Smartphones to laptops: Full list of items exempted from Trump's tariffs

The Trump administration late Friday said that it would exclude several electronics, including laptops and smartphones, from reciprocal tariffs

The Trump administration late Friday said that it would exclude several electronics, including laptops and smartphones, from reciprocal tariffs. A new guidance from US Customs and Border Protection listed these items, which are not usually manufactured in the US. This comes as the president earlier this month imposed 145% tariffs on products from China while authorizing a 90-day pause in the ‘Liberation Day’ tariffs for most trade partners.

Smartphones, laptops are among items exempted from Trump tariffs (AFP)

The exemptions are expected to benefit big tech companies like Apple, Samsung, and chip maker Nvidia. The three companies incurred heavy losses at the stock market following Trump's tariff announcement. Apple lost over $640 billion in market value, CNBC reported. The cost of an iPhone could have surged to as high as $3,500 under some estimates, the report added.

The US Customs and Border Protection said items like smartphones, laptops, hard drives, flat-panel monitors and some chips would qualify for the exemption. Machines used to make semiconductors are excluded too. They escape the 145% tariff and 10% baseline tariff too.

Here is a complete list of items exempted from tariffs

8471: Automatic data processing machines and units thereof; magnetic or optical readers, machines for transcribing data onto data media in coded form and machines for processing such data, not elsewhere specified or included.

8473.30: Parts and accessories of the machines of heading 8471.

8486: Machines and apparatus of a kind used solely or principally for the manufacture of semiconductor boules or wafers, semiconductor devices, electronic integrated circuits or flat panel displays; machines and apparatus specified in note 11(C) to this chapter; parts and accessories.

8517.13.00: Smartphones

8517.62.00: Machines for the reception, conversion and transmission or regeneration of voice, images or other data, including switching and routing apparatus

8523.51.00: Solid-state non-volatile storage devices

8524: Flat panel display modules, whether or not incorporating touch-sensitive screens without drivers or controls circuits

8528.52.00: Capable of directly connecting to and designed for use with an automatic data processing machine of heading 8471

8541.10.00: Diodes, other than photosensitive or light-emitting diodes (LED)

8541.21.00: Transistors, other than photosensitive transistors with a dissipation rate of less than 1 W

8541.29.00: Unmounted chips, dice and wafers

8541.30.00: Thyristors, diacs and triacs, other than photosensitive devices

8541.49.10: Other diodes

8541.49.70: Transistors

8541.49.80: Optical coupled isolators

8541.49.95: Other

8541.51.00: Semiconductor-based transducers

8541.59.00: Other

8541.90.00: Parts

8542: Electronic integrated circuits; parts thereof

The items excluded from Trump’s reciprocal tariffs under retroactive for products that have left the warehouse by April 5, 2025.

White House deputy press secretary Kush Desai, however, issued a word of caution after the exemption list was released. He said that President Trump ‘has made it clear America cannot rely on China to manufacture critical technologies such as semiconductors, chips, smartphones, and laptops’.

“At the direction of the President, these companies are hustling to onshore their manufacturing in the United States as soon as possible,” Desai added.

Trump has previously said he would consider exempting some companies from tariffs.