India shipped roughly $2.64 billion of ceramic and porcelain tiles in a single fiscal year, enough to rank as the world's second-largest tile exporter. Every one of those containers left a paper trail. That trail is ceramic tiles export data: shipment-by-shipment records of who bought, how much moved, and where it landed. Filed under HS code 6907, it runs from the kilns of Morbi, Gujarat to distributors in Dubai, Dallas and Durban. Most exporters never open it.
And 2026 is the year to start reading it. The buyer map is being redrawn fast: the UAE has overtaken the United States as India's single largest tile market, and anti-dumping walls (the US against China, the Gulf against China and India alike) are scrambling supply chains. Gaps open for whoever spots the shifting buyers first. The importer names sit inside the data, ranked by volume. Here is how the tile trade looks in 2026, and how to find the buyers behind it.
The 30-second version
- India exports about $2.64 billion of ceramic tiles a year (~525 million m²) under HS code 6907, ranking #2 worldwide (source).
- Morbi, Gujarat produces up to 90% of India's tiles across 1,800+ factories — one of the densest export clusters on earth (source).
- World tile exports totalled 2,674 million m² in 2024; China (600), India (525), Spain (329) and Italy (293.5) alone move 65.3% of it (source).
- The UAE is now India's top tile buyer at 36.8 million m², edging out the USA (34.3 million m²); Russia jumped +22.4% (source).
- Trade walls are rising: the US extended its anti-dumping orders on Chinese tile into 2026, and Oman set 23.5–58% duties on Chinese and Indian tile from May 2025 (source).
What ceramic tiles export data shows in 2026
Start with scale. The world exported 2,674 million m² of tile in 2024, a third straight annual decline at −2.5%. Yet the top of the table barely moved: four countries still ship about two-thirds of everything that crosses a border. Demand didn't vanish. It relocated, and the shipment records name exactly where it went.
India's engine is a single town. Morbi in Gujarat produces up to 90% of India's ceramic tiles across more than 1,800 manufacturing units, feeding an export book worth about ₹23,216 crore (US$2.64 billion), the output of the world's #2 tile-manufacturing nation. That density is a gift to anyone prospecting: a huge share of the world's exportable supply, and the buyers pulling it, concentrates into one searchable cluster. In practice, a Morbi plant can price and load a container faster than most exporters can work out which overseas distributor deserves the quote.
One Gujarati town makes nearly nine in ten of India's tiles. The buyers who empty those kilns are listed, by name and volume, in the shipment record — most exporters just never look.
Which country exports the most ceramic tiles?
China exports the most ceramic tiles: 600 million m² in 2024, about 22% of world exports and roughly $6 billion by value. India is second at 525 million m², ahead of Spain and Italy. The top four ceramic tile exporters move 65.3% of the global trade.
- China: 600 million m² (~22% of world exports)
- India: 525 million m² (#2 by volume, Morbi-led)
- Spain: 329 million m²
- Italy: 293.5 million m² (#1 by value)
Volume isn't value, though. Italy's €4.979 billion in tile revenue leads the world from fourth place by volume: premium porcelain and design brands against volume-grade ceramic. Where a country sits on that curve tells you which buyers it can realistically pitch.
Where the tile importers are in 2026
The demand side is where 2026 gets interesting. In 2024 the UAE overtook the United States as India's #1 tile destination, taking 36.8 million m² (+7.8%) against the US's 34.3 million m² (−7.1%). Iraq held third. Russia surged +22.4% to 28.1 million m². And into 2025 the Gulf pulled further ahead: UAE purchases of Indian tile rose about 20% to 31.7 million m² over nine months, while the US slipped to third.
Regionally, the growth is not where you'd guess. North America and Mexico absorbed 65.4 million m², the European Union jumped roughly 75% to nearly 60 million m², and Africa grew volumes by 68.8% as Gulf buyers, Latin American distributors and African contractors re-sourced. The classic buyer map (USA, the Gulf, Mexico, Africa, Latin America) is intact, but the weightings flip every year. A static prospect list goes stale in two quarters; live ceramic tiles export data catches the flip as it happens, which is the whole argument for using customs data to find buyers.
