HS codes for tea: 0902 green, black and the 3 kg rule

The HS code for tea is heading 09.02 of the Harmonized System, and the six-digit subheading turns on two questions: is the tea green, or black or partly fermented like oolong, and does each immediate packing hold 3 kg or less? Green tea is 0902.10 in packings of up to 3 kg and 0902.20 otherwise; black and partly fermented tea is 0902.30 or 0902.40 (World Customs Organization, HS 2022). In 2025, 55.3% of China’s tea exports by volume left under 0902.20 and 34.7% under 0902.10, according to China’s declarations to UN Comtrade.

HS code for tea: the four subheadings of heading 09.02

The heading reads “Tea, whether or not flavoured”, so flavouring alone does not take tea out of 09.02; the notes to Chapter 21 confirm it by excluding flavoured tea from that chapter. Each subheading then combines a type test with a packing test.

Heading 09.02 in HS 2022 (wording: World Customs Organization; examples: The Tea Trade)

“Fermented” is the HS word for what tea makers call oxidation, as our guide to the six types of Chinese tea explains. In the HS Explanatory Notes, green tea is fresh leaf that is heated, rolled and dried, while black tea is rolled and fermented before it is fired or dried.

What “immediate packings” and “not exceeding 3 kg” mean

The legal notes to Chapter 9 do not define an immediate packing. National wording points to the packing that holds the tea itself: China’s tariff asks whether the inner packing (内包装) holds a net weight of no more than 3 kg per piece, and Japan’s tariff speaks of direct packaging (直接包装) with a net weight of 3 kg or less. In practice:

• Weigh the tea, not the parcel. The test is the net weight in each packing, and “not exceeding 3 kg” includes 3 kg. In a 2025 ruling, US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) classified loose black tea in five-pound (2.27 kg) metallised film bags under 0902.30.
• Under China’s wording, count the inner packings, not the shipping carton. A carton of forty 250 g boxes holds forty inner packings of 250 g; a 25 kg carton lined with one bag of loose tea holds a single inner packing of 25 kg.
• Do not assume every customs service reads it that way. In 2012 CBP classified green and white tea “in small foil pouches, packed in bulk cartons” of up to 50 pounds under 0902.20, but the same pouches packed in retail tins or paper boxes of a pound or less under 0902.10. Only the outer packing differed, and the ruling gives no reasoning.

State the net weight of each inner packing on the invoice, packing list and carton marks, with the rest of your export documents, and ask the importing country’s customs or a broker before you ship a new packing format. Common formats, from lined bulk cartons to retail tins and tea bags, are described in the guide to tea export packaging formats.

Oolong, white tea, jasmine and compressed tea

The WCO’s Explanatory Notes, which guide the interpretation of the HS, settle most borderline teas. CBP rulings quote them in English, and Japan Customs publishes a Japanese version.

• Oolong. “This heading also includes partly fermented tea (e.g., Oolong tea)”, so oolong goes to 0902.30 or 0902.40. China gives it its own lines, 0902.3010 and 0902.4010. China’s grades for Tieguanyin, Wuyi rock tea and other oolongs are explained in our guide to oolong tea grades.
• Jasmine and other flavoured tea. Tea flavoured during processing, or with essential oils such as lemon or bergamot oil, artificial flavourings or “parts of various other aromatic plants or fruits (such as jasmine flowers, dried orange peel or cloves)”, stays in 09.02. Jasmine tea on a green tea base therefore stays green: China has had separate jasmine lines, 0902.1011 and 0902.2011, since 2023.
• Blends. These are judged one by one. In 2016 CBP moved a green tea with 30% lemon peel, 16% lemongrass and 1% jasmine flowers, and a green tea blended with spearmint, from 2101.20 to 0902.10 as flavoured green tea. The same year it kept a decaffeinated black tea blended with rooibos and spices in 2101.20, as a preparation with a basis of tea: rooibos, it said, is a herbal “tea”, not a flavouring.
• White tea. The 2022 HS text does not name it. China lists white tea under the green tea subheadings, with its own lines 0902.1020 and 0902.2020 since 2023, and a 2012 CBP ruling also classified white tea with green tea. The HS 2028 text names it as partly fermented tea (see below). China’s grades for white tea are explained in our guide to white tea grades.
• Dark tea and pu-erh. China lists ripe pu-erh (0902.3031 and 0902.4031) and other dark tea (0902.3039 and 0902.4039) under the black tea subheadings. Yellow tea and raw (sheng) pu-erh have no line of their own.
• Compressed and decaffeinated tea. In Japan Customs’ version of the Notes, the heading includes tea flowers, buds, waste and powdered tea formed into balls or tablets, and tea compressed into various shapes and sizes. Decaffeinated tea also stays in 09.02, while caffeine itself goes to heading 29.39.

