What Kuwait buys, and from whom.
Kuwait imported USD 29bn of manufactured and processed goods in 2024, level with 2022. These are its twenty largest source countries. 8 of them ship enough, across enough product lines, to have a lane page of their own.
Trade year 2024, compared with 2022.
The twenty countries Kuwait imports most from.
A lane page is written where the source ships USD 1bn or more a year across at least 50 product lines worth USD 1m each. For what Kuwait is best placed to make itself, see Made here: Kuwait.
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1
China
Share of Kuwait's imports24 per centChangeup 12 per cent on 2022USD 6.9bnin 2024 -
2
United States
Share of Kuwait's imports9 per centChangedown 1 per cent on 2022USD 2.5bnin 2024 -
3
Japan
Share of Kuwait's imports7 per centChangeup 4 per cent on 2022USD 2.0bnin 2024 -
4
United Arab Emirates
Share of Kuwait's imports7 per centChangedown 31 per cent on 2022USD 1.9bnin 2024 -
5
Saudi Arabia
Share of Kuwait's imports5 per centChangedown 2 per cent on 2022USD 1.5bnin 2024 -
6
Germany
Share of Kuwait's imports5 per centChangeup 13 per cent on 2022USD 1.5bnin 2024 -
7
India
Share of Kuwait's imports4 per centChangedown 8 per cent on 2022USD 1.2bnin 2024 -
8
Italy
Share of Kuwait's imports4 per centChangedown 17 per cent on 2022USD 1.0bnin 2024 -
9
France
Share of Kuwait's imports3 per centChangeup 34 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 824min 2024 -
10
South Korea
Share of Kuwait's imports3 per centChangeup 61 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 728min 2024 -
11
Switzerland
Share of Kuwait's imports2 per centChangeup 28 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 696min 2024 -
12
United Kingdom
Share of Kuwait's imports2 per centChangedown 15 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 638min 2024 -
13
Turkey
Share of Kuwait's imports2 per centChangedown 16 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 517min 2024 -
14
Thailand
Share of Kuwait's imports2 per centChangeup 10 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 489min 2024 -
15
Vietnam
Share of Kuwait's imports1 per centChangedown 13 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 354min 2024 -
16
Spain
Share of Kuwait's imports1 per centChangedown 24 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 341min 2024 -
17
Slovakia
Share of Kuwait's imports1 per centChangeup 90 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 335min 2024 -
18
Netherlands
Share of Kuwait's imports1 per centChangedown 4 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 314min 2024 -
19
Ireland
Share of Kuwait's imports1 per centChangeup 41 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 297min 2024 -
20
Oman
Share of Kuwait's imports1 per centChangeup 61 per cent on 2022Lane pageunder the lane thresholdUSD 280min 2024
What crossed the border, what it was worth, and what it weighed.
Every figure on this page is from CEPII's BACI file, which reconciles what each pair of countries reports to the UN about the same shipment. Trade year 2024, compared with 2022. A line is one six-digit customs heading (HS 2022). Values are in US dollars at the border; growth is in current dollars, so part of any change is price, not volume.
Unit value. Unit values are customs values per tonne, declared at the border, not product prices. It is the value of a line divided by its declared weight, so it mixes grades, models and qualities under one heading. It is shown only where the weight is recorded, at least three source countries of USD 100k or more ship the line to Kuwait with a weight, and the figure sits within a factor of five of the middle of those sources. Outside that band it is treated as a recording problem and left out.
Share is China's part of everything Kuwait imported in that line, from every source. Sources counts the countries that shipped any of it.
Scope. Manufactured and processed goods, customs chapters 16 to 96, without ores, fuels, precious metals, scrap, raw farm output and one-off capital and defence purchases: the same rule as the Made here pages.
A record of trade, not a shopping list.
What this record does not say: what sells at retail, what margin a trade leaves, how crowded the marketplaces are, or how much of a flow is re-exported through entrepots such as Hong Kong and Singapore.
A large line is not proof of an opening, and a lower unit value from another country is not proof the goods are the same. Tariffs, standards, freight, payment terms, lead times and the plain fact that a supplier is good at it are all invisible here. Nothing on this page is a forecast, a recommendation or a promise. No supplier company is named, because the record holds none.
Source: CEPII BACI, HS22, version 202601. Edition of 2026-11-03.