Homeowners keep sitting down at our table with a quote in hand and asking a version of the same question: “I keep reading that quartz prices are about to jump. Is my number still good?” Some already put down a deposit and assumed that settled it. It doesn’t always settle it.
There is a real quartz countertop tariff moving through Washington in 2026, and it does target engineered quartz. But most of what’s circulating is either a panic-buy sales pitch or a scope error, and a few widely repeated numbers are already out of date. Here’s the straight version: what the policy is, what it covers, what it does to a Florida price, and the question that costs money if you skip it. Does your quote have an expiration date, a surcharge clause, or a genuinely locked price?
We won’t tell you to buy this week. We’ll tell you how to read your paperwork.
What Actually Happened, and Why It’s Section 201
This is a global safeguard under Section 201 of the Trade Act of 1974, not Section 232, the national-security authority applied to steel and aluminum. It has its own scope, procedure, and clock.
- September 15, 2025: the Quartz Manufacturing Alliance of America filed a safeguard petition. Members at filing included Cambria, Dal-Tile, and Guidoni USA.
- December 1, 2025: the US International Trade Commission instituted investigation No. TA-201-79 and declared it extraordinarily complicated.
- April 1, 2026: the Commission found, 2-1, that quartz is being imported in such increased quantities as to be a substantial cause of serious injury to the domestic industry.
- By May 18, 2026: the report and remedy recommendation went to the President.
Status as of July 17, 2026
No proclamation has been signed. The statute gives the President 60 days after receiving the report, which puts the deadline at July 17, 2026, which is today. It can run later only if the President asks the Commission for supplemental information. Anyone quoting you a live quartz tariff rate today is quoting a recommendation, not a law. We’ll update this post when the proclamation lands.
The Numbers on the Table: A 25/40 Tariff-Rate Quota
Both affirming Commissioners recommended a tariff-rate quota rather than a flat tariff, running four years, covering slabs and fabricated quartz products.
| Relief year | In-quota rate | Above-quota rate | Quota volume |
|---|---|---|---|
| Year 1 | 25% | 40% | 140,000,000 sq ft |
| Year 2 | 24% | 39% | 159,000,000 sq ft |
| Year 3 | 23% | 38% | 164,000,000 sq ft |
| Year 4 | 22% | 37% | 169,000,000 sq ft |
In plain English: a tariff-rate quota lets a set volume in at the lower rate and charges the higher rate on everything past it. That volume releases quarterly, stopping importers from pushing a year of slab through the low-rate gate in January.
What It Might Do to Your Price
A tariff applies to the imported value of the slab, not to your installed price. The slab is one line in a job that also includes templating, fabrication, edge work, cutouts, sink setting, and install, and none of those get tariffed. A 25% duty does not turn an $80 per square foot countertop into a $100 one.
The best-sourced consumer estimate comes from industry comments reported by Fortune in June 2026: against an average quartz countertop of roughly $3,500, the tariff as originally requested, a flat 50%, would add $504 to $1,036 per kitchen at full pass-through. The recommended 25/40 TRQ is lighter than that. Our read: adopted as written, a Florida quartz kitchen moves by a few hundred dollars, not by half. For what the rest of your number is made of, see our breakdown of the line items most homeowners never see.
What’s In Scope, and the Part Everyone Is Getting Wrong
Engineered quartz only
The safeguard covers quartz surface products: silica bound with a resin binder, entering under HTS subheadings including 6810.99.0020, 6810.99.0040, and 7020.00.6000. Granite, marble, quartzite, porcelain, and sintered stone sit outside it entirely. Sintered stone falls out on the definition itself, because it’s compacted under heat and pressure with no resin binder. We compare those surfaces in our sintered stone vs porcelain slab vs quartz decision tree.
Before you conclude everything else is safe
“Quartz is tariffed, natural stone is safe” is the exact wrong takeaway. Section 201 is not the only regime in play, and Brazil is the dominant granite source for Florida fabricators.
