The NMFC changed in July 2025. Here is what actually moved
Every article about Docket 2025-1 tells you the density scale went from 11 steps to 13. Almost none of them tell you the useful part: which freight actually changed class, and which did not move at all. Put the two scales side by side and the answer is narrow, specific, and not what most shippers assume.
Put the two scales side by side
The old density scale had eleven subprovisions. The new one has thirteen. Here they are together, which is a comparison surprisingly hard to find anywhere else:
| Density (lb/ft³) | Class before | Class now | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Less than 1 | 400 | 400 | no change |
| 1 – 2 | 300 | 300 | no change |
| 2 – 4 | 250 | 250 | no change |
| 4 – 6 | 175 | 175 | no change |
| 6 – 8 | 125 | 125 | no change |
| 8 – 10 | 100 | 100 | no change |
| 10 – 12 | 92.5 | 92.5 | no change |
| 12 – 15 | 85 | 85 | no change |
| 15 – 22.5 | 70 | 70 | no change |
| 22.5 – 30 | 65 | 65 | no change |
| 30 – 35 | 60 | 60 | no change |
| 35 – 50 | 60 | 55 | one step cheaper |
| 50 or greater | 60 | 50 | two steps cheaper |
Read the right-hand column. Eleven of the thirteen bands map exactly as they did before. The reform did not renumber the scale, redraw the breakpoints or shuffle the classes. It took the old top step — everything from 30 lb/ft³ upwards, all of it class 60 — and split it into three.
So on the density scale alone, the change has one direction and one shape: freight denser than 35 lb/ft³ got cheaper, and nothing else moved. If your pallets run at 12 lb/ft³, the density scale did exactly nothing to you.
Then why did my class change?
Because for a lot of freight the density scale was never what decided the class in the first place. That is the part of the reform that actually costs money, and it is not a table.
Before July 2025, a great many commodities carried a fixed class in their own NMFC item, set by what the thing was rather than how dense it was. Bagged product, furniture, machinery, apparel: the item said class 85, and class 85 it was, whether the pallet came out at 9 lb/ft³ or 19.
Docket 2025-1 moved roughly a hundred commodity groups off those fixed classes and onto the density scale. Apparel and textiles, metal goods and building materials, agricultural and food products, furniture and fixtures, chemicals, electronics and sporting goods are the groups the industry reports as most affected.
For those shippers the class did not shift by one step on a table. It stopped being a fixed number and became a function of how they pack. Two pallets of the same product, packed differently, now classify differently. That is a change of kind, not of degree.
If your freight was already classified by density and runs under 35 lb/ft³, nothing changed. If it carried a fixed class from its NMFC item, everything changed — and the number you get now depends on your packing, not on your product.
Who got cheaper and who got dearer
The direction follows from the mechanism, so you can reason it out rather than guess.
Dense freight won. Anything over 35 lb/ft³ that was already on the density scale dropped from class 60 to 55 or 50. Bricks, tiles, canned goods, fasteners, liquids in drums, metal stock. This is the clearest win in the reform and it is unambiguous.
Light bulky freight is exposed. Not because the scale moved against it — it did not — but because product that used to hide behind a favourable fixed class is now measured. A foam or plastics shipper who was quietly enjoying class 85 on freight that actually runs at 5 lb/ft³ is now looking at class 175.
Anyone who guesses their dimensions is exposed twice. When class came from an item number, a sloppy bill of lading still produced the right class. Now the dimensions are the class. Carriers reweigh and remeasure, and a correction lands after the freight has moved, when you have no leverage.
How to check your own freight in ten minutes
You do not need a subscription or a consultant to find out where you stand. You need one pallet, a tape measure and a scale.
- Measure a real pallet, not the spec sheet. To the outermost point, including overhang and shrink wrap. Include the pallet in the height.
- Weigh it, pallet included. A wooden pallet is around 40 lb, and leaving it out is the single most common way to land in the wrong band.
- Work out the density and read off the class. The freight class calculator does the arithmetic and shows every step, so you can check it rather than trust it.
- Compare against what you are being billed. Pull three recent invoices for the same product and look at the class on them.
- If they disagree, find out why before you argue. It may be a specific NMFC item that still applies, a negotiated class in your contract, or a genuine reclassification. Those three have very different answers.
Three traps worth naming
The pallet. Forget it and your height is short by five and a half inches and your weight by forty pounds. On a light pallet that is enough to cross a band, and it crosses in the direction that costs you.
Averaging across a mixed shipment. Density is worked out per handling unit, not across the load. Ten identical pallets classify as one. Ten different pallets do not — each one stands on its own.
Assuming a lower class number is worse. It is the other way round, and it catches people out constantly. Class 50 is the cheapest band and class 400 the most expensive, so denser freight costs less to move per pound. Packing tighter is not a trick; it is the whole logic of the system.
What this does not tell you
Density is now the primary factor. It is not the only one. The NMFTA still classifies on handling, stowability and liability where those matter, so hazmat, fragile goods and awkward shapes can sit away from their density. Some commodities keep their own item and their own fixed class.
The binding source is the NMFC itself, published by the NMFTA and reached through their subscription. Anything free — this guide included — is a way to work out what you should be seeing, and to ask a sharper question when you are not seeing it.