Quoted 2026 mill-direct numbers cluster in three bands: 6063/5052/7050 sheet at US$1,490–1,690/ton with a 3-ton MOQ, polykraft-coated 1xxx/3xxx/5xxx coil negotiable around the US$2,550–2,850/ton mark with a 500 kg MOQ, and finished building-product sections such as roller-shutter profiles at US$30–55 per square meter at 2 m² MOQ [S3][S4][S6].
The reference benchmark for downstream buyers in North America remains the Platts US A380 Secondary Aluminum Alloy Price assessment, a secondary-alloy (recycled-content) price series that anchors die-casting and automotive buy/sell contracts in the United States and is the go-to cross-check when comparing Chinese exports against US spot levels [S1].
Form factor sets the price band before grade does
Coil and sheet are the cheapest form factor across every series surveyed: 100 kg-class MOQs for thin sheet sit between US$1.00 and US$10.00 per kg on Made-in-China listings, while the same series in 1 mm–40 mm plate jumps to the US$1,490–1,690/ton range with 3-ton MOQs — roughly a 3-4× premium per kg driven by rolling-mill scheduling and gauge-change losses, not alloy chemistry. [S1]
Forged parts open a much wider spread. Qingdao Hulk Metal Technology posts US$0.50–21.80 per piece at 100-piece MOQs, and Qingdao Jinchuan Machinery lists US$1.00 per piece for unspecified forging stock [S5]. That 40× ratio inside one product category is die/forging cost plus CNC machining minutes, not the alloy itself, which is a useful sanity check when a quote looks too low to be the right grade.
Series selection: 1xxx/3xxx/5xxx/6xxx/7xxx in context
The Chinese wholesale catalogues expose how the series map to price: 1050/1060/1100 (1xxx, >99% Al) and 3003/3004/3105 (3xxx, Mn-bearing) dominate coated-coil listings for roofing and honeycomb-core panels because they form easily and resist atmospheric corrosion, but they are not structural [S3][S4]. 5052/5083/5086/5A05 (5xxx, 3–5% Mg) carry the load — Mingtai's export range covers coils, sheets/plates, foils, strips and tread plate from a 1.3 million m² base running 100+ production lines, and the 5xxx family is what you specify for marine and pressure-vessel skins [S2].
For anodized architectural extrusions and window/door profiles, 6063 is the default — referenced explicitly in the 6063 7050 sheet listing — while 7050/7075 (7xxx, Zn-bearing) appears only in higher-strength 1mm–40mm plate SKUs and commands the upper end of the 1xxx–7xxx price ladder on the same listing. A short comparison passage for procurement: 1xxx is cheapest and softest, suitable for reflectors and chemical tank liners; 3xxx adds strength at a small premium for cookware and signage; 5xxx is the workhorse for marine and chassis with a mid-tier price; 6xxx (6061/6063) is the structural-extrusion standard at a 10–20% premium over 5xxx; 7xxx is aerospace-grade at the top of the range. Cross-reference the aluminum alloy encyclopedia entry for chemistry and temper details.
MOQ, surface treatment and OEM audit tier shift the real cost
Minimum-order quantity is the single biggest non-metallic lever: a 1-piece MOQ on a CNC machined aluminum part lists at US$1.50–9.50, but the 100-piece tier (US$0.50–21.80) and the 500-pair tier for door hardware (US$2.75–6.50) reveal the per-piece economics at small-batch production [S5]. For volume buyers, Mingtai's 100,000 m.t./month supply capability on aluminum coil is the relevant ceiling for capacity planning [S4].
Surface treatment layers cost on top of base alloy. Polykraft coating, embossing, and the white-aluminum-oxide abrasive (US$308–335/metric ton, 1-ton MOQ) for sandblasting prep are the three most common adders in the Made-in-China dataset [S3]. Diamond Member / Audited Supplier badges and CCC, ISO9001, CE marks cluster around higher-priced listings (the US$30–55/m² shutter sections carry the full certification stack), so treat the certification tier as a soft 5–15% adder built into the headline price [S6].
Cross-check against ferrous and competing non-ferrous guides
For buyers running a multi-metals budget, the alloy steel price and cost guide 2026 is the natural steel-side counterweight: alloy steel per-ton pricing runs higher than commodity 1xxx/3xxx aluminum coil but lower than 7075 plate on a like-for-like tonnage basis, which matters when total weight is a design constraint rather than a budget constraint. Where forming machinery is the dominant capex line — die-casting cells, for instance — the die casting machine price & cost guide 2026 is the right companion read, because the A380 benchmark the Platts assessment tracks is exactly the alloy that feeds hot-chamber and cold-chamber die casters [S1].
If a project is aluminum-intensive on the building-envelope side (window/door framing, curtain wall, louver) rather than the structural side, the aluminum window & door encyclopedia page gives the profile-and-glazing breakdown that explains why 6063 extrusions dominate residential quotes even when 5052 sheet is technically available. Decorative panels and interior cladding fall under the aluminum veneer panel category and price out higher per m² than raw coil because of the PVDF/polykraft coating and the flatness-tolerance step.
Where the Platts A380 secondary benchmark fits in
The Platts US A380 Secondary Aluminum Alloy Price is a North American die-casting reference, not a Chinese mill-export series, and is published as an assessment (a surveyed range) rather than a single tick [S1]. For a Chinese mill quoting a 6063 extrusion at US$1,490–1,690/ton FOB, the right cross-check is not A380 spot but LME primary aluminum plus a regional conversion premium (the Shanghai and CIF Turkey premia are the two most-watched for Asian and Mediterranean buyers, both outside the dataset here). Treat the Platts series as a signal for US secondary-alloy die-casting supply, and use it to flag when a Chinese A380-equivalent export quote is anomalously low or high relative to US secondary economics.
Spec discipline: standards, MTC and the audit trail
For load-bearing or pressure-retaining applications, EN 485/EN 515 (European sheet and temper), ASTM B209 (US sheet/plate), and ASTM B221 (extruded bar/rod/wire) are the spec families to call out on the purchase order. For marine and offshore, specify ASTM B928 (5086/5083 H116/H321 plate) rather than the generic B209 line, because B928 adds the intergranular-corrosion and exfoliation tests that B209 omits. None of these are named in the source material as a price driver, so the recommendation is generic: insist on a mill test certificate (MTC) tied to the actual heat number, and reject any quote that offers only a generic "aluminum alloy" description without a series-and-temper callout. [S2]
For anodized architectural sections, reference the linear guide encyclopedia entry only when a project is mixing structural aluminum framing with linear-motion hardware (CNC gantries, machine-tool frames); it is not a price-anchor for the alloy itself. Likewise the crossed-roller guide page is relevant where a precision slide sits on an aluminum chassis, not for the alloy buy.
The next trackable signal is the July 2026 Platts assessment window for the US A380 Secondary Aluminum Alloy Price [S1]; cross-reference it against the Shanghai Metal Market (SMM) daily for 6063 extrusion and 5052 sheet to triangulate the actual Chinese mill FOB trend rather than relying on a single Made-in-China listing [S4]. If a buyer's quote cluster is more than ~10% below the alloy steel buying guide 2026 baseline for comparable tonnage, treat that as a red flag for mis-graded material rather than a bargain.