Guides
The egg market, explained
How the numbers on this site actually work: the large white benchmark, cage-free versus conventional, how bird flu moves the price, loose versus cartoned. Each guide is built on the same live data as the trackers, so the examples are real and current.
The market, explained
How to read the USDA egg market report
The USDA egg market report is not one report but a family of them, published by the Agricultural Marketing Service under Egg Market News: a daily national benchmark, weekly regional prices, weekly inventory, a monthly cage-free read and a weekly look at grocery ads. The free public benchmark is the national large white number, a five-day weighted average of graded loose eggs in cents per dozen.
Why are egg prices high right now?
When egg prices are high the reason is almost always one of four things, often several at once: a bird-flu hit to the laying flock, thin inventory, a wholesale benchmark running well above a year ago, and a stretch of the calendar when demand runs hot. This page tracks all four live, so the charts below show where each stands today rather than a number that goes stale.
Cage-free vs conventional: the premium explained
Cage-free eggs cost more because they cost more to produce: the hens need more space, more labor and more feed per egg than caged hens. On top of that a growing set of states now require cage-free eggs to be sold at all, and the premium over conventional shrinks when a supply shock lifts the conventional price toward it.
Egg sizes and grades: large, extra large, AA and A
USDA egg sizes are set by minimum net weight per dozen, not by how wide an egg looks: the ladder runs from peewee at 15 ounces up through medium, large and extra large to the biggest class at 30 ounces, each step three ounces apart. Grades AA, A and B describe interior quality judged by candling, and large is the benchmark size the wholesale market quotes.
Loose vs cartoned: how wholesale eggs trade
Wholesale shell eggs trade in two forms: loose eggs, sold in bulk on flats and in cases before grading, and cartoned eggs, graded and packed for the retail shelf. The public USDA benchmark is a loose price, because it reflects the egg itself before packaging, grading and store handling are added on top.
What retail feature activity means
Retail feature activity is USDA's weekly count of how hard grocery stores are advertising eggs, reported as a feature rate, the share of sampled stores running an egg ad, and an activity index that counts the total store-features. It is a demand-side signal: heavy features usually go with ample, cheap supply, and features pull back when eggs get scarce and dear.
How US egg prices are set
There is no single official US egg price. A number forms at each step of the chain: producers sell into supply and demand, a small spot market at Egg Clearinghouse Inc helps discover the price, private services like Expana (Urner Barry) publish assessments, most supply moves on formula contracts pegged to those assessments, and distributors and retailers mark it up to the shelf. USDA reports the market for free alongside all of it, and the index this site shows is one public benchmark inside that system.
Breaking stock and the egg products market
Breaking stock is shell eggs sent to be broken rather than cartoned. What they become, liquid, frozen and dried egg, is the market USDA prices by the pound.
The US scrambled egg mix market
Scrambled egg mix is whole egg blended with dairy, oil and salt, pasteurized and sold to foodservice by the pound. USDA prices the egg in it, not the mix.
The US liquid egg market
Liquid egg is shell egg broken and pasteurized, sold by the pound as whole, whites or yolk. USDA prices all three weekly and publishes the pounds traded.
The US egg products market
The US egg products market is the part of the egg business that never reaches a carton: shell eggs broken and sold as liquid, frozen or dried egg, by the pound, to manufacturers and foodservice. USDA prices nine of those lines every week.
The US egg powder market
Egg powder is shell egg with the water taken out: a shelf-stable ingredient that ships without refrigeration and keeps for a year or more. USDA prices dried whole egg and dried yolk in dollars per pound, and quotes them only when enough trades confirm.
Supply and shocks
How HPAI moves egg prices
HPAI, highly pathogenic avian influenza, moves egg prices by removing hens from the laying flock faster than they can be replaced. When APHIS confirms the virus on a farm the whole flock is depopulated, and because a new flock takes months to reach laying age the price jumps quickly and eases slowly.
From hen to shelf: why retail lags wholesale
Retail egg prices lag the wholesale market because the eggs move through a chain, from farm to packer to distributor to shelf, and much of that volume is priced on formulas that reset on a delay. The lag runs both ways: store prices climb after wholesale climbs and, just as stubbornly, stay high after wholesale falls.
The egg demand calendar
Egg demand runs on the calendar: it builds through the fall into Thanksgiving and Christmas baking, peaks again at Easter, and eases through the summer. Supply runs year-round while demand concentrates, which is why the fourth quarter tends to be structurally tight and prices firm into the holidays.