China reclaims spot as top German trade partner from US – DW – 11/19/2025

China has again overtaken the US to become Germany’s top trading partner thanks to increased imports into Germany in the first three quarters of 2025.

It comes amid tariff tensions with both countries, although Donald Trump’s trade policies are perhaps getting the most attention, and as German exports to both main markets have faltered. Especially car sales were affected.

What were the key figures?

Destatis, the government’s statistics office, published revised data. Trade with China between January and September totaled €185.9 billion (about $215 billion), Wednesday showed. This is an increase of 0.6% compared to the same period last year.

Meanwhile, trade with the US fell 3.9% compared to the first nine months of 2024 to €184.7 billion.

China overtook the US as Germany’s biggest trading partner in 2016 and remained there steadily until it lost the top spot last year.

Imports to Germany from both countries increased, by 2.8% in the case of the US but by 8.5% from China.

Meanwhile, the value of German exports fell in both directions, falling 12.3% against China and 7.8% against the US.

But overall the US remains the more attractive export market for Germany, with sales of €112.7 billion compared to €61.4 billion. – which means germsOne still has a trade surplus with the US and a trade deficit with China.

In fact, the second largest importer of products for Germany is not the US but the neighboring Netherlands, which is slightly ahead of the US in third place.

More signs of the decline of the car business

Exports of German cars and car parts have declined more sharply amid tariff disputes with the two countries and China’s booming car industry continues to deal with its high-end domestic demand at the expense of manufacturers around the world.

Sales to the US fell by €3.6 billion or 13.9% amid the introduction of higher 15% tariffs on imports from the EU, and followed a brief period where tariffs rose from less than 3% to nearly 27.5% in the first half of the year following Trump’s withdrawal.

Meanwhile, sales to China fell by €6.1 billion or 35.9%. This comes as the EU and China are in a dispute over high tariffs imposed on Chinese electric vehicle sales in Europe.

Edited by: Wesley Rahn