France attaches a small charge of its own to almost every parcel arriving from outside the European Union, and two exemptions decide whether it reaches you. Below 150 euro an item carries a 2 euro customs administration charge alongside the tax; a private gift worth under 45 euro escapes it, and so does anything addressed to Corsica. The rules on this page were read from the postal country listing for France on 2026-08-07.
A charge small enough to forget and specific enough to check before you write the value on the form.
The tax picture across the Union has been the same since the low-value exemption ended, and the country listing for France restates it in one line: “As of July 1, 2021, the value-added tax (VAT) exemption is abolished on all imported goods.” What sits on top of that is French rather than European, and it is the part worth knowing before you fill in a value.
| What a sender wants to know | What the listing states |
|---|---|
| How much | 2 euro, described as a customs administration charge |
| On what | Items valued below 150 euro, charged in addition to value-added tax |
| First exemption | Shipments between two private people worth less than 45 euro, addressed to France or Monaco |
| Second exemption | Anything addressed to Corsica or Mayotte |
| Above 150 euro | A marketplace operator selling into France has to hold a French tax registration number |
| On the form either way | A six-digit harmonized system code for every article in the box |
Read the two exemptions together and a pattern appears. Both of them describe the parcel most people reading this are actually sending: a personal package, modest value, one household to another. The charge was written for the flow of small commercial orders, and a birthday box under 45 euro sits outside it. Value the contents honestly anyway, because the exemption turns on the declared figure and an inflated one buys the charge back.
The wider European rules that sit underneath this, including the flat duty the Union introduced on low-value consignments in July 2026, are set out on our page about shipping to Europe. France applies those in common with every other member state; the two-euro charge and the exemptions above are its own.
France keeps a short prohibition list, and the short lists are the dangerous ones because nobody thinks to check them. Three entries here have no analogue anywhere else on this site, and all three sit in ordinary luggage.
The rest of the list runs to the categories most destinations refuse: ammunition, arms other than antique firearms, human and cremated remains, live plants and animals, and radioactive materials. Nothing on the prohibition list can be fixed with a form. If it is named there, the parcel does not go.
The listing requires that books in the French language printed abroad show the names of the publisher and the printer, as prescribed by French copyright law. A self-published French edition run off in the United States needs those imprints before it is mailable.
Manufactured tobacco, cigars and cigarettes included, may be sent to a person in France for personal use up to 10 kilograms a year, which is roughly 22 pounds. The allowance belongs to the recipient rather than to the parcel.
Bees, honey and beeswax need a certificate of origin, with shipments of 2 kilograms or less exempted. Beekeeping equipment and hobby honey are more common in the mail than the entry suggests.
Gold coins and gold articles require a permit from the Banque de France. Medicines require an import license. Both are documents held by somebody other than the sender, so both need arranging before postage is bought.
One more restriction is unusual enough to record: perishable biological substances are admitted only to named Pasteur Institute locations, so a research sample addressed to a university department is going to the wrong place. Plants and seeds need health certificates, and canned goods have to be marked with the country of origin.
| Product | Weight ceiling | Size ceiling | Customs paperwork |
|---|---|---|---|
| Priority Mail International | 66 lb | 60 in longest side, 108 in length plus girth | PS Form 2976-A inside PS Form 2976-E |
| Priority Mail Express International | 66 lb | 60 in longest side, 108 in length plus girth | PS Form 2976-B inside PS Form 2976-E |
| First-Class Package International Service | 4 lb | Small packet limits per the international manual | PS Form 2976 |
| First-Class Mail International | 3.5 oz letters and postcards, 15.994 oz large envelopes | Letter and flat limits | None, unless otherwise required |
| Airmail M-bags | Not available to France | — | — |
| “Global Express Guaranteed” | Listed as suspended since September 29, 2024 | — | Not applicable while suspended |
The M-bag row is the one that costs somebody money. An M-bag is the direct sack rate built for printed matter traveling to a single addressee, and it is why a carton of books prices low to some destinations. France does not take them, so a student shipping a term's reading or a small press mailing a run of titles pays parcel weight on every pound. Italy takes M-bags at 66 lb, which makes it the cheaper of the two large Latin markets for paper.
Both parcel products sit in price group 15 and stop at the same 66 lb, so paying for speed does not buy capacity here. Below 4 lb the lightweight package product applies. The starting prices the Postal Service publishes across all of these are set out on our guide to the international products, and they are the operator's figures rather than ours.
The listing serves all locations in France, Corsica and Monaco under one country entry, which reads as though the three are interchangeable. On one point they are not. The listing states that “Priority Mail Express International With Money-Back Guarantee” service is available to France but not to Corsica or Monaco.
The express product still reaches both places. What is missing is the refund term attached to a missed date, which is the whole reason a sender pays the express price for a deadline rather than for speed. Ajaccio and Monte Carlo are ordinary express destinations with no remedy behind the date. If a delivery day is the point of the shipment, that distinction is worth more than the postage difference.
Corsica reappears in the tax rules as well, exempted from the two-euro charge alongside Mayotte. The island sits inside the customs territory and outside parts of the fiscal one, which is why it keeps turning up as an exception rather than a destination.
The listing is explicit that shipments must not be fastened by means of wire, while straps without sharp edges are allowed. A wired carton is a packaging defect at acceptance, not a customs question, and it is caught at the counter.
A number for the addressee is required. French delivery runs on the recipient being reachable, and a box address with no number is short of a stated requirement before it leaves the building.
Two copies go with every commercial shipment regardless of value, and with a personal shipment once the declared value reaches 300 United States dollars. Duplicate means two physical copies, not one copy plus the customs form.
Parcels may be addressed to a street address or to a post office box, which is a wider allowance than several neighboring countries give. The six-digit harmonized system code applies per article rather than per parcel, so a box holding a sweater, a book and a bottle of sauce needs three codes on the declaration and not one covering the lot.
The calculator here quotes movements inside the United States from two ZIP codes, and it is the right tool for the leg that gets a parcel to a consolidator, a freight forwarder or a relative who is flying. It cannot price a lane that crosses a customs frontier, and no figure on this page is a postage quote.
For the crossing itself, send the dimensions, the weight, the contents and the French address through freight review and a person comes back with what the movement actually costs and which products the ceilings above still allow. That is slower than a button, and it is the only honest way to price a shipment where the paperwork decides as much as the pounds do.
Country listings are revised without notice and the figures above are what the listing carried on the date shown. Check the entry again on the day you mail, because a prohibition added between reading and posting is still a prohibition.
Yes. The postal country listing sets a 2 euro customs administration charge on items valued below 150 euro, on top of the tax. Two carve-outs remove it: a shipment between two private people worth less than 45 euro, and anything addressed to Corsica or Mayotte.
66 lb on both Priority Mail International and Priority Mail Express International, with the longest side capped at 60 inches and length plus girth at 108 inches. The lightweight package product stops at 4 lb.
No. Airmail M-bags are listed as not available to France, so printed matter pays parcel postage by the pound. Books in the French language printed outside France also have to carry the publisher and printer names.
Ammunition, arms other than antique firearms, French banknotes and legal-tender coins, precious metals, butane cigarette lighters, feeding bottles, funeral urns, human and cremated remains, live plants and animals, radioactive materials, and saccharine in tablets or packets.
A person does. The calculator on this site prices United States movements between two ZIP codes. A shipment leaving the country goes through freight review instead, because the ceilings, the paperwork and what lands on the recipient are settled case by case.