Three decisions carry an electronics box: what the battery is and what condition it is in, how the panel or the board is braced against pressure, and what number goes in the declared value field. The rest is tape. The carrier rules quoted below were read from the carriers' own pages on 2026-07-29.
A phone, a graphics card and a 55-inch panel are the same three problems in different proportions: charge, pressure, and paperwork.
This is the first fork, and almost every other choice follows it. A battery sealed inside the device it powers is the simple case; a battery travelling on its own is a different shipment with different paperwork; a battery that has been dropped, swollen or recalled is a refusal at most docks.
FedEx publishes the thresholds it works from: lithium ion cells rated at no more than 20 watt-hours and batteries at no more than 100 watt-hours, and lithium metal cells holding no more than 1 gram of lithium with batteries no more than 2 grams. Consumer hardware sits comfortably under those figures — a laptop pack is usually somewhere between 40 and 99 watt-hours — which is why a laptop moves without ceremony and a spare pack for an e-bike does not.
Charge level and condition are where shipments actually get stopped. UPS states that used cell phones must be tendered with an indicated battery capacity of 30 percent or less, and that damaged, defective or recalled lithium batteries are restricted to ground transportation by law and accepted only in the lower 48 states. FedEx applies the same 30 percent state-of-charge cap to standalone lithium ion batteries in Sections IA and IB without approval from both the origin authority and the operator's authority. USPS takes the matching position on hardware rather than cells: pre-owned, damaged or defective electronic devices containing lithium batteries move by ground, with Restricted Electronic Device and Surface Transportation Only printed on the outer packaging.
| What is in the box | How it moves | What the shipper has to do |
|---|---|---|
| Battery sealed inside a working device — laptop, phone, camera, drone | Ground services, handled under UN 3481 | Power it down fully, stop it waking in transit, tick the battery panel at checkout |
| Power bank or a loose cell shipped by itself | Ground only, under UN 3480, at or below 100 watt-hours and 5 lb | Tape the terminals, one pack per box, no partial charges above the carrier cap |
| Pre-owned, damaged, defective or recalled hardware | Surface transport, and several carriers will not take it at all | Mark the box as the carrier requires, or send the device for recycling instead |
| Device with no battery and no capacitor bank | Any service the box and route allow | Nothing beyond ordinary packing |
On a quote here, a device with the cell sealed inside returns ground options and the lithium handling mark; a power bank is held to ground service, 100 watt-hours and 5 lb; a swollen or fire-damaged pack is refused rather than priced.
Screens rarely die from a single drop. They die from a heavier box sitting on the glass for two days. Stand a monitor or a television on edge, block the corners so the frame carries the load, and leave the face clear of anything that can press on it.
A bare graphics card, a memory module or a motherboard goes into a metallised anti-static bag before it goes anywhere near foam or bubble. Loose fill and plain plastic build a charge while they rub against each other in a moving trailer.
A power brick rattling beside a laptop lid has half the box as a run-up. Bag the cables, tape the adapter to the far wall, and fill the gaps so nothing inside can travel more than a finger's width.
Two boxes beat one. The retail carton was engineered to survive a pallet in a warehouse, not a conveyor sorting eighty parcels a minute, so put it inside a second box with two inches of padding on every face. Before the tape goes on: sign out of the accounts and reset the device, pull the SIM and the memory cards, take the ink or toner out of a printer, and either remove a heavy graphics card from a tower or brace it against the case.
Declared value is a ceiling, not a payout. It tells the carrier how far its liability can run if the shipment is lost or crushed; it does not settle the question of whether the packing was adequate, and that question is where high-value electronics claims are won and lost.
Declare what the item would sell for today rather than what it cost new, because that is the number a claims adjuster will test against listings. Photograph the serial number, photograph the item sitting in its padding, and photograph the sealed box. Keep the sale record. Add signature on delivery for anything worth more than an afternoon of arguing, and check whether the carrier limits liability on used or reconditioned goods before assuming a high declaration will hold. Shipping protection is offered during checkout where the carrier supports it for that route.
The difference between declared value and cover is set out separately, along with what UPS charges to raise its liability and how FedEx handles the same request.
Carriers revise these pages without notice. Check the source before you tender anything unusual, and treat any figure on this page as the figure that was published on the date shown.
Yes, and leaving it installed is the easier path. A battery sealed in a device it powers stays under the thresholds carriers publish for ordinary handling, so long as the device is switched off, cannot switch itself on in the box, and is not damaged or swollen.
Condition, mostly. UPS says damaged, defective or recalled lithium batteries are restricted to ground transportation by law. USPS puts pre-owned, damaged or defective devices holding lithium batteries on surface transport as well. A loose power bank also stays on a truck.
A device with its battery inside normally travels under UN 3481 and carries the lithium battery handling mark. USPS asks for two extra lines on pre-owned or defective hardware: Restricted Electronic Device and Surface Transportation Only, printed on the outer packaging.
On edge, upright, with rigid corner blocks holding the frame and nothing resting on the glass. Panels fail under steady pressure far more often than under a single drop, so the job is to keep other boxes off the face for the whole trip.
What the item would fetch today, not what it cost new. Declared value sets the ceiling a carrier will consider, and a claim still turns on proof: a photograph of the serial number, a photograph of the packed box, and the sale record.