Durable Goods Orders
Durable goods orders count the value of new orders placed with US manufacturers for goods meant to last three years or more — aircraft, vehicles, machinery, electronics. Because orders precede production, the series leads manufacturing activity, and businesses only commit to expensive, long-lived equipment when they are confident about future demand.
Latest reading
As of May 2026, Durable Goods (Durable goods orders ($)) stands at $332B — down from $348B the prior reading. The headline is volatile thanks to lumpy aircraft and defense orders, so the cleaner signal is core capital goods (non-defense, ex-aircraft) or the ex-transportation cut. Use year-over-year comparisons to see the trend; double-digit YoY growth marks robust investment, while sustained declines below -5% flag recession risk. Rising order backlogs point to strong demand ahead. Series history runs from 1993 to present.
Sources, methodology & freshnessLast updated 2026-07-24 · Open ↓Close ↑
Durable goods orders ($)
- YoY %
- -3.4%
Next release: Jul 27, 2026
Full history
Orders level ($)
Year-over-year %
The annual growth rate. Shaded zones split growth (green, above 0%) from decline (red, below 0%) — cliff-edge drops below zero tend to lead recessions.
Methodology & data
Durable Goods is sourced from Census via the Federal Reserve's FRED service (Census Bureau via FRED (DGORDER), monthly, seasonally adjusted). We pull the complete history, chart it on a monthly basis, overlay SPY for context, and generate a dated plain-English reading from the latest release — with no smoothing or adjustment beyond what the chart legend states.
Every reading is stamped with its release date, last updated 2026-07-24. Maintained and reviewed by Yuriy Matso; see our methodology for the standards every series on the site is held to.
Frequently asked questions
What is the Durable Goods Orders?
Durable goods orders count the value of new orders placed with US manufacturers for goods meant to last three years or more — aircraft, vehicles, machinery, electronics. Because orders precede production, the series leads manufacturing activity, and businesses only commit to expensive, long-lived equipment when they are confident about future demand.
How do you read Durable Goods?
The headline is volatile thanks to lumpy aircraft and defense orders, so the cleaner signal is core capital goods (non-defense, ex-aircraft) or the ex-transportation cut. Use year-over-year comparisons to see the trend; double-digit YoY growth marks robust investment, while sustained declines below -5% flag recession risk. Rising order backlogs point to strong demand ahead.
Where does the Durable Goods data come from?
Census Bureau via FRED (DGORDER), monthly, seasonally adjusted. We chart the full history and publish a dated, plain-English reading with every release; the raw series is downloadable as CSV at /data/indicators/durable-goods-orders.csv.
How often is Durable Goods updated?
Durable Goods is a monthly series from Census, refreshed here as soon as a new release posts to FRED.
thetrading.tools PRO
Talk to this data with your AI
PRO is an MCP server that plugs Claude, ChatGPT, Cursor or any AI agent straight into everything on this site — the live market scores, ~90 economic indicators with full histories, and every signal study. Ask a market question; your AI answers from our data, dated and sourced.
Cancel anytime