What falls outside heading 09.02

Tea-like products classified elsewhere (HS 2022, HS Explanatory Notes, CBP rulings)

China’s tariff adds a national note: its line 1211.9039 can cover single-species herbal “teas” such as mint tea and rooibos (2024 tariff line adjustment table).

Does HS 2028 change the HS codes for tea?

The numbers stay; the wording changes. The 2028 edition of the HS, accepted after a recommendation of the WCO Council of 26 June 2025, enters into force on 1 January 2028 with 299 sets of amendments. Its new text for the tea subheadings reads:

• 0902.10: “Non-fermented tea (green tea) in immediate packings of a content not exceeding 3 kg”
• 0902.20: “Other non-fermented tea (green tea)”
• 0902.30: “Fermented tea (black tea, dark tea) and partly fermented tea (white tea, yellow tea, oolong tea), in immediate packings of a content not exceeding 3 kg”
• 0902.40: “Other fermented tea (black tea, dark tea) and partly fermented tea (white tea, yellow tea, oolong tea)”

The 3 kg split is unchanged, and dark tea, already under China’s black tea subheadings, is named as fermented tea. White and yellow tea, however, are named as partly fermented, under 0902.30 and 0902.40, whereas China’s tariff and the 2012 CBP ruling put white tea with green tea. The WCO’s correlation tables between the two editions (July 2026 corrigendum) list no transfer of goods within heading 09.02. They only flag that the new heading 21.07 for dietary supplements may take in some products now under 09.02, one of 48 headings they list for that possible transfer. The new Chapter 21 notes limit “measured doses” to capsules, pills, tablets, ampoules and cachets, and leave plants intended to be infused out of the retail supplement preparations, so the change concerns supplements in such doses, not leaf tea or tea bags.

China publishes each year’s tariff at the end of the year before: the 2026 edition was announced on 31 December 2025. White tea exporters should check China’s 2028 lines, and their buyers’ tariffs, when they appear (checked October 2026).

National tariff lines: China, the EU and the US

Countries add their own digits to the six HS digits. The lines below are those in force in October 2026.

China: eight categories on each side of 3 kg

China’s 2026 tariff (State Council Tariff Commission announcement 2025 No. 12, in force since 1 January 2026) has 16 eight-digit lines for tea, and none has changed since 2023. The China Tea Marketing Association (CTMA) reports export volumes, based on customs statistics, for eight categories whose names match these lines. CTMA gives no codes, so the pairing in the table below is our inference.

China’s tea tariff lines and 2025 export volumes (lines: State Council Tariff Commission; volumes: CTMA; pairing: our inference)

The totals support the pairing. The code list printed in the December 2024 monthly tea report of China’s Ministry of Commerce (MOFCOM) counts only 0902.1090 and 0902.2090 as green tea, and MOFCOM’s green tea total for 2025 was 368,985.5 t; adding CTMA’s jasmine, white and other scented tea gives 377,119.5 t, against 377,120 t exported under 0902.10 and 0902.20 (our calculation from UN Comtrade). MOFCOM puts every line except the “other” green and black lines into speciality tea (特种茶), and its code list still carries four codes that are not in the current tariff, such as 0902.1010, the single scented tea line split in 2023.

