How much does it cost to manufacture clothing in Bangladesh? Cost by product (2026)

What clothing costs to make in Bangladesh depends on the garment: fabric is close to half of any garment price and the cost of making 15–24%; construction, decoration, testing and shipping terms build up the rest. CMB Sourcing Ltd. publishes no prices, because every style is quoted from its own tech pack. This guide shows how a price is built, lists our minimums and what moves the price in fourteen product categories, walks through a published cost sheet line by line, and turns an FOB price into a delivered cost for the UK, EU, US, Canada and Australia.

Minimums and what moves the price, by product

These are the minimums for each category made through CMB Sourcing Ltd., with the choices that usually move the price most. We publish no prices: fabric, weight, decoration, quantity and shipping terms set every one, so each style is quoted from your tech pack or a reference garment, and the sections below explain why.

Minimums as of 8 October 2026, for our own orders. Small first runs from 150 pieces go to our sister company, which prices them itself; our co-founder Homaira Jashim co-founded it and AB Rahman is its Head of Growth.

What a garment price is made of

A factory or buying house costs each style line by line. A 2023 study of cost sheets from four Bangladeshi garment factories, published in the Journal of Textile Science and Technology, lists the main components:

• Fabric: the amount of fabric per garment, including cutting waste, multiplied by the fabric price.
• Trims and accessories: thread, labels, buttons, zips, tags, polybags and cartons.
• Cost of making (CM): cutting, sewing, finishing and packing labour and overheads.
• Washing, print and embroidery, where the design needs them.
• Testing: laboratory tests your market or retailer requires.
• Commercial, transport and other costs: banking, documents and inland transport, plus any agent commission and the factory’s margin.

How the cost splits by product

The same study broke down four basic FOB orders:

Two patterns matter for your costing. Fabric is the largest single cost for every product, close to half of the price. And construction drives labour: the study notes a t-shirt needs about 12 sewing operations and a polo about 16, while a shirt has more than 40, which is why its cost of making is the highest.

A t-shirt cost sheet, line by line

To see what those shares mean in money, take the study’s own basic t-shirt, costed at US$39.40 a dozen on FOB terms, about US$3.28 a piece. These are the study’s 2023 figures from four Bangladeshi factories, not our price and not a quote: your own sheet will differ with every choice below. The study’s tee also had a chest print and a garment wash, which it counted in other costs.

The per-piece figures are the study’s dozen price divided by 12 and multiplied by its rounded shares, so they are approximate; the study itself gives the fabric as US$16.78 a dozen and the cost of making as US$6.00 a dozen. Read the sheet from the top. Fabric is where a quote is won or lost: a heavier jersey, a custom colour with its own dye lot, or certified organic cotton each move the largest line first. The cost of making, the line people argue about most, is under a fifth of the total on a basic tee.

What moves the price most

• Fabric choice. Composition, weight (GSM or ounces), custom colours and certified fibres such as organic or recycled cotton all change the largest line in the costing. Our fabric sourcing page explains where Bangladesh makes its own fabric and where it imports it, which also decides your duty after LDC graduation.
• Construction. Every extra panel, pocket, placket or topstitch adds sewing operations and time.
• Washes and decoration. Garment dyeing, enzyme or stone washes, prints and embroidery are costed separately. Screen printing is priced by colours and positions, embroidery by stitch count, sublimation by area; see how each method is priced.
• Quantity per style and colour. Set-up, sampling and fabric minimums are spread over fewer pieces on small orders, which is why a 300-piece run costs more per piece than 3,000 of the same style. Our guide to minimum order quantities shows where the thresholds sit.
• Testing and compliance. Children’s products and some retailers need specific laboratory tests, charged per test.
• Shipping terms. An FOB price stops at the port in Bangladesh. CIF adds sea freight and insurance, and DDP adds import duty, clearance and delivery to your door.

The costs that sit outside the price per piece

Compare quotes on the same basis by asking what is excluded. Development samples and pattern making are usually charged, then credited or waived against a bulk order. Fabric swatches, lab dips and strike-offs travel by courier, and courier charges add up on a long development. Laboratory testing is billed per test at the laboratory’s rate. A third-party inspection, if your retailer requires one, is priced per inspector-day. None of these are large next to a production order, but all of them arrive before it, and a quote that hides them is not a lower quote.

