What landed cost actually is
Landed cost is what one unit really costs you by the time it is sitting in your warehouse in the destination country — not what the supplier invoiced. It is the product price plus international freight, insurance, customs duty, import VAT or GST, and every local charge between the vessel and your door.
The gap between invoice price and landed cost is usually larger than people expect. On a low-value, bulky consignment, freight and duty can add a third to the unit cost. Quote off the invoice price and you have quietly given that margin away.
This matters most when you are quoting a buyer, comparing two suppliers in different countries, or deciding whether a market is worth entering at all. Two suppliers with the same ex-works price are rarely the same landed cost once origin, tariff treatment and freight lane are taken into account.
FOB, CIF and DDP — who pays for what
Incoterms decide where the seller's responsibility stops and the buyer's begins. Under EXW the buyer collects from the seller's premises and owns every cost thereafter. Under FOB the seller gets the goods loaded at the origin port, and the buyer takes on ocean freight, insurance and everything at destination.
CFR adds freight to the seller's side but not insurance. CIF adds both — the seller's price already covers freight and insurance to the destination port. DDP is the far end: the seller delivers to the buyer's premises with duty and import tax paid.
The practical trap is double-counting. If you agreed CIF and then also type a freight figure into a landed cost calculator, you have charged yourself for freight twice. The incoterm you pick above changes the guidance shown, not the arithmetic — the arithmetic only ever uses what you actually enter.
Why duty is usually charged on CIF value, not the product price
Most customs authorities assess duty on the CIF value: the goods value plus international freight and insurance up to the port of entry. The logic is that the value being imported into the economy includes the cost of getting it there, and valuing on the product price alone would reward shipping arrangements that shift cost out of the invoice.
So a 5% duty on a $50,000 consignment with $4,000 of freight and $500 of insurance is 5% of $54,500, not 5% of $50,000. That $225 difference is small on one shipment and material across a year of them.
A minority of countries assess duty on the FOB value and exclude freight and insurance — the United States, Canada, Australia and South Africa among them. Getting this backwards is one of the most common errors in homemade landed cost spreadsheets, which is why this calculator makes the valuation basis an explicit, visible setting rather than a hidden assumption.
Import VAT follows a second rule that also catches people out: it is normally charged on the duty-paid value, meaning the customs value plus the duty just assessed. Tax on tax is intentional and it is how nearly every VAT and GST regime works.
How to read this calculator's numbers
Anything this tool filled in for you carries a badge saying so, along with the date it was last checked, and stays editable. A suggested VAT rate is a starting point that saves you a lookup — it is not a determination, and reduced rates, exemptions and trade agreements are not modelled here.
Every subtotal has a Show calculation control. Open it and you will see the exact arithmetic, including which value the percentage was applied to. If a figure looks wrong, you should be able to find out why in one click rather than trusting us.
The totals are built from the line items, never computed separately — total duty is the sum of the per-line duty amounts, and shared freight is apportioned so the allocated parts add back to exactly what you entered. If those two things ever disagree, the page tells you rather than showing you a number it cannot defend.
The duty rate is the one field deliberately left blank. It depends on the precise HS code, the certified origin, and whether you can claim preferential treatment — a guess there would be more dangerous than an empty box.