, 2026-12670 (all modes except mail, 91 FR 37789) and 2026-12669 (mail, 91 FR 37801); CBP's proposed rule Low-Value Shipments, 2026-20650; Public Law 119-21, section 70531; CBP's user fee table; and the duty headings 9903.05.31 and 9903.05.84 in the Harmonized Tariff Schedule. The duty rates on our products come from our tariffs post, where each classification and its basis are set out; they are our classifications, not the brands'. Order sizes, landed costs and factory prices are from each business's launch estimate in our data, and KALOTOYS' manufacturing and shipping details are the founders' own statements and public import records as cited on its profile. None of this is legal advice: check a rate with a broker before you rely on it.