Labour costs in context

The minimum monthly wage for Bangladesh’s garment workers was set at Tk 12,500 in late 2023. In December 2024, workers, owners and the government agreed a 9% annual increment. Labour is only one part of the cost of making, which the study above puts at 15–24% of the price of basic garments, so a wage rise of that size moves a garment price by a few cents rather than by dollars.

From FOB price to landed cost, market by market

To compare Bangladesh with other countries, compare landed cost, not FOB price. Add freight and insurance, import duty, clearance and delivery for your market. Duty is where the markets differ most, and as of September 2026 it favours Bangladesh in every major market except the United States.

Two cautions. Zero duty depends on the goods meeting the origin rules and the shipment carrying the right proof, which our shipping guide explains. And Bangladesh is scheduled to leave the least developed country category on 24 November 2029, after which each preference follows its own transition; the UN General Assembly moved the date from 24 November 2026 on 29 October 2026. Our LDC graduation guide sets out the dates market by market.

The order cost estimator turns a price per piece into an order total and shows the cost split, and the landed cost calculator does the rest of the arithmetic once your quote states the shipping term.

Duty on a hoodie from Bangladesh, worked through (23 September 2026)

The table above gives the rules. Here they are applied to one hoodie at an illustrative price of US$10.00 paid to the seller for the goods, a figure invented for the arithmetic: it is not a quote and not our price. Freight, insurance and broker fees are left out because they come from your forwarder; transit times are in our sea vs air freight guide. The fibre that predominates by weight decides the tariff line, so cotton-rich and polyester-rich hoodies are classified differently, as our HS code guide explains.

The US figure: what the extra 10% is, and what it is charged on

The extra 10% is the Section 301 tariff on products of Bangladesh entered on or after 24 July 2026, recorded in the US tariff schedule under heading 9903.05.26 as the garment’s own rate plus 10%, and US duty is charged on the price actually paid for the goods, without international freight and insurance. The “reciprocal” tariffs of 2025, still quoted on some sourcing pages, ended with Executive Order 14389 of 20 February 2026. Our guide to US tariffs on clothing from Bangladesh gives the rate for each garment, the fees per entry and the rules for samples.

The UK, EU and Australian figures: zero duty, not zero tax

All three zero rates depend on the origin rules and proof described above. In the UK the same 0% and 12% apply to a man-made fibre hoodie (6110 30 91 00). UK import VAT is 20% of the customs value plus transport, insurance and other costs up to the goods’ first destination in the UK, plus any duty. A VAT-registered business can declare it through postponed VAT accounting and reclaim it as input tax under the normal rules; a UK business that is not registered for VAT pays it and cannot reclaim it.

In the EU each member state sets its own VAT rates, with a standard rate of at least 15%, and the customs value includes transport and insurance up to the point where the goods enter the EU, which matters if the preference is refused. Australia admits goods of Bangladesh duty-free on every tariff line, provided the last process of manufacture happens in Bangladesh and at least 50% of the total factory cost is labour and materials from least developed countries, Forum Island Countries, developing countries or Australia, with materials from developing countries that are not LDCs counting for no more than 25%. Fabric from India or Pakistan, for example, counts towards that 50% only up to 25% of the total factory cost. GST of 10% is then charged on the customs value plus international transport, insurance and any duty.

New Zealand also admits goods of Bangladesh duty-free, under its preference for least developed countries, but its cost test is stricter for imported fabric: the last process must happen in Bangladesh and at least 50% of the factory or works cost must be spent in least developed countries or New Zealand, so fabric from China, India or Pakistan counts against it in full. NZ Customs then charges GST of 15% on the customs value plus any duty and the shipping and insurance costs (both checked 14 October 2026).

How to get an accurate quote

Quotes are only comparable when every supplier prices the same specification. Send a tech pack or reference garment, the fabric composition and weight, your quantity per style and colour, decoration details, your market and your preferred shipping terms. If you do not have a tech pack, our free template covers what a factory needs. Tell us what you want to make and we will reply within one working day with questions or a first costing.