Combined Nomenclature (CN): the EU's 8-digit customs code

The Combined Nomenclature (CN) is the EU's tool for classifying goods when they are declared to customs. It was established by Council Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 to meet, at the same time, the requirements of the Common Customs Tariff, the EU's external trade statistics, and other EU policies on the import and export of goods. It is a further development of the World Customs Organization's Harmonized System (HS). Most goods imported into or exported from the EU are classified under a CN code.

Why the code matters

The CN subheading you declare decides two things:

• which rate of customs duty applies to the goods; and
• how the goods are treated for statistics and for other EU policies - including whether they face prohibitions and restrictions or need a licence.

Get the code right and the duty and the paperwork follow correctly. Get it wrong and both can be wrong.

How a CN code is built

A CN code has eight digits. Under Article 3 of Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87, the first six digits are the HS heading and subheading, shared worldwide, and the seventh and eighth digits identify the EU's own CN subheading. Reading a chocolate example from the top down:

• Chapter 18 - cocoa and cocoa preparations (2 digits, from the HS).
• 1806 - chocolate and other food preparations containing cocoa (4 digits, the HS heading).
• 1806 10 - cocoa powder, containing added sugar or other sweetening matter (6 digits, the HS subheading).
• 1806 10 15 - containing no sucrose, or less than 5 % by weight of sucrose (8 digits, the CN subheading).

The first six digits are the international HS; the seventh and eighth are the EU's detail. In a customs declaration the code is usually carried further still, to the 10-digit TARIC code: the ninth and tenth digits (Article 3(2)) add EU measures such as suspensions, anti-dumping duties and quotas.

What the Combined Nomenclature contains

The CN comprises the HS nomenclature and the EU's own subdivisions, and around them (Article 1(2)):

• preliminary provisions - including the General Rules for the interpretation of the Combined Nomenclature, the rules on duties, and the rules applicable to both;
• the goods descriptions, with section, chapter and subheading notes and footnotes;
• the conventional duty rates - the EU's WTO tariff commitments - and some autonomous EU duties;
• supplementary units (for example litres or number of items); and
• tariff-related annexes and the special coding system in Chapters 98 and 99.

The whole CN is reproduced in Annex I to Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87.

Legal basis and explanatory notes

The CN is established by Council Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 of 23 July 1987. Each year the complete, up-to-date CN - with the duty rates - is republished as a Commission implementing regulation; for 2026 it is Commission Implementing Regulation (EU) 2025/1926, applying from 1 January 2026.

The CN can be interpreted with the help of the Explanatory Notes to the Combined Nomenclature, which explain the scope of the headings. They are a useful aid, but - unlike the General Rules and the legal notes - they are not legally binding.

Updates - and the correlation table

The CN is not fixed. Every year, Annex I to Regulation (EEC) No 2658/87 is replaced by a complete new version in the Official Journal. Updates fold in changes agreed internationally - at the WCO for the HS, or at the WTO for conventional duty rates - as well as changes for commercial policy, technology or statistics. For 2026, for example, new subheadings were introduced for green-technology goods such as wind-turbine blades, photovoltaic wafers and lithium battery chemistries. Codes are created, split, merged or closed.

That is a problem for anyone who has to keep master data, binding tariff information (BTI) decisions and declaration templates correct: a code you used last year may no longer exist. The tool for this is the correlation table. It maps the old codes to the new ones, in both directions: from the old code (the code that has been replaced, its end date, the code that replaces it, and the date the new code takes effect); and from the new code (the new code, when it enters into force, and the code it was derived from).

Worked example, from the 2026 table:

In each case one code was subdivided into two more specific ones. An importer using the old code has to move to the correct new code from the date it takes effect - and check whether any BTI resting on the old code is still valid. The scale is easy to underestimate: the 2026 correlation table carries around 200 new-code entries and close to 300 replaced-code entries, with changes taking effect on some fifteen different dates across the year.

Use case

Question to Classify AI (Quick mode): "wooden pallet 1200×800mm".

A standard 1200×800 mm wooden pallet - the familiar flat transport pallet - classifies under CN code 4415 20 20, "flat pallets; pallet collars", which carries a 3 % conventional duty. Classify AI has three modes; this is Quick mode, and Quick mode does not classify the goods. It gathers the evidence and gives a reasoned answer to build on. Here it converges on 4415 20 20 from two binding tariff information (BTI) rulings of the Italian customs authority (2024), both describing a functionally identical product - a rigid wooden board used to stack and move smaller packages, liftable by forklift.

The reasoning sits in the structure of heading 4415, which covers wooden packings and load boards. Subheading 4415 20 is 'pallets, box pallets and other load boards; pallet collars', and it splits in two: 4415 20 20 for flat pallets (and pallet collars), and 4415 20 90 for the rest - box pallets and other load boards. A plain flat pallet falls in 4415 20 20.

Quick mode also shows what to discard, which matters as much as what to keep. It sets aside an EU classification regulation on collapsible pallet collars, and two Court of Justice cases on unrelated wooden goods - window-frame blocks and shelving - because none concerns a flat transport pallet. The answer rests on the directly comparable rulings, not on near-misses. Try Classify AI.