How Much Does a Pallet Weigh

A pallet weight is either the empty pallet or the loaded handling unit, and the two numbers answer different questions. The empty pallet is tare. The loaded unit is what a carrier bills, what a rack has to hold, and what a forklift picks up. Neither number is fixed by the footprint. A 48 × 40 inch deck can be a dry wood stringer near 40 pounds or a block pallet near 64 pounds, and the same deck can be rated for a few thousand pounds on a fork and a much higher figure when it sits on a solid floor.

The plan size, the deck height, and how many of those pallets fit in a container or a 53-foot van are in the standard pallet sizes and dimensions guide. What the loaded weight does to the price of one pallet is in how much it costs to ship a pallet. This page is the weight itself: empty weight by material, the three capacity ratings and why they differ, the loaded weights LTL and truckload run into, and how to put the scale weight on the bill of lading.

Quick reference

Every figure below is a published rating for a named pallet, or a published engineering analysis of a named design. The cluster of those builds is the working range. It is not a legal tare, and it is not the rating on a pallet you have not identified. Weigh the pallet. Read the rating for that build.

The spread is the useful fact. A pallet is not 40 pounds, and a plastic pallet is not automatically the light one.

Static, dynamic, and racked capacity

Manufacturers print up to three load numbers because the pallet is held up in three different ways.

Static is the load while the pallet rests on a solid, flat floor, including a block stack. The deck is supported across its area. This is the highest number.

Dynamic is the load while a forklift or a pallet jack moves the pallet. Forks and motion load the structure differently. Manufacturers also call this the fork rating or the safe working load. It is lower than the static figure.

Racked is the load when the pallet is supported only at its ends, across an open span, the way a selective rack holds a pallet on two beams. The deck is in bending. This is the lowest number, and many pallets are not rated for it. A supported rack, with decking under the pallet, is a different and higher rating. The static number is the wrong input for a beam.

The ORBIS row is the cleanest picture of why the three numbers exist. One heavy-duty plastic pallet is rated 30,000 lb on the floor, 5,000 lb on a fork, and 2,600 lb on an edge rack. The pallet did not change. The support did. The light-duty row of that same family has no rack rating at all.

A stringer pallet's rack rating, when a manufacturer prints one, belongs to that build. Nelson's 48 × 40 GMA spec lists 2,000 lb racking next to 2,200 lb dynamic and 6,000 lb static, and the sheet says the figures are guidelines that vary with use, material, and environment. Another mill's stringer will not match them. The pallet sizes guide makes the same point about entry: a block pallet and a stringer pallet share the 48 × 40 plan, and the rated load depends on the build.

Empty weight by material

48 × 40 wood: stringer and block

North American grocery and LTL freight sit on the 48 × 40 inch pallet (1,219 × 1,016 mm). ISO 6780 sets that plan size and a manufacturing tolerance. It does not set a tare or a rated load.

Wood weight moves with species and with moisture. The Pallet Design System is the engineering program of the National Wooden Pallet and Container Association, developed with the Center for Unit Load Design at Virginia Tech and the USDA Forest Products Laboratory. Two published PDS printouts for a 48 × 40 stringer pallet show the moisture effect on a single design:

A dried stringer in these two analyses falls between about 38 and 49 pounds. At manufacture, when the lumber is still green, the same styles are about 59 to 63 pounds. The pallet sizes guide uses a working range of about 30 to 48 pounds for a stringer pallet that has dried, which leaves room for a lighter softwood build than these two printouts. Use the range to plan a trailer. Use a scale for the bill of lading.

A block pallet replaces the three stringers with blocks and opens all four sides to a pallet jack. CHEP's 48 × 40 block pallet, model B4840A, is the pooled pallet many grocery and retail networks ship. CHEP lists an average weight of 29 kg (about 64 lb) and a height of 141 mm (5.6 inches).

