Steel prices in Egypt — what was actually paid in 2024

Egypt exports more steel than it imports and still buys over a million tonnes of hot-rolled coil a year. The two facts belong together: the mills here were built for rebar and wire rod, so long products leave for Africa and the Levant while the flat products the appliance and pipe makers need come in from China, Türkiye and Russia. Everything else on this page — the price spread, the port pattern, the licensing — follows from that shape.

Last updated 24 September 2026

Every figure here comes from Egypt's own customs declarations: value divided by net mass, nothing modelled. How it is done and where it breaks down →

• 2,272,868 tsteel imported (2024)
• 2,760,312 tsteel exported
• Net exporter487,444 t surplus

Imports

Exports

What the Egypt numbers say

• The spread in Egypt runs from 702 USD per tonne for hot-rolled bar to 1,579 for narrow coated strip — 2.2× — and it maps onto the country's own production split rather than onto a quality ladder.
• Hot-rolled coil and plate carries 54 % of the inbound tonnage, which is why the flat side of the Egyptian market moves with one product's price.
• The lanes are concentrated, with China taking 51 % of the top five on that heading.
• On narrow coated strip Egypt pays 1,579 USD per tonne and receives 1,166 — 413 apart, the signature of a country importing a commodity and exporting a niche.

Buying and selling into Egypt

• Egypt's trade pattern splits cleanly by product shape: long products go out, flat products come in. Bar and wire rod left the country at 1.41 million tonnes in 2024 while hot-rolled coil arrived at 1.22 million — the same steel industry seen from two ends.
• That split is a capacity story. Egyptian mills are built around rebar and wire rod for the domestic construction market and for export into Africa and the Levant; flat rolling capacity has never matched domestic demand from the appliance, pipe and can-making sectors, so coil is imported.
• Alexandria and El Dekheila take most of the flat cargo; Port Said and Damietta handle containers and smaller parcels; Ain Sokhna serves the Suez industrial zones on the Red Sea side. From Istanbul the sea leg is three to five days, which is why Turkish coil competes on delivery as well as on price.
• Import licensing runs through the General Organisation for Export and Import Control. Registration of the producing mill, pre-shipment inspection and a conformity certificate are routine for steel consignments, and a shipment that arrives without them waits at the port rather than being refused — an expensive difference.
• Egypt has repeatedly used antidumping and safeguard measures on long products and on billet. Any offer into this market has to be checked against the measure in force on the day of the bill of lading, not the day of the enquiry.
• Payment terms move with the currency. After the 2024 devaluation and the return to documentary collection from the earlier letter-of-credit regime, importers have been negotiating on tenor as hard as on price; a quotation that fixes both is worth more here than a low headline number.

Main supplying countries

Hot-rolled coil and plate (HS 7208)

Coated sheet (galvanized and painted) (HS 7210)

Wire rod (HS 7213)

Angles, shapes and sections (HS 7216)

How Egypt import values moved, 2020–2024

Other markets

Questions about steel prices in Egypt