HSN Code Lookup with BCD, IGST & FTA Rates: A Complete Guide (2026)

An HSN code lookup that returns just a description and a chapter number is half a tool. The other half — the part that decides whether your import costs ₹100, ₹130, or ₹190 — lives across five separate CBIC datasets that almost no public tool joins together. We did the join. This post is a walkthrough of every layer in Pyrelo's HSN Code Lookup, what each layer comes from, and why you would not want to file a Bill of Entry without seeing all of them.

Layer 1: The HSN structure itself

India uses an 8-digit ITC-HS code — the global 6-digit WCO Harmonized System plus 2 India-specific tariff digits. Digits 1–2 are the chapter (97 active), 3–4 the heading, 5–6 the international sub-heading, 7–8 the Indian tariff item. Our dataset covers 11,481 8-digit codesacross 97 chapters with the full CBIC description text, including the hierarchical "heading - sub-heading - tariff item" breakdown so you can see exactly where each leaf sits inside its parent group.

If the structure itself is fuzzy for you, the HSN code explained post breaks down what each digit means with worked examples.

Layer 2: The full duty stack — BCD + AIDC + SWS + IGST + Cess

Most lookups show you BCD if they show duty at all. The actual duty stack on an Indian import has five active components, plus several rarely-applied ones that still need to be checked:

• BCD — Basic Customs Duty. The headline tariff rate per HSN, set by current CBIC notifications and revised at every Union Budget. Calculated on CIF (Cost + Insurance + Freight).
• AIDC — Agriculture Infrastructure and Development Cess. Imposed since the FY 2021–22 budget on a narrow set of HSN codes — mostly agricultural produce, edible oils, gold and silver, certain alcoholic beverages, coal. 0% for most non-agri imports, but when it hits, it can hit hard (gold AIDC was 5%, then revised).
• SWS — Social Welfare Surcharge.10% of (BCD + AIDC), fixed by the Finance Act 2018. A specific set of HSN codes are SWS-exempt — our dataset flags this per code, because no other public tool we've seen calls it out.
• IGST — Integrated GST. Applied to (CIF + BCD + AIDC + SWS). Rate comes from Notification 9/2025-Integrated Tax (Rate), more on that below.
• Compensation Cess. Top-up on motor vehicles, tobacco, aerated drinks, certain coals. Most goods have 0; the ones that have it can have 12% / 17% / 22% / sometimes more.

The lookup shows each component as both the headline rate (e.g. BCD 30%) and the effective contribution to total duty per ₹100 CIF (e.g. BCD amt 30, AIDC amt 9, SWS amt 3.9, IGST amt 7.145, Cess amt 0 → total 50.045% effective duty). The amts are pre-computed from the notification stack so you can compare landed cost across HSNs without doing the cascade math each time.

The rarely-active duties that still need a check

The same dataset also exposes — even if usually zero — Additional Customs Duty (ADC / CVD on items where the BCD itself excludes input tax), Safeguard Duty (currently only on isolated commodities), Anti-Dumping Duty (very product- and country-specific — solar cells from China is the canonical example), GST Compensation Cess, and Health Cess (tobacco-specific). If any of these is non-zero for your HSN, you'll see it surfaced; if they're all zero, they collapse below the active components so the page doesn't become a wall of zeros.

Layer 3: IGST schedule + notification reference under 9/2025

IGST on imports is structured around Notification 9/2025-Integrated Tax (Rate), effective 22 September 2025. There are seven schedules:

For every HSN, the lookup tells you which schedule it maps to, the S.No within that schedule, the matched code prefix (because the notification is sometimes written at 2/4/6-digit granularity), and the exact entry text. So if a customs officer pings you on the rate, you can quote the notification + schedule + S.No + entry text without leaving the page.

Layer 4: FTA preferential rates across 23 country groups

India has free-trade agreements (FTAs) and preferential arrangements with twenty-plus country groups. If you import from any of them and produce a valid Certificate of Origin (CoO) at customs, you may pay a lower BCD — often zero. The 23 country / regime groups we currently track:

ASEAN, Japan (CEPA), Korea (CEPA), Singapore (CECA), Malaysia (CECA), the UAE (CEPA), Australia (ECTA), Mauritius (CECPA), Sri Lanka (ISFTA), Chile (PTA), APTA, APTA (LDC), SAFTA, SAFTA (LDC), MERCOSUR, Bangladesh, Nepal, Afghanistan, the Philippines, Thailand, GSTP countries, Least Developed Countries (LDC), and the bilateral preferential schedule for Mauritius–Seychelles–Tonga.

For each HSN, the lookup shows:

• The MFN rate — Most-Favoured Nation, the default applied to non-FTA imports.
• The best preferential rate and the country / regime that offers it (e.g. "ASEAN 0%").
• The number of FTA countries that offer any preferential rate and how many of those are 0%.
• A country-by-country table sorted lowest rate first, with the regime name ("Preferential tariff for ASEAN countries") and the underlying FTA agreement ID so you can verify against the original notification.

Data is sourced from ITC's MacMap (the gold-standard cross-government tariff database) and matched onto our 8-digit codes. The agreement IDs in the table line up with what your CHA will quote when filing the bill of entry; for a real cross-check, see the Import Duty Calculator, which lets you pick a country and watch the preferential BCD prefill into the duty cascade.

