Bangladesh garment industry statistics 2026: the verified numbers, with sources

Bangladesh shipped US$38.70 billion of ready-made garments in the fiscal year that ended on 30 June 2026, and those garments made up 80.62% of everything the country exported. That comes from Export Promotion Bureau (EPB) data, published by the garment exporters’ association BGMEA. The WTO ranks Bangladesh second among single countries for clothing exports in 2025, with 6.76% of the world total. Every number below carries its period and a primary source, checked on 23 September 2026. Many statistics pages that rank for these searches still repeat figures that are years old or were never right, so where sources disagree, we show both and explain the difference.

The Bangladesh garment industry at a glance

If you need the whole picture before the numbers, here it is in seven parts. Each figure is sourced in the sections below, and each part links to the guide that covers it in depth.

• Size. Garments earned US$38.70 billion in FY2025-26, 80.62% of all goods exports, which makes Bangladesh the world’s second-largest clothing exporter after China, with 6.76% of world exports in 2025 (WTO).
• History. The export industry began in the late 1970s: Desh Garments in Chattogram, trained with Daewoo of South Korea, was the first export garment factory. In FY1983-84 garments earned US$31.57 million, 3.89% of exports; they passed half of all exports in FY1990-91 and have stayed above 74% since FY1998-99. The largest clothing manufacturers in Bangladesh grew out of that first wave.
• Structure. Mapped in Bangladesh counted 3,315 export-oriented garment factories in June 2025: 1,308 knit, 1,008 woven, 560 sweater and 439 making both. Most belong to one of two associations, BGMEA or BKMEA (how they differ), and they cluster around Dhaka, Gazipur, Narayanganj and Chattogram (where clothing is made). Large vertical groups sit beside thousands of single factories, and many foreign buyers order through a buying house.
• Workers and wages. About 3 million people work in export garment factories (Mapped in Bangladesh), and about 4.2 million across the wider sector (IFC and ILO, 2025). About 54% are women. The legal minimum for the entry grade has been Tk 12,500 a month since 1 December 2023 (garment worker wages).
• Products and markets. Knitwear is 53.3% of garment exports and woven garments the rest. T-shirts are the largest single customs heading (18.3%), followed by men’s woven suits, jackets and trousers, the same for women, and knitted jerseys and sweaters; those four make up 62.4% of the total. The EU buys 49.25%, the United States 20.01% and the United Kingdom 11.34% (garment exports by market).
• Safety. The Rana Plaza collapse on 24 April 2013 killed more than 1,100 people. About 3,780 export factories were then inspected, and the country now has 291 LEED-certified green garment factories (what changed after Rana Plaza).
• Risks and outlook. Exports have moved sideways, between US$36 billion and US$40 billion, for four years, though the first quarter of FY2026-27 was 6.10% up. Two things decide the next few years: graduation from least developed country status, now scheduled for 24 November 2029 (what it changes for duty), and the 10% US Section 301 tariff in force since 24 July 2026. How Bangladesh compares with its rivals is in Bangladesh vs Vietnam vs China vs India.

The fact sheet: the key numbers, dated and sourced

The table gathers the figures most often searched for. The sections that follow explain each one, and the full list of sources sits at the end of the page.

Exports and their weight in the economy

Bangladesh counts its fiscal year from July to June, so FY2025-26 means 1 July 2025 to 30 June 2026. The table uses the EPB series as BGMEA publishes it. Compare years within this one series rather than mixing in totals from other publishers, which may use a different basis or an older release.

On a calendar-year basis the same source gives US$35.89 billion for 2023, US$38.48 billion for 2024 and US$38.82 billion for 2025. The 2025 figure matches the value in the WTO’s world ranking. The new fiscal year started higher: EPB data for July to September 2026 show US$10.58 billion of garment exports, 6.10% more than the US$9.97 billion of the same quarter a year earlier, with knitwear at US$5.96 billion (up 6.88%) and woven garments at US$4.61 billion (up 5.11%). Compare a quarter with the same quarter a year before, never with a full-year total.

The long view shows how far garments have come to dominate Bangladesh’s trade. In FY1983-84, garments earned US$31.57 million, just 3.89% of exports. Their share passed half in FY1990-91 (50.47%) and has stayed above 74% in every fiscal year since FY1998-99. In the last four years the total has moved sideways, between US$36 billion and US$40 billion.

Against the size of the economy, the World Bank puts Bangladesh’s 2025 GDP at US$456.3 billion. Garment exports equal about 8.6% of that if you use the FY2024-25 total, or 8.5% with calendar 2025. That is our arithmetic, and it compares gross export sales with GDP, which measures value added. Imported yarn, fabric and trims are inside the export value, so the industry’s own contribution to GDP is smaller than the ratio suggests. Any line saying garments are a given percentage of GDP should say which measure it used.