Brazilian granite and marble did carry tariffs as high as 50% under IEEPA. In February 2026 the Supreme Court ruled 6-3 that IEEPA does not authorize those tariffs, and they were terminated. A 10% Section 122 surcharge took effect February 24, 2026 in their place, a balance-of-payments authority capped at 15% and 150 days, expiring around July 24, 2026. On May 7, 2026 the Court of International Trade held that surcharge invalid too, but limited relief to the plaintiffs before it. The government appealed, and on June 11 the Federal Circuit stayed that ruling pending appeal, so the 10% is still being collected today, on a duty a court has called unlawful. And on July 15, 2026 USTR took final Section 301 action on Brazil: 25% on most Brazilian goods, effective for entries on or after 12:01 a.m. Eastern on July 22, 2026. Granite, marble, and slate are covered. Quartzite is not, it sits on the exclusion list under HTS 6802.99.00.
So the honest scope map: the quartz safeguard is still a recommendation on the President’s desk, while Brazilian natural stone is already moving.
Slab origin is suddenly a spec
Separately, antidumping and countervailing duty orders on quartz from India and Türkiye have been in force since June 2020, continued by Commerce on January 15, 2026. Those are not new and not the safeguard. If your quartz line is Indian- or Turkish-made, that duty has been in your quote for years.
The Commissioners also recommended excluding certain countries from the TRQ, plus an anti-circumvention mechanism. Trade press has named Canada, Mexico, Singapore, and South Korea. Treat that as reporting, not settled law: the binding list is written into the proclamation, which doesn’t exist yet.
One neutral fact while you shop: domestic quartz isn’t imported, so an import safeguard doesn’t touch it. Cambria is US-made, in Minnesota. It’s also a petitioner here. Both are true, weigh them how you like. Our rundown on Cambria covers it on the merits.
Does Your Quote Expire? The Question That Costs You Money
That’s context. This decides what you actually pay. Most countertop quotes carry a validity window, commonly 30 days, sometimes 60 or 90, in small type near the signature line. A quote from April is not automatically honored in July. Find the date on yours. If there isn’t one, ask for it in writing.
Deposit locks the price, or deposit locks your spot?
These are not the same thing. A deposit that locks your price fixes the contract number regardless of what happens upstream. A deposit that locks your spot reserves calendar time and slab allocation, with the price still subject to whatever clause sits in the agreement. Both are legitimate. Only one protects you from a July proclamation. Ask, in exactly these words: “If material cost rises before install, does my number change?” Get it in writing.
How to Read a Material Surcharge Clause Before You Sign
Escalation clauses got common across construction after 2021, and they’re not inherently predatory. A fabricator holding a fixed price on a job that installs four months out is taking real risk. The problem is the open-ended version: “Price subject to adjustment for increases in material cost,” with no floor, no ceiling, and no trigger. That passes 100% of an unknown to you. A threshold version, where only the excess above a 5% increase gets passed through, is much fairer.
If a clause is broader than you like: cap it with a not-to-exceed number, date it with a firm-price period covering your install date, or strike it, accepting that a fully fixed price may carry a slightly higher starting number, because someone is pricing that risk either way.
What We’re Seeing in Our Own Orlando Slab Yard
The rule that matters most here: a tariff hits the next container, not the slab already on the rack.
Duties are assessed at import, on entry. Material standing in a Central Florida yard was landed at its landed cost, and that doesn’t change because of a proclamation signed after it arrived. So the answer to “should I rush?” depends less on the news cycle than on a boring question: is the slab you want physically here?
What we’re seeing this month is quieter than the headlines. Supplier pricing has not moved on the quartz safeguard, because nothing has been signed. What changed is conversation: distributors are talking about inventory positioning. That’s normal hedging, not a price event. Which is why we keep telling people to go look at the racks, as we lay out in our slab yard guide.
Buy Now, Wait, or Switch? Our Honest Answer
If you’re already mid-project, with cabinets in and a template date near, nothing here should change your material. Read your clause, confirm your window, proceed.