Layer 5: PGA requirements + policy classification

Duty is only one side of the import equation. The other is regulatory clearance — what additional licences, certificates or test reports must be uploaded into ICEGATE / e-Sanchit before the consignment can be released. These are called PGA requirements(Participating Government Agencies — FSSAI, BIS, Drug Controller, Animal Quarantine, Plant Quarantine, Wildlife, AERB, and many others). Miss any mandatory one and your Bill of Entry sits in "under inspection" until you scramble.

For every HSN, our lookup shows:

• The policy classification from the ITC-HS policy schedule — Free, Restricted, Prohibited, STE (State Trading Enterprise), or one of several conditional regimes. Most goods are Free, but the ones that aren't can carry severe penalties for non-compliance.
• Every PGA requirement attached to the code — agency, info-type, qualifier (e.g. "Item Characteristics → Breed"), and whether it's mandatory or optional. We surface the count of mandatory items so you can tell at a glance if a code is "just upload an invoice" vs "you'll need three certificates".
• The full compliance note from CBIC for codes that have one — typically multi-paragraph instructions referencing specific circulars (e.g. "Circular No 24/2022-Cus dtd 28-11-2022") with the exact document codes the importer must use in e-Sanchit (853AQ1, 001AQ1, etc.). Tax officers reference these by number; having them inline saves a Google trip.

Where does the data come from?

Five separate CBIC + ICEGATE + MacMap datasets, joined on the 8-digit HSN code:

1. The First Schedule to the Customs Tariff Act, 1975 — for the HSN hierarchy, chapter / heading / sub-heading descriptions, and unit of measure. Sourced from the CBIC's published v2 schedule.
2. Notification 9/2025-Integrated Tax (Rate) — for the seven IGST schedules and the per-HSN mapping.
3. Current CBIC duty notifications — for BCD, AIDC, Compensation Cess and the SWS-exemption flag per code, plus the notification reference number (e.g. 009/2025, 029/2025) so you can verify upstream.
4. ICEGATE PGA configuration — for the agency-by-agency requirements, info-type / qualifier codes, and the mandatory / optional flag.
5. ITC MacMap — for the preferential rate table across 23 country groups, with the underlying FTA agreement IDs that line up with the CoO documentation customs will demand.

Joining these on the 8-digit code is more work than it sounds — the CBIC publishes some at 8 digits, some at 6, some at 4, the notifications are written prose-first and need careful prefix matching, and MacMap uses its own normalised structure. We do the join once, statically, and ship the result; the lookup itself is just a fast in-memory query against the joined dataset.

Why this matters — three scenarios

Scenario one: you're a small importer comparing landed cost across suppliers. Your Chinese supplier quotes USD 8/unit. Your Vietnamese supplier quotes USD 8.40. The Vietnamese unit looks more expensive — until you check the FTA rate. ASEAN preferential BCD is 0%, Chinese imports pay the full MFN. On a ₹10 lakh order, the Vietnamese option could be ₹2 lakh cheaper landed. The lookup makes that visible in one query.

Scenario two: you're classifying goods for a new product line.Two candidate HSNs differ by one digit — the "Other" tariff item at 19 90 and a specific item at 19 10. The specific item attracts 5% IGST under Schedule I; the "Other" sits in Schedule II at 18%. Same description in the chapter, dramatically different IGST. Without the schedule mapping visible, you'd not know.

Scenario three: you're prepping a Bill of Entry and the CHA flags a compliance gap.The code has 14 PGA requirements, 6 mandatory. Three of them need specific document codes uploaded into e-Sanchit. The compliance note quotes Circular 24/2022 verbatim with the exact codes. You don't want to be reading these for the first time the morning the container lands.

Limits we're honest about

• Rates change.BCD changes at every Union Budget; specific notifications come throughout the year. Our dataset is current as of the latest notifications we've indexed, but for a Bill of Entry you should always cross-check against the live CBIC notification cited in the lookup.
• Anti-Dumping Duty isn't auto-computed.ADD is product- and country-specific and changes too frequently to bake into a per-HSN table. Where it's known, we surface it; where it's a possibility, the calculator nudges you to check the latest CBIC notification.
• Services (SAC, chapter 99) aren't covered yet. SAC is structurally separate from ITC-HS; a SAC-specific tool is on the roadmap.
• Final word stays with Customs. A lookup is a budgeting and verification tool. The legally binding rate is what Customs applies at the time of import — based on the Bill of Entry, the actual classification, the country of origin, current notifications, and any exemption you claim. Always run final numbers past a CHA.

How to use it

Open the HSN Code Lookup. Search by product name ("t-shirt", "laptop adapter", "turmeric powder") or paste a 2–8 digit code. Click any result to expand the full data card: hierarchy → duty stack → all duty components → IGST schedule → FTA preferential rates by country → PGA requirements → compliance notes. The "Use in calculator →" link drops the same code into the Import Duty Calculator with all rates pre-filled, where you can plug in a CIF value and country of origin to read out the landed cost.

No signup. No rate-limited API. Lookups run server-side at Pyrelo — your queries don't leave our infrastructure, and we don't log which codes you search for.