HS code 6907 and the porcelain tiles export breakdown
Every tile shipment is classified under one heading: HS code 6907 — "ceramic flags and paving, hearth or wall tiles; ceramic mosaic cubes and the like," the heading that captures India's ceramic-tile trade. Since the 2017 Harmonized System revision, glazed and unglazed, wall and floor, porcelain and standard ceramic all sit under 6907, split at the eight-digit level chiefly by water absorption. Porcelain is the low-absorption, higher-value grade, and the vitrified GVT and PGVT ranges Morbi is known for sit in that same bracket. Chasing porcelain tiles export business specifically? Filter on the porcelain sub-code. Get the digits right and the shipment record snaps into focus; get them wrong and you're searching a different product. Our guide to finding and using HS codes walks through it.
The 2026 wildcard: anti-dumping walls redraw the buyer map
Tile is one of the most heavily defended product categories in world trade, and the walls are getting taller. The US International Trade Commission ran a 2025 sunset review and Commerce continued its anti-dumping and countervailing orders on Chinese ceramic tile into 2026, keeping the door propped open for alternative suppliers. The EU has held anti-dumping duties on Chinese tile for over a decade. The Gulf has now joined: Oman imposed duties from 29 May 2025 on Chinese tile at 23.5–58%, and on Indian tile too, under the GCC's unified anti-dumping law.
For an exporter, that cuts both ways. Duties on China push US, EU and Latin American buyers toward India, Turkey, Brazil and Vietnam — a clear opening. But Gulf duties on Indian tile mean the exact accounts that dominate your order book may be re-pricing right now. Ask a Morbi exporter about the Gulf this quarter and the conversation starts with duty percentages, not designs. You cannot manage that blind. Watching which importers keep buying, which switch origin, and how volumes move quarter to quarter is the difference between riding the shift and getting caught by it.
Anti-dumping duties don't destroy demand — they relocate it. The tiles still get laid; the only question is which exporter's containers arrive, and the buying signals show up in the trade record first.
How ceramic tiles export data closes the buyer gap
Here's the gap most tile exporters never close. The buyer names, the volumes, the shipment cadence: they already exist. Platforms like ShipScout sit on 11 billion-plus shipment records across 240+ countries, and somewhere in that pile is the ranked list of every distributor importing under HS 6907 in your target market, with contact intelligence where available. Yet most Morbi and mid-size exporters still hunt buyers through trade fairs and cold guesses. For India specifically, the platform works from mirrored, licensed trade data — helping exporters find buyers with data-backed targeting rather than chasing them.
How to find ceramic tile buyers with ShipScout
ShipScout is a global trade-intelligence platform — an affordable alternative to Panjiva and ImportGenius — built so a tile exporter can go from "we make great porcelain" to "here are 200 verified importers ranked by volume" in an afternoon:
- Search HS code 6907. Pull ceramic tiles export data across markets and see the importers, their suppliers and how often they buy. Start from the company directory and filter to tile.
- Rank importers by volume in a target market. Don't pitch a one-container reseller when a US distributor moves a container a week. Sort by tonnage and work the top down — the same play behind finding export buyers from India.
- Target the shifting hot markets. Drill into Dubai's re-export hub — now India's #1 tile buyer and a gateway to the wider Gulf and Africa — then benchmark against the India supply base.
- Vet suppliers and track rivals. Check a counterparty's real shipment history before you wire a deposit, and watch which buyers your competitors ship to — then go win those accounts.
The data-backed approach beats blind outreach every time: you decide on real shipment evidence, not hope. If you export ceramic tiles, porcelain tiles, vitrified tiles or wall tiles, the buyer list is already written — you just need to open it. Start a free trial and search HS 6907 to see who's importing right now.
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