"Customs release" is the SHEIN status people search most once a parcel has crossed the border, because it sounds final and the parcel then goes quiet. This page explains what the scan records, whether you still owe anything, how long the gap after it normally lasts, what the next statuses should be, and the point at which it stops being normal.
Short answer: "Customs release", "customs released" and "CBP release" all mean the customs authority in the destination country has finished with your SHEIN parcel and let it through. "CBP release" is the United States version, named for U.S. Customs and Border Protection. Nothing is stuck. The parcel now moves from the customs facility to the domestic carrier's network, and the next scans are a sorting-hub arrival, "transferred to courier" or "handed over to last-mile carrier", then "out for delivery". The quiet stretch after a customs release is the ordinary handover gap, usually one to three days, not a customs problem.
What "customs release" means
Customs clearance is a decision by a government authority, and release is the moment that decision is recorded on your tracking. In the United States, CBP describes the postal process as a CBP official preparing the paperwork for importing the parcel, assessing the proper duty, and releasing it for delivery. In the European Union, the Commission's guidance for online shoppers defines clearance for release as the documented permission granted by the national customs authority to allow the goods to be used or consumed in the EU. The SHEIN "customs release" scan is that permission, passed through the carrier's feed.
So the status tells you three things at once: the declaration was accepted, no inspection is holding the parcel, and the parcel has been handed back from the customs area to the logistics chain. It is the same milestone that other feeds call "customs clearance completed", which has its own page: customs clearance completed meaning.
"Customs released" vs "CBP release" vs "customs clearance completed"
They describe one event in three vocabularies:
| Status on SHEIN tracking | Where you see it | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Customs release / customs released | Most countries | The destination country's customs authority has cleared the parcel |
| CBP release | United States | The same clearance, recorded by U.S. Customs and Border Protection |
| Customs clearance completed | Many feeds, including the long SHEIN strings that end in "waiting for LM" | The same clearance, worded as the end of the clearance process |
Treat them as one step. The full SHEIN status list, with every customs and warehouse string in order, is in SHEIN tracking statuses.
Do I still owe anything after "customs release"?
Usually not, but release and payment are separate. Clearance can be granted while a duty or tax bill is still open; in that case the carrier collects it before delivery, and the European Commission's guidance states that such an invoice must be paid before the goods are handed over. In practice SHEIN orders in the UK and EU are mostly cleared with duties handled at checkout; SHEIN's UK shipping page notes that for orders exceeding £160, handling fees for customs duty and clearance processing, which depend on the total order value, will be applied. If a payment request arrives after a customs release, it comes from the carrier, not from customs, and the parcel waits at the carrier until it is paid. How to tell a real payment request from a fake one is explained on the customs clearance completed page.
How long from "customs release" to delivery?
SHEIN publishes no per-status timings, so this is a practical reading rather than a rule. After a customs release the parcel is collected from the customs facility, sorted at the first domestic hub and handed to the local courier, which normally takes one to three days before the "transferred to courier" or "handed over to last-mile carrier" scan, and then one to three days more to delivery. SHEIN's own published windows are for the whole journey: on its UK page, Standard Shipping is 5 to 8 working days and Express Shipping is 4 to 7 working days, and it states that "Receiving time = Processing time + Shipping time". The stage-by-stage breakdown, and when an order counts as late, is in how long does SHEIN take to deliver.
What comes next
- A domestic sorting scan. "Arrived at local courier facility", a hub name, or on UK feeds a terminal name. The one UK shoppers search most is explained in Hatfield terminal SHEIN meaning.
- The courier handover. "Transferred to courier" or "handed over to last-mile carrier": the local carrier (Evri, Royal Mail or Yodel in the UK; USPS, FedEx or UPS in the US) now has the parcel. See handed over to local carrier meaning.
- Out for delivery, then delivered. See out for delivery meaning.
If the parcel shows "customs release" and then nothing for a day or two, it is in the handover gap. Customs is finished; the silence is the drive to the hub and the wait for the local carrier's first scan.
"Customs release" but tracking still says "in transit"
The top-level state on a tracking page describes the journey stage; the detail line describes the last scan. A parcel can show "in transit" as its state and "customs release" as its latest event at the same time. Read the detail line for what happened. The state will change to "out for delivery" when the local courier loads the parcel.
When to worry, and who to contact
- Check the estimated delivery window on your SHEIN order page. While the last day has not passed, a quiet stretch after a customs release is inside the plan.
- After three working days with no new scan following the release, the parcel is usually waiting at the handover. Check whether a payment request has arrived from the carrier.
- After the window has passed, contact SHEIN, not customs and not the courier. Customs has already released the parcel, and the courier may not have received it yet. SHEIN's UK page asks customers who have not received a parcel within the estimated time to contact customer service within 45 days of the payment date.
The opposite case, a parcel that sits in clearance without a release, is covered in package stuck in customs and awaiting customs clearance meaning.
For merchants
"Customs release" is a true, final, reassuring status that generates tickets anyway, because the parcel goes quiet right after it. A brand shipping cross-border sees the same pattern on its own carriers: the release scan arrives, the handover to the domestic network takes two days, and the customer writes in on day one. The fix is to treat the release as a milestone with an expected follow-up: show the shopper "cleared customs, with your local courier soon", and message only if the handover scan does not arrive within the expected window. Pango normalises customs and courier statuses from every connected carrier onto one plain set, in the customer's language, and watches the gaps between milestones rather than displaying the carrier's strings. If you ship internationally and want to see how your carriers' customs events map onto one status set, start with carrier management software.
The bottom line
"Customs release" and "CBP release" are the border saying yes. The parcel is cleared, usually with nothing to pay, and is on its way to your local courier. Allow the handover gap, watch for "transferred to courier" and "out for delivery", and contact SHEIN only when the estimated delivery window has passed.
