China to India Shipping Cost:
Rates, Transit Times & Customs

There is no single per-kilo number for India, and any site that publishes one for every product is guessing. Your landed cost is four things added together: (1) freight — sea LCL billed per CBM or per 1,000 kg, sea FCL billed per container, air billed per chargeable kilo; (2) Chinese export charges — export clearance, consolidation, palletising; (3) Indian import charges — terminal handling, customs clearance, and duty; (4) inland delivery to your city. Duty is the part that surprises first-time importers: basic customs duty is commonly 7.5%–20% depending on HS code, a Social Welfare Surcharge of 10% is added on top of that duty, and IGST of 5%/12%/18%/28% applies on the duty-paid value but is creditable if you are GST-registered — so the effective cash outlay is often 20%–35% of CIF before you recover IGST. Send us the product, volume and destination pin code and we quote the freight against the current rate card for your exact shipment.

Port-to-port sea freight from Shenzhen, Nansha, Ningbo or Shanghai to Nhava Sheva (JNPT) or Mundra is typically 15–25 days; LCL adds consolidation time at both ends, so allow 20–30 days. Air freight is typically 3–7 days airport to airport. Express courier is 4–8 days door to door. Then add Indian customs clearance, which is usually 2–5 days when documents are clean but can be 10+ days if BIS approval, a query, or an examination is involved. Realistically: door-to-door sea 30–45 days, door-to-door air 7–12 days.

Yes. Our free freight cost calculator gives you a ballpark for sea, air and express using chargeable weight and volume, and it is honest about being an estimator, not a quotation. Bring it the weight and dimensions of what you are buying, and the destination city in India. For a firm number we need: product, HS code if you have it, total CBM or weight, supplier city in China, and delivery pin code in India. We reply with a per-shipment quote against the forwarder rate card, usually within one working day.

Yes. A commercial import into India requires an Importer-Exporter Code (IEC) issued by the DGFT, and the IEC must be quoted on the bill of entry. You also need GST registration if you want to claim input credit on the IGST you pay at import, and a PAN. If you are not registered yet, clearance can be done by a customs broker in your name, but the importer of record still needs the IEC. We prepare the China-side export documents so that the bill of lading, invoice and packing list match what your CHA files.

The Bureau of Indian Standards runs a mandatory registration scheme (BIS CRS) covering a long list of product categories — electronics and IT goods, batteries, toys, footwear, certain building materials and more — and those goods cannot be cleared without valid BIS registration held by the Indian importer or brand owner. Whether your product falls under it depends on the exact HS code and category, so this must be checked before you order, not after the container sails. We flag it during sampling: if your product is in scope, the registration has to be in place in India before shipment, because retrofitting compliance after arrival means storage, demurrage and sometimes re-export.

China and India are both parties to the Asia-Pacific Trade Agreement (APTA), which can give a reduced basic customs duty on eligible goods when a valid APTA certificate of origin accompanies the shipment. Coverage is product-specific and the duty reduction varies, so the rule is simple: ask your customs broker to check APTA eligibility for your HS code before we ship, and if it qualifies we issue the certificate on the China side. Note that a standard "Made in China" certificate is not the same document as an APTA preferential certificate.

For under about 15 CBM, LCL is normally cheaper on freight but more expensive per CBM and slower, because your cargo is consolidated and deconsolidated at both ends — and with India, extra handling at the CFS adds both cost and clearance time. From around 15–18 CBM the arithmetic flips to a 20ft container, and from about 25–28 CBM to a 40ft. The real deciding factor is often not price but risk: LCL means more touches by more people. If your cargo is damage-sensitive or you need speed, move to FCL earlier.

Yes, and for India it matters more than for most destinations, because duty and clearance cost are incurred per shipment. We collect from each supplier, verify quantities against your PO, consolidate at our Guangzhou warehouse, inspect before loading (AQL sampling or full inspection), re-pack and palletise for the container, and ship as one bill of lading to your Indian port. One entry, one clearance, one inland leg — instead of three of each.