In this article
Follow China's finished human-hair exports and the first destination is the United States. The next is Nigeria. Ghana and South Africa follow, ahead of the United Kingdom.
That order makes the trade more interesting than a simple factory-to-American-salon story. It also raises a question: are these shipments wigs, extensions or something else?
The short answer: China reported $3.555 billion in exports of finished human-hair articles in 2024, with 62.05% of that value destined for the United States. The customs category is HS 670420. It covers more than extensions, so it cannot supply an extensions-only market size.
The destination map, in numbers
Read the following as one country's export record—not a ranking of global retail spending. Every row uses China as reporter, 2024 as year and HS 670420 as the category.
| Destination | China's exports, US$ million |
|---|---|
| United States | 2,205.8 |
| Nigeria | 363.7 |
| Ghana | 165.2 |
| South Africa | 132.9 |
| United Kingdom | 115.2 |
| Democratic Republic of the Congo | 101.2 |
Source: China's 2024 export table, WITS / UN Comtrade.
Four of the five destinations immediately after the US are African countries. That is a concrete finding about this export table. It does not establish which country's consumers buy the most pieces or which retail market is growing fastest.
A compact way to read the same table is: China's export value → United States 62.05% / all other destinations 37.95%. The percentages describe declared value, not the proportion of hair fibres or customers.
The US import record tells a different-sized story
The United States reported $768.9 million in total HS 670420 imports in 2024. Selected recorded suppliers were:
| Partner in the US import table | US imports, US$ million |
|---|---|
| China | 660.4 |
| Indonesia | 57.4 |
| Vietnam | 15.5 |
| Bangladesh | 12.6 |
| Cambodia | 1.0 |
Source: US 2024 import table, WITS / UN Comtrade.
These records establish a trade connection. They do not identify where each donor's hair was collected or reconstruct the manufacturing history of a particular bundle.
Why $2.206 billion and $660.4 million must stay separate
China reported $2.206 billion leaving for the US. The US reported $660.4 million arriving from China, in the same year and category. Those are partner records of the same bilateral trade, but they do not agree: the first is approximately 3.34 times the second.
Do not divide the US's total imports by China's total exports and call the result America's share of China's shipments. That mixes reporters. The 62.05% above is calculated entirely within China's export table.
Nor should the two bilateral figures be averaged into a supposedly better number. The discrepancy is a research question. This comparison alone cannot tell us which value is correct or establish smuggling, fraud or the amount of either.
What this tells us about the extensions business
The useful business distinction is between a flow of goods and a consumer market. Customs records describe cross-border declarations. They do not include a salon's installation charge, reveal a retailer's margin or separate every attachment format sold under the finished-human-hair category.
Someone researching tape-ins, wefts or fusion tips therefore needs to resist an attractive shortcut: attaching a large customs total to that one product type. The data support the broader category, not that narrower claim.
Country names need the same care. Collection, processing, manufacture and a style label can describe different things. See where hair extensions come from for that distinction.
How these figures were prepared
The two linked WITS tables present UN Comtrade data. This article uses calendar-year 2024 and HS 670420 throughout; it does not claim 2024 is the latest available year for every reporter. WITS displays trade values in thousands of US dollars; table values here are converted to millions and rounded.
Shares and the bilateral ratio are calculated from the unrounded table values. No raw-hair or prepared-material totals have been added to finished goods. These are nominal customs values, not retail revenue, profit, product quality or donor origin.
Published by Prarvi, a hair supplier. This article presents trade-data analysis; it makes no claim about the provenance or performance of a particular product.