On an export declaration, China uses a ten-digit commodity number: the first eight digits are the tariff and statistics code, and digits 9 and 10 are supervision codes (GACC announcement 2019 No. 18).

European Union: four CN codes

The EU’s Combined Nomenclature for 2026 (Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/1926) does not subdivide the tea subheadings: its codes are 0902 10 00, 0902 20 00, 0902 30 00 and 0902 40 00, worded as in the HS, and TARIC import codes add two zeros. The third-country duty is 3.2% on 0902 10 00 and free on the other three, according to the UK Trade Tariff’s Northern Ireland service, which shows the EU tariff measures that apply there (checked October 2026). Tea from China under all four codes also faces increased border checks for pesticide residues, as our guide to EU pesticide limits for tea explains.

United States: flavoured green tea pays duty

US tariff lines for tea (Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States, Revision 20, 2026)

Statistical suffixes separate certified organic tea in most lines, and tea in tea bags under 0902.30.00. The US also has its own packing rule: under Additional U.S. Note 4 to Chapter 9, the immediate and intermediate containers of tea in packages of less than 2.3 kg net are dutiable as if imported empty, except for goods from 11 listed partners, a list that does not include China. Nor is the general rate the whole bill: a 2025 CBP ruling on black tea of Chinese and Sri Lankan origin listed additional duties under Chapter 99 of the HTS, so check the current measures before you quote a landed cost.

Morocco and West Africa

Morocco and the ECOWAS countries add national digits too. Morocco splits green tea in packings over 3 kg into packings under 20 kg and packings of 20 kg or more, which sets its duty (see Morocco’s import duty on green tea). The lines and charges of ECOWAS countries are in our guide to West African tea import duties.

Why the 3 kg line matters: duties and statistics

Does the 3 kg line change the import duty? (general or MFN rates; EU tariff 2026 via the UK Trade Tariff for Northern Ireland, WTO, UNCTAD TRAINS, US HTS 2026)

Morocco’s green tea rates follow its 2024 finance law, as recorded by the WTO, and were unchanged in 2026; its black tea rates, and the ECOWAS rate as applied by Senegal, Côte d’Ivoire and Ghana, are those reported to UNCTAD for 2023. The 3 kg line therefore moves the duty on green tea in the EU and on black tea in Morocco, where green tea has turned on a 20 kg line since 2024, and not at all in ECOWAS countries or the United States. Algeria’s latest tariff data (UNCTAD, 2023) make no difference either, with 30% on green tea in both subheadings (Algeria’s duties on imported tea).

It also decides how statistics see the trade. China’s declarations to UN Comtrade split its 2025 exports as follows.

China’s tea exports by HS subheading, 2025 (UN Comtrade via WITS; shares and unit values: our calculation)

Source: UN Comtrade via WITS, exports reported by China (2025)

Senegal, Mauritania, Ghana, Côte d’Ivoire and Mali were the five main buyers of green tea in packings of 3 kg or less by volume, while Morocco alone took 39.3% of the green tea in larger packings. Unit values are customs values divided by weight: they mix grades and include the packing, so they are not prices. Country detail is in our guide to China’s 2025 tea exports. How China’s 20 largest tea markets have changed since 2015 is shown in our guide to Chinese tea export markets.

Before you declare: a checklist

• Type: green, or black and partly fermented; from 2028, check where white tea goes.
• Packing: the net weight of tea in each inner packing, not the weight of the carton.
• National code: China’s eight-digit line at export, the buyer’s national code at import.
• Blends: ask for a ruling when herbs or fruit make up a large share of the blend.
• Consistency: the same description and code on the contract, invoice, packing list and label.