CHEP's page prints two handling figures that do not match each other. The nominal-capacity line says the maximum load weight is 2,800 kg (6,173 lb). The configuration note recommends a maximum of 1,270 kg (2,800 lb) uniformly distributed, and says stacking loaded pallets on a solid surface is not to exceed 4,535 kg (10,000 lb). A separate line allows that stack up to five unit loads high, not to exceed 10,000 lb. The 2016 CHEP spec sheet's maximum loading capacity of 1,270 kg matches the configuration note, not the 2,800 kg line. Use the rating on the paperwork for the pool pallet you were issued.

CHEP's handling note says to rack the pallet under the outside blocks, and the product page says the pallet allows free-span racking in either direction. That is a handling instruction. It is not a published edge-rack weight.

Nelson's PWN-4840-GMA-S, a new 48 × 40 GMA stringer, lists the pallet at 55 lb and 4.75 inches tall. The sheet is explicit that hardwood or softwood may be used and that the technical data are guideline values. A 55-pound pallet sits between the dried PDS designs and the CHEP block average, which is where a real dock's mix of pallets actually lands.

Deck height still belongs in the handling-unit height. A product stack of 48 inches on a pallet about 6 inches tall is a 54-inch unit. The pallet optimizer lays cartons on the deck. It does not know which pallet will sit under them.

Plastic

Empty weight and rack rating are both model-specific. ORBIS's heavy-duty RackoCell is one published 48 × 40 plastic pallet: 49 lb, 6.25 inches tall, 30,000 lb static, 5,000 lb dynamic, 2,600 lb edge rack, and 5,000 lb supported rack. ORBIS says the weight can vary on the FM-approved version.

The family spec sheet shows the light-duty and medium-duty rows at the same 49 lb, with 30,000 lb and 5,000 lb in the load-capacity columns. The light-duty row has no rack rating. The medium-duty row prints 2,200 lb in the first rack column and 5,000 lb in the second. The fire-retardant row weighs 64 lb, and ORBIS says its rack rating may differ.

FedEx Freight's packing guide says plastic pallets can be heavier than wood. On these published figures a 49-pound plastic pallet sits with a dried hardwood stringer, and a 64-pound fire-retardant pallet matches the CHEP block average. A nestable pallet from another molder can be lighter. The spec sheet for the pallet on the floor is the number to use.

Metal

Steel is not one weight. Vestil's SPL-4048 drawing, a 48 × 40 galvanized pallet 4.75 inches tall, lists an approximate weight of 60 lb, a floor rating of 8,000 lb, a fork rating of 4,000 lb, and an unsupported rack rating of 2,200 lb. Vestil's BVS-PS4840, a different 48 × 40 slotted-top model, is listed at 100 lb with those same three load numbers.

Palac's TANKO chart puts a standard 48 × 40 galvanized pallet at 52 lb, with 3,300 lb dynamic and 6,600 lb static, and states that the ratings follow ASTM D1185. The light export model in the same 48 × 40 size is 37 lb, with 2,000 lb dynamic and 2,800 lb static. The higher static number is the wrong figure for a rack beam unless that model publishes a rack rating.

Pressed wood

Litco's 48 × 40 molded-wood pallet is a one-piece deck of wood fiber and resin. The current product table lists three duties, each ±1.5 lb:

• Medium: 34 lb empty, 1,500 lb dynamic, 4,500 lb static.
• Heavy: 38.5 lb empty, 2,000 lb dynamic, 6,000 lb static.
• Extra heavy: 41 lb empty, 2,500 lb dynamic, 7,500 lb static.

Litco says the pallets are not intended for open-beam rack storage, that the ratings assume a uniformly distributed load, and that the safe-load ratings follow ASTM D1185. FedEx Freight's packing guide does not recommend pressed-block or molded-pulp pallets for its network, on the grounds that they lack the stiffness of a wood pallet. A pressed-wood pallet can still be the right export deck. It is a poor assumption for an open rack, which is what Litco's own sheet says.

Euro pallet

The EPAL Euro pallet is specified. EPAL lists 11 boards, 9 blocks, 78 nails, length 800 mm, width 1,200 mm, height 144 mm (5.67 inches), weight about 25 kg (about 55 lb), and a safe working load of 1,500 kg (about 3,307 lb). When laden pallets are stacked on a solid, even surface, the bottom pallet must not carry more than 5,500 kg (about 12,125 lb).

