Is Coffee the Second Most Traded Commodity? The Myth, Debunked
You've probably heard it: "Coffee is the second most traded commodity in the world, after oil." It's on café chalkboards and in books and documentaries. It has even come up in U.S. Senate testimony.
It isn't true. The real story is still worth knowing.
Where the myth came from
Back in 1970, coffee really was second to oil. Since then, grains and metals have passed it. By 2000, coffee had dropped to around 15th among commodities.
PolitiFact checked the claim with a World Bank economist and called it false. Even Mark Pendergrast, the coffee historian who repeated the claim in Uncommon Grounds, published a correction in 2009.
So what's actually traded most?
Oil is far ahead of everything else, at about US$1.26 trillion in exports a year. Behind it come natural gas, iron ore and steel, gold, copper, aluminum, soybeans and wheat.
Coffee ranks around 98th among all traded products. That's well behind soybeans and wheat, so it isn't even the second most traded farm product.
It isn't near the top of the futures markets either. Coffee is a major "soft" commodity, alongside sugar, cocoa and cotton. But on the overall futures volume charts it sits far down the list.
Where coffee really does lead
- It's the #1 tropical product traded in the world.
- It's the #1 beverage crop, well ahead of tea and cocoa.
- It's a top export for more than a dozen developing countries.
- Around 25 million farming families depend on it.
The money is big too. Coffee exports were worth about US$42B in 2023. Prices then more than doubled after drought in Brazil, and global coffee trade hit nearly US$70B in 2025. (That 2025 number counts some coffee twice, because beans get imported, roasted or processed, and shipped out again.)
How coffee compares to other drinks
| Drink | Export value |
|---|---|
| Coffee | US$42B (2023), about US$70B (2025) |
| Spirits | US$41.3B (2024) |
| Wine | US$40.7B (2024) |
| Soft drinks | US$31B (2024) |
| Beer | US$18.1B (2024) |
| Cocoa | about US$16B (2024) |
| Tea | US$7.55B (2024) |
| Bottled water | about US$4.8B (2024) |
These aren't perfect apples-to-apples numbers. Coffee's 2025 figure includes re-exports and the years differ a little. Before the price surge, coffee was roughly tied with spirits and wine.
Water is the funny one. It's the most consumed drink on earth, but it's near the bottom of the trade list, because almost nobody ships it far. That's the same lesson as the coffee myth, just flipped: how much we drink and how much gets traded are two different things.
Why getting it right matters
Stretching the truth doesn't help coffee. It hurts our credibility when we talk about the problems that are real: low prices for farmers, climate risk, and how much poorer countries depend on this crop.
Coffee doesn't need to beat steel to matter. It needs fair prices, a stable supply, and an industry that gets its facts straight.
Want to build a coffee business on real knowledge? Check out our business and barista courses.
Sources: PolitiFact (2017), with World Bank economist John Baffes; MIT Observatory of Economic Complexity (OEC); ITC trade data; International Coffee Organization; Vinetur (2025); IndexBox (2025); World's Top Exports; Pendergrast, M. (2009), Tea & Coffee Trade Journal.
