What actually happened to US de minimis in 2026
The $800 exemption is gone, reciprocal tariffs are gone, the 10% surcharge is gone, and a Section 301 forced-labour tariff took its place on 24 July 2026. Most of what is written about this online describes a rule set that has been superseded twice. This page is the sequence, with the Federal Register citation for each step.
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E.O. 14389 terminates every IEEPA tariff
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A 10% Section 122 surcharge starts, capped at 150 days
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De minimis suspended for courier, air, ocean and truck
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De minimis suspended for post; surcharge expires; Section 301 begins
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Entry Type 13 electronic mail entry test opens
CBP interim final rule, 91 FR 37801, DATES and §III (doc 2026-12669)
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FY2027 customs user fees take effect
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Postal informal entry closes to chapter 99 goods, including every Section 301 origin upcoming
CBP interim final rule, 91 FR 37801, DATES and §III (doc 2026-12669)
Each change, in full
In forceEndedUpcomingConditional
From 22 October 2026, postal informal entry closes to anything carrying a Section 301 duty Upcoming
CBP calls this a narrow grace period, but read 19 CFR 145.12(a)(2)(v)–(vi) and it is not. After 22 October 2026, postal informal entry is limited to goods classifiable only in HTSUS chapters 1–97. Any mail shipment subject to an additional chapter 99 duty then needs formal entry, and the 2026 Section 301 forced-labour duties are chapter 99 headings (9903.05.20–9903.05.84) covering every origin on this site, unless your product is on the annex exemption list. The same goes for anything under FDA, USDA, FCC or other Partner Government Agency requirements, and for parcels claiming Chapter 98 or free-trade-agreement duty-free treatment. The one alternative is the voluntary Entry Type 13 electronic mail entry test, which CBP scheduled to begin on 22 September 2026 and which accepts chapter 99 and PGA goods. Goods under antidumping or countervailing duty orders or quotas cannot use it and need formal entry.
The $800 de minimis exemption is gone for post too In force
Since 24 July 2026 the $800 de minimis exemption is indefinitely suspended for mail as well, and CBP has stood up a new postal informal entry process in its place. The ceiling for that process is $2,500, not $800. The party making entry must hold a basic importation and entry bond, and must be the owner or purchaser of the goods or a licensed customs broker they designate — a seller overseas generally cannot file it themselves, so in practice the postal operator or a broker handles it and bills it on.
The 10% across-the-board surcharge expired on 24 July 2026 Expired
Between 24 February and 24 July 2026 almost everything entering the US carried an extra 10% Section 122 balance-of-payments surcharge under Proclamation 11012. Section 122 caps such a surcharge at 150 days unless Congress extends it, Congress did not, and it lapsed by operation of law at 12:01 a.m. EDT on 24 July 2026. It is no longer collected. If you are comparing a quote against an invoice from June or early July, that 10 percentage points is the difference.
What replaced it: Section 301 forced-labour tariffs, live since 24 July 2026 In force
The same instant the surcharge lapsed, a new country-level duty took its place. USTR investigated 60 economies over their failure to impose and enforce a prohibition on importing goods made with forced labour, and now applies 10% or 12.5% ad valorem to all goods of each, with annex exemptions. It took effect at 12:01 a.m. ET on 24 July 2026. Goods already loaded and in transit before that moment and entered before 28 July 2026 were spared; everything since is caught. This is now the main country-level add-on on top of the ordinary MFN duty rate.
Some products are exempt — and we cannot read the list for you Conditional
Annexes I and II of the USTR notice exempt specific HTS lines from the Section 301 tariff for each economy. In the Federal Register those annexes are published as scanned page images, not as text, so they cannot be encoded here and this calculator does not apply them. If your product is exempt, your real duty is lower than the estimate below. Check the annex against your 10-digit HTS code before you price anything.
The $800 de minimis exemption is gone for courier and freight In force
Since 24 June 2026 the $800 de minimis exemption is indefinitely suspended for every mode of importation except the international postal network. Any shipment arriving by courier, express, air, ocean or truck — whatever it is worth, even $12 — must now go through formal or informal entry procedures. Entry Type 86 is suspended and release-from-manifest is no longer available, which leaves Entry Type 11 informal entry as the normal path for shipments valued at $2,500 or less.
Reciprocal tariffs were abolished in February 2026 — ignore any page that still quotes them Terminated
This is the one almost every other site still gets wrong. On 20 February 2026, Executive Order 14389 terminated all additional ad-valorem duties imposed under IEEPA — including the reciprocal-tariff regime of E.O. 14257, along with the Canada, Mexico, China-fentanyl, Brazil, Russia, Cuba, Iran and Venezuela-oil duty orders. The order states those duties "shall no longer be in effect and, as soon as practicable, shall no longer be collected." If a landed-cost calculator is still adding a 26%, 34% or 50% "reciprocal tariff" for your country, it is quoting a rule that has been dead since February.
What this means if you sell abroad
Three practical consequences. First, there is no value floor any more — a $9 parcel and a $900 parcel both need a customs entry, so the fixed cost per shipment now matters more than the duty rate on cheap items. Second, the country-level add-on is smaller than it was during the surcharge period but it applies to everything, so a duty-free product like a toy or a book is no longer duty-free once origin is counted. Third, if you ship by post, put 22 October 2026 in your calendar. From that date postal informal entry is closed to anything carrying a Section 301 duty, which covers almost every parcel from the economies it applies to. What changes on 22 October, and what to do.
The single most common error we see in other guidance is treating the European Union, Japan, Korea, Switzerland and Taiwan the same way as everyone else. For those, the Section 301 duty is a cap: if the ordinary MFN rate already meets or exceeds the cap, the additional duty is zero. Adding it as a surcharge overstates the bill by up to the full rate.
Get told when these rules change
US import rules for small sellers changed three times in 2026 — February, June and July. When the next one lands, you get one plain-English email. No schedule, no filler; some months there is nothing to send.