EPAL's product materials describe the pallet as suitable for high-bay racking. They do not publish a racking load in kilograms. A rack design needs a racking figure for the support condition, not the 1,500 kg safe working load copied onto the beam.

A damaged EPAL pallet is a different object. EPAL says the safe working load is no longer guaranteed when the pallet is rotten, heavily splintered, or has damaged blocks. An exchange pallet that fails the quality classification should not be loaded to the published rating.

Loaded weight on LTL and on a full truck

The empty pallet is a small slice of a loaded unit. The limit you hit depends on which network takes the freight.

LTL

NMFTA's LTL packaging guidance says a standard stringer pallet can hold up to about 2,800 pounds and can be built up to 7 feet (84 inches) with no overhang. That is packaging guidance for a unit the LTL network can handle. It is not one carrier's tariff, and it is not the static rating of the pallet.

Carriers publish their own caps on top of that. FedEx Freight's current packing guide says a shipment can weigh up to 20,000 lb and run up to 20 feet long, and asks the shipper to notify the local service center before pickup when an individual handling unit is more than 3,500 lb. The same guide says a liftgate shipment with an individual pallet over 2,000 lb, and bigger than 60 × 80 inches, may be refused. FedEx Freight's services page uses a tighter description of what counts as LTL in the first place: a shipment under 15,000 lb and under 15 feet, with a single pallet under 2,000 lb.

Those are one carrier's published lines, and they do not all say the same thing. The packing guide is the handling limit. The services footnote is the general definition of an LTL shipment. The rule on your pricing agreement is the one that bills. The pallet sizes guide notes a Saia pallet-rate item limited to 40 × 48 inches and 84 inches high. Many docks still build to about 72 inches so the unit stays stable and can sit under a second unit in a trailer. Past the carrier's cap, the shipment leaves the standard pallet program. The comparison between one pallet, a partial, and a full trailer is in how much it costs to ship a pallet.

FedEx Freight also says overhang can cut a carton's compression strength by up to 32 percent. The cube penalty is separate from that strength loss, and the carrier measures to the outside of the overhang either way.

A full truck

A full trailer is limited by the truck, not by a per-pallet catalog number. FHWA's Interstate limits are 80,000 pounds gross vehicle weight, 20,000 pounds on a single axle, and 34,000 pounds on a tandem. Gross weight includes the tractor, the trailer, the fuel, the pallets, and the goods.

The floor counts in the pallet sizes guide are 26 GMA pallets with the 48-inch side along a 53-foot van, or 30 when they are turned and the van is wide enough. That guide's illustration is the right scale: 30 pallets at 1,500 pounds each are 45,000 pounds of cargo before the tractor and trailer are added, which is already tight against 80,000 pounds gross. Dense freight weighs out with floor spots left. Light freight cubes out with weight left. Axle placement can stop the load before the gross weight does.

Empty pallets are part of that cargo. Thirty pallets at the CHEP average of about 64 pounds are about 1,920 pounds of tare before any product. Thirty dried stringers at 40 pounds are 1,200 pounds. Either figure is real weight on the scale, and a small share of a cargo budget that is already pressing on 80,000 pounds gross. It is not small on a reweigh of one LTL pallet.

How pallet weight changes freight class and the LTL bill

For most general freight, LTL class follows density. Density is the weight of the handling unit divided by its cubic feet. NMFTA's density guidance says to use the greatest outside length, width, and height, pallet and overhang included, and the weight of the complete unit as shipped. The worked example on that page is a 48 × 40 × 45 inch unit at 450 pounds: 48 × 40 × 45 ÷ 1,728 = 50 cubic feet, and 450 ÷ 50 = 9 lb/ft³.

The 18 density bands are in What Is Freight Class?. A commodity-specific NMFC item can override density. When the item has its own code, the class on the quote has to be that code, confirmed with the carrier.

The pallet changes the math in two places. The height usually matters more than the tare.