World rank, markets and products in brief

World rank. The WTO’s Statistical Tables 2026 (Table 22) put Bangladesh’s 2025 clothing exports at US$38.82 billion, second among single countries after China, with 6.76% of the world total, against 4.22% in 2010. The WTO also lists the European Union as one exporter, but that total includes trade between member states, so Bangladesh’s rank is quoted among single countries. Viet Nam, in third place, finished about US$1.3 billion behind. How the four big Asian producers compare for a buyer is covered in our guide to Bangladesh vs Vietnam vs China vs India.

Markets. In FY2025-26 the EU took 49.25% of Bangladesh’s garment exports, the United States 20.01% and the United Kingdom 11.34%, according to EPB data. Values by market, the largest EU buyers and the view from the importing side are in our deeper guide to Bangladesh garment exports, so we do not repeat them here.

Products. Knitwear (customs chapter 61) earned 53.3% of garment export value in FY2025-26 and woven garments (chapter 62) 46.7%. BGMEA’s five main product families, led by trousers, t-shirts and sweaters, made up about 80% of the total. The same exports guide breaks the figures down by four-digit HS heading.

Download the data: apparel exports by country, FY2025-26 (CSV) for the 40 markets our country guides cover, with the change on the year before and each market’s share of the total, and a chart of the 15 largest (PNG). The figures are BGMEA’s Export Performance table, built on Export Promotion Bureau data. Both files are free to reuse with a credit to BGMEA and the EPB and a link to this page.

Factories and workers: why every source gives a different number

The most detailed public count comes from Mapped in Bangladesh (MiB), a project of BRAC University’s Centre for Entrepreneurship Development that builds its list by surveying factories on the ground. Its 2025 booklet, with data as of June 2025, records:

• 3,315 export-oriented garment factories in 20 districts.
• By type: 1,308 knit, 1,008 woven, 560 sweater and 439 making both knit and woven.
• By membership: 2,053 in BGMEA, 739 in BKMEA, 807 in neither, and 284 counted in both associations.

The 2025 booklet gives no worker total. The workforce figure comes from an earlier publication: MiB’s impact report for 2022 to 2024, when its map listed 3,722 factories, put the workforce in export-oriented garment factories at about 3 million; MiB’s March 2022 census of 3,723 factories had counted about 2.78 million. The report says the map tracks new factories as well as those that stop operating, which is why its total moves: on 23 September 2026 the live map showed 3,320 factories.

Other counts answer different questions. An association’s member list counts members, and the MiB split shows why that differs from a factory census: some factories belong to both associations and hundreds to neither. A national labour figure may also include textile mills, subcontractors and informal work: a 2025 assessment for the IFC and ILO puts the sector’s workforce at about 4.2 million. Before you rely on a number, check three things: whether it covers export garment factories only, whether it counts factories that are still operating, and its date. Where the factories cluster and how to check one are covered in our guide to garment factories in Bangladesh, and the two associations in BGMEA vs BKMEA.

Women in the workforce: most of the sewing floor, few of the supervisors

Women hold most of the jobs in Bangladesh’s garment factories, but by a smaller margin than the figure of about 80% that still circulates from the industry’s early years. A survey of 337 factories, carried out by BRAC University researchers in 2022 and published by GIZ, the German government’s development agency, found a slow decline: women were 54.22% of workers in 2015, 53.89% in 2018 and 53.65% in 2021, against about 80% in the 1980s. A 2025 assessment for Better Work, the programme of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) and the International Labour Organization (ILO), written by researchers from the University of Oxford and BRAC University, cites that study for its figure of about 54%.

The share changes with the kind of factory and the job. In the 2021 survey women were 60.64% of workers in woven factories and 51.84% in knit factories, 71.47% in Chattogram and 57.06% in Dhaka, and 64.57% in the sewing section. Women are also a growing share of those who leave: of the workers who left the industry in 2021, 50.63% were women, against 48.86% in 2015. Former women workers most often gave caring for children (26.67%) and pregnancy (17.89%) as the reason.

The gap is in promotion. The 2025 assessment says women make up three quarters of helpers and sewing operators but are nearly absent from supervisory and management roles. In the 50 factories of its training programme, which supply H&M, Levi Strauss & Co., Marks & Spencer, Ralph Lauren and VF Corporation, the average share of female supervisors rose from 10% to 18% between 2016 and 2022, and lines run by the trained supervisors were 2.5 percentage points more efficient than lines run by supervisors without the training.

