China Hard Surfaces Show Up-and-Down 2025

BEIJING – Hard-surface exports from China last year mirrored other producing countries last year, with small growth in volume and larger declines in value.

Exports of natural and man-made dimensional materials totaled just under 8 million metric tons in 2025 for a 2.2% year-over-year growth, according to an analysis from the China Stone Material Association. Total value, however, dropped 15.7% to $4.2 billion.

The report noted that China’s export volume may be stabilizing, given its performance in the past decade. Exports reached a high of 12.5 million metric tons in 2017, only to have shipments fall to a low of slightly under 7.5 million metric tons in 2022. This year’s 7.98 million metric tons continued a trend small-but-steady growth in the past few years.

That 10-year analysis, however, also showed a significant decline in export value, with a peak of $7.7 billion in 2022, followed by three consecutive years of decline of double-digit decline. The report cited “intensified competition” among major stone-exporting countries such as India, Turkey, and Brazil driving down prices.

“This indicates that the international trade environment has a significant impact on China’s stone imports, with lower average prices reflecting the intense price war in the stone-product export trade,” the analysis noted.

China’s granite exports last year reflected that, with shipments of nearly 3 million metric tons virtually even with 2024 at -0.1%, but the $1.4 billion in revenue marked a 26.7% decline from the previous year.

Man-made stone material made up the second-largest export category with 1.08 million metric tons in 2025 and also showed a miniscule year-over-year change of -0.2%. The $844 million in revenue, though, resulted in a 11.6% drop from 2024.

Marble and other calcareous stone fared better last year, shipping 1.05 million metric tons for a 12.9% gain from 2024. The $1.1 billion in value only declined by 1.9% from the previous year.

While the United States is a large destination for China’s stone with 548 thousand metric tons, it’s only the third-largest customer; South Korea is a surprising first in 2025 with 1.5 million metric tons, followed by Malaysia at 749 thousand metric tons. Even with that large share of China’s exports, South Korea’s total is 21.1% less than 2024. Malaysia declined by 8.6% year-over-year, and 18.9% less came to the United States.

The $817 million in stone value for South Korea last year also placed it first among all nations, but also represented a stunning 41.6% fall from 2024. The United States ranked second at $512 million, with a year-to-year decline of 26.9%.

The report also offers strategies for China’s stone industry, including focusing on developing markets with strong infrastructure demand; reducing heavy reliance on a few countries; promoting green production and practices; develop high-end stone manufacturing; and, moving away from a low-price OEM model for exports to brand-building in the international market.