If you’re 6 to 12 months out, don’t buy quartz slab today to beat a tariff that hasn’t been signed. You’d pay to store material and lock a design decision early to hedge a few hundred dollars. One exception worth knowing: if you’re set on Brazilian granite or marble, the 25% lands July 22, and the same container logic applies, so ask your fabricator what’s already on the ground.
If you’re choosing between quartz and something else anyway, policy is a tiebreaker at most. Quartz is non-porous and never needs sealing, but its resin scorches around 300°F and yellows under sustained Florida UV, so it stays indoors. Granite handles heat better. Quartzite is natural, harder than granite, and etch-resistant. Our granite vs quartz comparison and quartzite guide go deeper than a tariff ever should.
If your quote has an open-ended surcharge clause, that’s the actual emergency here. Fix it today. For current numbers, our Florida countertop price guide holds the ranges we quote against: installed quartz in Central Florida runs about $60 to $120 per square foot, still true as of July 2026.
Frequently Asked Questions
Are countertop prices going up in 2026?
Not yet on quartz. As of July 17, 2026 no proclamation has been signed, so no Section 201 quartz tariff is in effect. If the recommended 25% in-quota / 40% above-quota TRQ is adopted, expect gradual pass-through as new containers land, likely a few hundred dollars on a typical kitchen rather than a doubling. Our installed quartz range in Central Florida is unchanged at roughly $60 to $120 per square foot. Brazilian granite and marble are a separate story: that 25% is already signed.
Does the quartz tariff affect granite, quartzite, or marble?
Not Section 201, no. The safeguard covers resin-bound engineered quartz only. But Brazilian granite and marble sit under separate regimes: the IEEPA tariffs were struck down by the Supreme Court in February 2026, a 10% Section 122 surcharge replaced them and is in litigation, and USTR took final Section 301 action on July 15, 2026 imposing 25% on Brazilian granite, marble, and slate effective July 22, with quartzite exempted.
Can my fabricator raise my price after I sign?
Only if your contract lets them. Look for a material surcharge or escalation clause and a quote validity window, commonly 30 to 90 days. An “any-increase” clause with no cap passes unlimited risk to you. Ask for a threshold, a not-to-exceed cap, or a firm-price period covering your install date. A deposit reserving your spot is not the same as one locking your price.
Does the tariff apply to slabs already sitting in a Florida yard?
No. Duties are assessed at import, on entry. A slab that already cleared customs was landed at its existing cost, and a proclamation signed afterward doesn’t reach back and retax it. A tariff hits the next container, not the slab on the rack, which is why pass-through shows up gradually as inventory sells through.
Which countries are excluded from the quartz safeguard?
Nobody knows yet, because no proclamation exists. The Commissioners recommended excluding certain countries plus an anti-circumvention mechanism, and trade press has named Canada, Mexico, Singapore, and South Korea as free-trade-agreement partners. Reports conflict on the full list. The recommendation also isn’t binding: USTR’s Trade Policy Staff Committee weighs it alongside other factors before advising the President. Until a proclamation issues, treat every exclusion list you read as reporting, not law.
Should I switch materials to avoid the tariff?
Almost certainly not. Adopted as recommended, the 25/40 TRQ moves a Florida quartz kitchen by a few hundred dollars, because the duty applies to the slab’s imported value and not to templating, fabrication, or install. That’s a rounding error against 20 years of living with a surface you settled for. Switching isn’t a clean escape either: Brazilian granite and marble take 25% under Section 301 on July 22. Pick the material you actually want.
Talk Real Numbers With Us Before You Decide
Policy stories are loud and vague. Your project is specific. Bring us the quote you already have, whoever wrote it, and we’ll read the validity window and the surcharge clause with you and tell you plainly what it commits you to. That costs nothing, and it beats refreshing trade headlines.
Come by the showroom at 6650 Hoffner Ave in Orlando and walk the racks to see what’s physically on the ground right now. We template, fabricate, and install in-house, so when we quote a number, it’s ours to stand behind. Free quote, no countdown clock.
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