These are national and programme averages, not a figure for any one factory. If your brand reports on gender in its supply chain, ask the factory that will make your order for its own headcount by grade and by sex, from operators to line chiefs and managers, with the date it was counted. Grade-by-grade pay is in our guide to garment worker wages.

The legal minimum wage in taka, dollars, euros and pounds

The Minimum Wage Board’s list of declared rates, updated in September 2026, gives the garment sector’s rate under a gazette of 20 December 2023, in force from 1 December 2023. An entry-grade worker must receive at least Tk 12,500 a month: basic pay of Tk 6,700, house rent of Tk 3,350, and fixed allowances of Tk 750 for medical care, Tk 450 for transport and Tk 1,250 for food. The list also sets an annual increment of 9% of basic pay, which on the entry-grade basic of Tk 6,700 is Tk 603 a month at the first increment (our arithmetic).

Bangladesh Bank’s rate page for 23 September 2026 gives a weighted average of Tk 122.99 to the US dollar. At that rate Tk 12,500 is about US$102 a month, and at the bank’s cross rates for the same day it is about €89 or £76. These are floors, not typical pay: higher grades, the increment and overtime all sit on top. Grade-by-grade rates, wages inside export processing zones, living-wage estimates and the next wage review are in our guide to garment worker wages.

Green factories: 291 LEED buildings and how to check one

BGMEA’s environment page stated on 23 September 2026 that Bangladesh has 291 LEED-certified green garment factories, certified by the U.S. Green Building Council (USGBC), and that 53 of the world’s top 100 green garment factories are in the country. Check the date behind any count you see, because a total without one cannot be compared with this figure.

LEED certifies a building project: its design, energy and water performance, and materials. It is not a social audit and says nothing about wages, hours or chemical management, so treat it as one line in a supplier file, next to the audit reports. You can check any claim yourself in the USGBC LEED project directory, which is public: search the factory name, filter by country, and confirm that the certified site matches the address on your purchase order, because a certificate for one building does not cover a sister unit elsewhere. Our guide to verifying factory certificates covers the other registers a buyer can search. Some of these factories open their doors to international guests on BGMEA's Green Factory Tour on 17 November 2026, the day before BATEXPO 2026.

Trade status: LDC graduation and the US tariff

LDC graduation. According to the UN LDC Portal, Bangladesh is scheduled to leave the least developed country category on 24 November 2029. On 18 February 2026 the UN Committee for Development Policy received the government’s request to consider extending the preparatory period. The committee concluded that an extension by the General Assembly would be appropriate, provided Bangladesh makes significant progress on domestic reforms, and on 29 October 2026 the General Assembly extended the preparatory period by three years, from the original date of 24 November 2026. What graduation would change for duty in the EU, UK and other markets is set out in our guide to LDC graduation and duty-free apparel.

United States. A USTR notice published in the Federal Register on 28 July 2026 imposes a 10% Section 301 tariff on goods of Bangladesh entered on or after 12:01 a.m. eastern time on 24 July 2026, with listed exemptions. For Bangladesh the 10% is charged on top of the normal duty, not netted against it as it is for a few other economies. The notice also says tariff-rate quotas for Bangladesh, linked to its imports of US cotton and textile inputs, will be set up when feasible. Separately, on 20 February 2026 the US Supreme Court held that the International Emergency Economic Powers Act, the law used for the 2025 reciprocal tariffs, does not authorise the President to impose tariffs. Confirm the full duty on your own HTS code with your customs broker; our page for US brands covers the rest of the import process, and our guide to US tariffs on clothing from Bangladesh works through the duty by product.

Numbers still repeated online, and what the sources say

These figures appear on statistics and sourcing pages that rank for the searches above. We describe the claim, not the page, and give the primary figure that replaces it. Claims about duty, tariffs and origin rules are checked the same way in our Bangladesh clothing sourcing myths and facts guide.

What to do next

For a buyer the numbers point to three practical conclusions. Bangladesh is a volume specialist in knitwear, trousers and sweaters; the EU and UK together take about 60% of its garments; and trade terms are in motion in the US and after LDC graduation, so price on landed cost, not ex-factory cost alone. Our why Bangladesh page sets out the wider case.

CMB Sourcing Ltd. is a buying house in Narayanganj, Dhaka. We make knitwear and caps in our own factory and source everything else from audited partner factories, and we name the factory in writing before production, with its address and the certificates and audit reports it holds, so you can check it against the registers above yourself. Our full package production page explains how an order runs, from sampling and fabric to inspection and shipment. Our own orders start at 500 pieces per style and colour, with higher minimums for some categories, such as 2,000 for denim and jackets. Send us your product list or tech pack for a quote, and we will reply within one working day.