Market Data

What Counts as a U.S. Aluminum Import? Inside the $2.80B Monthly Census Number

A plain-English guide to the Census International Trade series every metal buyer quotes but few understand: what it includes, how it's measured, and the four forces that move it month to month.

U.S. aluminum imports are the customs value of aluminum and aluminum articles entering the country, tracked monthly by the Census Bureau's International Trade program, and they ran $2.80B in May 2026, up about 38.0% from a year ago. It is the number behind most headlines about foreign metal, and it deserves a precise definition, because what it includes, and what it leaves out, changes what a buyer should do with it.

What's inside the number

The series spans the aluminum chapter of the trade classification: unwrought primary metal and alloys, plus wrought forms, plate, sheet, foil, bar, wire, extrusions, tube, and basic aluminum articles. It is valued at customs value, the transaction price at the foreign port before U.S. duty, freight, and insurance, which means the published figure sits below what importers actually pay landed. Canada dominates the supply base, a structural fact that ties this line to the exchange rate and to North American trade policy more tightly than most commodity series. The number is released monthly in the Census FT-900 report, about five to six weeks after each month ends.

The customs-value convention has a practical consequence buyers routinely miss: the published number is not what imported aluminum costs at your dock. Duty is assessed on top, and Section 232 rates on aluminum have been material, then ocean or cross-border freight, brokerage, and inland haulage stack further. A landed-cost calculation can run meaningfully above the customs value the Census records, and the gap widens every time duties rise. When you benchmark supplier quotes against "the import number," remember that the number is the starting line of the cost build-up, not the finish.

U.S. aluminum imports, May 2026: $2.80B. The monthly customs value has ranged from $1.84B in Jul 2025 to $16.07B in Apr 2026 in the archived window; today's print sits at the 7th percentile of that span.

The four forces that move it

Month-to-month swings decompose into four drivers. Demand: aluminum feeds transportation, packaging, construction, and electrical equipment, so factory activity pulls the line directly. Price: this is a dollar series, and aluminum's world price is volatile, the line can jump without an extra pound arriving. Tariffs: Section 232 duties, in place since 2018 and adjusted repeatedly since, have caused some of the sharpest single-month moves on record as buyers raced deadlines; treat outsized months in the archived range with suspicion. Currency: because so much supply is Canadian, the exchange rate quietly reprices the whole line. A disciplined reader checks all four before crediting any move to "demand."

A quick attribution routine sorts most months in minutes. Check the world aluminum price first: if it moved sharply, assume price explains much of the line until proven otherwise. Check the calendar second: duty announcements and quota deadlines cluster orders into specific months, and the distortion reverses the following quarter. Check the Canadian dollar third. Only when all three are quiet does a move in the series earn a demand interpretation, and that is precisely when it is most worth acting on, because quiet-month demand signals are the ones that persist.

The import line can jump without a single extra pound of metal arriving, price, tariffs, and currency all wear the same disguise as demand.

The arithmetic that makes it useful

The May 2026 pace annualizes to roughly $33.64B of foreign aluminum, the national bill that surcharges, duties, and hedging decisions all key off. A one-percent move in the series represents about $28,031,107 a month of metal value nationally. For a single buyer the translation is direct: if your aluminum spend tracked the series' latest year-over-year move (+38.0%), a $50,000-a-month purchasing line would swing by about $227,847 a year. That is why the definition matters, this series is the earliest public warning of what your next aluminum quote already knows.

Model your import exposure with the tariff impact calculator to see what duty changes add to each purchased part. See what a duty does to your cost

Published 2026-07-13.