The tare moves the weight. A 48 × 40 × 48 inch unit is 92,160 ÷ 1,728 = 53.33 cubic feet, the same handling unit the pallet-cost guide uses. The freight class calculator places 15.0 lb/ft³ in Class 70 (15 up to 22.5) and a result from 13.5 up to, but below, 15 in Class 77.5.

• 760 pounds, with the pallet left off the scale: 760 ÷ 53.33 = 14.3 lb/ft³, Class 77.5.
• The same goods plus a 40-pound pallet: 800 ÷ 53.33 = 15.0 lb/ft³, Class 70.

Forty pounds is an illustration inside the dried-stringer range, not a standard tare. On this cube it is enough to step the class, because the goods were sitting on the boundary. The same 40 pounds added to a 500-pound unit on the same cube goes from 9.4 lb/ft³ to 10.1 lb/ft³, and both results sit in Class 100 (9 up to 10.5). The class does not move. The billed weight does. Leaving the pallet off the bill is a reweigh either way.

NMFTA's density page lists the tolerance of a certified scale as ±5 lb on a handling unit up to 2,500 lb, ±10 lb from 2,505 to 5,000 lb, and ±20 lb from 5,010 to 10,000 lb. A catalog tare that misses the pallet by 15 or 20 pounds is outside the tolerance on a normal LTL unit. The same page notes that a half-inch error on the dimensions moves the density more than the weight tolerance does. Build a little margin when the result sits on a class line.

The deck adds cube. A 48-inch product stack on a 6-inch pallet is a 54-inch handling unit. The extra cube lowers density, which can raise the class, while the pallet's own pounds push density the other way. Measure the unit you built. Then price that class and that weight in the LTL rate estimator. The dollar rate per hundredweight is the carrier's tariff. The estimator is the sketch of how class, weight, and lane move the number. Fuel and accessorials are the rest of the bill, covered in the pallet-cost guide.

Parcel pricing is a different rule. Parcel carriers bill the greater of actual weight and dimensional weight. That calculation is the dimensional weight calculator, and the definition is in what dimensional weight is. A unit that is still inside a parcel network is the case for it. A pallet on an LTL bill is classed by density, then rated per hundredweight.

How to weigh a pallet

1. Weigh the finished handling unit. A floor scale, or a forklift or pallet-jack scale, should see the goods, the pallet, the stretch wrap, and the dunnage. That is the weight on the bill of lading.
2. If the goods were weighed separately, weigh the empty pallet you will actually ship and add it. A published average is for planning a trailer, or a quote, before the pallet is in the building.
3. Measure length, width, and height to the outside of the deck and any overhang. Include the pallet in the height. If you change the pallet or the stack, weigh and measure again. NMFTA's density page says a change in height or overhang changes the cubic feet.
4. Divide the weight by the cubic feet and read the class from the freight class calculator. If the commodity has its own NMFC item, use that item. The bands are in What Is Freight Class?.
5. Keep the scale ticket. At the terminal the carrier can reweigh the unit. A miss on tare or on height is the reweigh case in the guide to avoiding LTL reclassification fees.

The bottom line

An empty 48 × 40 wood stringer, in two published Pallet Design System runs, weighs about 38 to 49 pounds after the wood has dried and about 59 to 63 pounds at manufacture. A CHEP 48 × 40 block pallet averages 29 kg (about 64 lb). An EPAL Euro pallet is about 25 kg. A pressed-wood 48 × 40 on Litco's current table runs about 34 to 41 pounds. Plastic and steel of the same footprint, on the specs above, run from the high 30s to about 100 pounds. The safe load is three ratings: static on a floor, dynamic on a fork, and racked across a span, and the racked number is the one that fails first. NMFTA's packaging guidance stops a standard stringer around 2,800 pounds and 84 inches. FedEx Freight's packing guide asks for a call before pickup above 3,500 pounds on one unit, and its liftgate note can stop a pallet above 2,000 pounds. On a full truck the Interstate 80,000-pound gross is the ceiling, and 26 or 30 GMA floor spots share whatever that rig can legally scale. Weigh the unit you tender.

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