HS Codes for Fashion Imports: Bags, Apparel & Footwear Explained (2026)

If your brand imports more than one product category — bags plus apparel, or a full look with footwear — you’re dealing with three different chapters of the tariff schedule, each with its own logic and its own traps. Bags live in Chapter 42, clothing in Chapters 61 and 62, footwear in Chapter 64. The one rule that runs through all of them: material choice moves your duty more than anything else, and synthetic fibres are consistently penalised. This guide maps the three chapters, shows example rates side by side, and flags the classification trap in each one that costs importers real money.

Last updated: 23 July 2026. Rates below are General (Column 1) MFN base rates under the 2026 Harmonized Tariff Schedule — before any additional surcharges, which apply by country of origin and change frequently. The definitive classification for your product comes from CBP or a licensed customs broker.

How HS codes actually work (60 seconds)

The Harmonized System (HS) is the international 6-digit product classification used by nearly every customs authority. The US extends it to a 10-digit HTS code, which sets your duty rate. The first two digits are the chapter — and for a fashion brand, four chapters cover almost everything you’ll ever ship:

Everything below is about what happens inside those chapters — because that’s where the money moves.

Chapter 42: bags — duty follows the outer surface

For bags, the rate is driven by what material forms the outer surface: leather handbags run 9–10%, cotton canvas 6.3%, and man-made fibre (polyester, nylon) 17.6% — an 11-point gap between two totes a customer can’t tell apart.

We’ve covered this chapter in full — the complete rate table, the coated-fabric trap, the $20 leather breakpoint, and a worked example — in our guide to HTS 4202 and US import duty on bags. If bags are your main category, start there.

The Chapter 42 trap: coated fabrics. A cotton bag with a polyurethane-coated exterior classifies as plastic sheeting (16%), not cotton (6.3%), because customs classifies what you see and feel on the outside.

Chapters 61 & 62: apparel — knit or woven decides the chapter

Clothing splits at the chapter level on a single question most brands never think about: is the fabric knitted or woven? Knits (t-shirts, hoodies, jersey dresses) are Chapter 61. Wovens (denim, poplin shirts, tailored jackets) are Chapter 62. Same garment silhouette, different chapter, different rate.

Then, inside each chapter, fibre content takes over — and the synthetic penalty is much bigger than in bags:

• A cotton knit t-shirt (6109.10) carries 16.5%.
• The same t-shirt in polyester (6109.90.10) carries 32% — nearly double.
• Across the two chapters, cotton garments generally run ~9–16.6% while man-made-fibre garments run ~14–28% and higher.

For blended fabrics, classification generally follows the fibre that predominates by weight — which means a 52/48 blend can sit on the profitable side of a 15-point rate gap. Mills know this; so should you.

The Chapter 61/62 trap: assuming “a shirt is a shirt.” A knit polo and a woven camp-collar shirt classify into different chapters, with different rates and different statistical categories. Get the construction wrong on your paperwork and you’ve misclassified the whole line.

Chapter 64: footwear — the most complex chapter in fashion

Footwear classification is famously intricate: the rate turns on the outer sole material, the upper material, the shoe’s function — and, uniquely, its value per pair.

• Athletic shoes with textile uppers valued over $12/pair (6404.11.90) carry 20% — the line most branded sneakers land on.
• Specific lines run far lower — vegetable-fibre-upper shoes at 7.5%, and textile-upper shoes in the $3–$12/pair value bands at 12.5%.
• At the other end, some footwear lines reach 37.5% or even 48%, and a few carry compound rates like 90¢/pair + 37.5% — a flat per-pair charge on top of the percentage. Leather-upper footwear (6403) generally sits well below its textile/synthetic equivalents.

Those value-per-pair bands exist nowhere else in fashion classification — the same shoe can change duty rate because its customs value crossed the $3, $6.50 or $12 threshold. Combined with sole/upper distinctions (is that sole rubber or plastic? does the upper’s surface count the overlays?), Chapter 64 is where we most strongly recommend a broker or a CBP binding ruling before you price a line.

The Chapter 64 trap: the upper-material measurement itself. What counts as the “external surface area of the upper” — with or without accessories and reinforcements — has been litigated for decades. Small design details (a leather overlay on a textile shoe) can flip the heading.

The pattern across all three: material is a duty decision

Put the chapters side by side and the pattern is unmistakable:

Illustrative General-rate comparisons — actual rates depend on the full 10-digit classification. Surcharges by country of origin apply on top; see our Section 301 guide for how those stack.

The takeaway isn’t “always use cotton” — synthetics often win on performance and price per metre. The takeaway is that fabric decisions made at the design stage are duty decisions, and the time to model them is while the tech pack is still open, not when the customs bill arrives.

Sourcing mixed categories from Southeast Asia

Here’s the practical reason this matters to our readers: fashion brands rarely ship one category. A typical seasonal order might be handbags plus matching small leather goods, or a capsule with bags, tees and footwear. Two things to know:

1. Each product line classifies on its own. There’s no blended rate for a mixed shipment — every line item on your commercial invoice carries its own HTS code and its own duty. Your broker files them together, but the classification work multiplies with each category.
2. The origin advantage applies across all three chapters. The same logic that makes Vietnam attractive for bags — no China Section 301 layer, genuine origin documentation — applies equally to apparel and footwear, which is why so much of both industries has already moved there.

At Bagsource SEA, bags are our core specialism — and because our factory network in Vietnam and Malaysia sits inside the broader garment and footwear manufacturing ecosystem, we can source apparel and footwear alongside your bag programme where it makes sense: one sourcing partner, one QC standard, one set of origin paperwork, one consolidated shipment. If you’re planning a mixed-category order, send us a brief and we’ll tell you honestly which parts we can serve well — our sourcing process works the same way across categories.

Frequently asked questions

Sources & further reading

• USITC — Harmonized Tariff Schedule of the United States (the official schedule — Chapters 42, 61, 62, 64; all rates in this article verified against the current release).
• USITC — Chapter 62 tariff schedule (PDF).
• GingerControl — HTS Classification for Textiles and Apparel: Fiber Content and GRI.
• FreightAmigo — HS Codes: Cotton vs Synthetic Shirts.
• ClearitUSA — Importing Footwear into the U.S.: Classification, Duties & Pitfalls.

Duty rates and trade measures change. Confirm your product’s classification and current rates with a licensed customs broker before making sourcing or pricing decisions.