What Is Recycled Polyester?

How is recycled polyester made?

Recycled polyester is made from used polyethylene terephthalate (PET), the plastic of drinks bottles, which is either melted down and spun into new fibre or broken back into its chemical building blocks and rebuilt as fresh polymer. Britannica describes both routes. PET bottles and containers are commonly melted down and spun into fibres for fibrefill or carpets, and methods have been devised to break the polymer into its chemical precursors so it can be made into PET again.

Where the raw material comes from

Almost all of it comes from bottles. According to Textile Exchange, about 97% of the recycled polyester produced in 2025 came from plastic bottles. Across all fibres, textile-to-textile recycled fibre remains at about 1% of production: 0.76% in 2025, up from 0.61% in 2021.

Why clean, single-fibre waste matters

Britannica notes that PET collected in a suitably pure state can be recycled into its original uses. Mixed waste is harder. The European Commission says that blending different types of polyester can adversely affect thermo-mechanical recycling, and that blends such as polyester with cotton make recycling more difficult because few technologies can separate textile waste by fibre. Elastane, the stretch fibre, can act as a contaminant in almost all textile fibre recycling technologies.

What are the properties of recycled polyester?

Recycled polyester is the same polymer as polyester, PET, spun into fibre, and neither US nor EU fibre-naming law gives it a separate name. Britannica credits the large ring structure in each PET repeating unit with the polymer’s notable stiffness and strength. The same stiffness gives fabrics excellent resistance to wrinkling, which is why PET fibres are used in durable-press blends with rayon, wool and cotton.

On the label, what changes is the evidence, not the fibre name. A recycled polyester garment and a virgin one carry the same legal fibre name, so the difference lies in the recycled-content claim and the paperwork behind it.

How is recycled polyester graded or measured?

Recycled polyester is measured by its recycled content: the share, by weight, of the fibre or product that came from material recovered from the waste stream. US Federal Trade Commission guidance (the Green Guides) counts material recovered during manufacturing (pre-consumer) or after consumer use (post-consumer). A seller who claims pre-consumer content should be able to show that the material would otherwise have entered the waste stream, and a seller who separates the two needs evidence for each percentage.

Certification thresholds

Textile Exchange runs two standards for recycled content, the Recycled Claim Standard (RCS) and the Global Recycled Standard (GRS). Both accept pre- and post-consumer material, verify it against the ISO definition of “recycled”, and use a third-party certification body to audit each stage of the supply chain.

• GRS between businesses: products with at least 20% recycled content.
• GRS on a consumer label: products with at least 50% recycled content.
• GRS extras: social, environmental and chemical processing requirements; chemicals with harmful potential are not allowed on GRS products.
• RCS: the same as the GRS except that the GRS is the more rigorous standard.

As of 2026, Textile Exchange is unifying its standards into a new Materials Matter Standard, which becomes effective on 31 December 2026 and mandatory from 31 December 2027.

How does recycled polyester appear on a clothing label?

On the sewn-in fibre label, recycled polyester appears simply as “polyester” with its percentage by weight; the word “recycled” is an additional claim, not a separate legal fibre name.

Under US rules

• The generic name is “polyester”, defined as a long-chain synthetic polymer of at least 85% by weight of an ester of a substituted aromatic carboxylic acid (16 CFR 303.7).
• Fibres are listed by generic name and percentage by weight in order of predominance, with the name or registered identification number (RN) of the manufacturer or another company that markets or handles the product, and the country where the product was processed or made.
• A fibre under 5% of the weight is normally listed as “other fiber”, with exceptions that include fibres of clearly established and definite functional significance.
• Extra information such as a recycled claim must not minimise, detract from or conflict with the required information.
• Under the Green Guides, it is deceptive to misrepresent recycled content. An unqualified “recycled” claim fits only a product made entirely of recycled material, apart from minor, incidental components; otherwise the claim should be clearly qualified to show the amount or percentage, by weight.

Under EU rules

• Only the fibre names in Annex I of Regulation (EU) No 1007/2011 may describe fibre composition. Polyester is entry 35: at least 85% by mass of an ester of a diol and terephthalic acid. Annex I has no separate name for recycled polyester.
• All fibres are normally listed by name and percentage by weight.
• “100%”, “pure” or “all” is reserved for products made of one fibre, with a tolerance of up to 2% extraneous fibres (5% for carded products) under Article 7(2).

A recycled nylon or acrylic is not recycled polyester: both fibres have their own generic names under US rules, and nylon is listed as “polyamide or nylon” in the EU.

How do you tell good recycled polyester from poor?

Judge recycled polyester by the evidence for the claim, because the fibre label reads “polyester” whether the fibre is recycled or virgin. Five checks take a minute in a shop or on a product page:

1. Find a number. Look for a percentage of recycled content on the hangtag or listing. “Made with recycled materials” with no figure, on a garment that is only partly recycled, falls short of the US FTC’s guidance to state the amount.
2. Match it to the fibre label. Read the sewn-in label for the polyester percentage. If a hangtag claims a high recycled share but the label shows polyester as a minor fibre, the claim needs explaining.
3. Look for a certification logo. A GRS logo on a consumer product means at least 50% recycled content under Textile Exchange rules, plus chemical, social and environmental requirements. An RCS logo signals verified recycled content with fewer extra requirements.
4. Ask what was recycled. With 97% of recycled polyester made from plastic bottles in 2025, “made from textile waste” is the rarer claim and deserves supporting detail.
5. Read the blend for the next life. A recycled polyester garment blended with cotton or elastane will be harder to recycle again, according to the European Commission.

How do you care for recycled polyester?

Care for recycled polyester as you would any polyester, following the garment’s care label, since the fibre is the same polymer. Washing is also where synthetic garments shed microplastics. The European Commission names textiles made of synthetic fibres as one of the main sources of unintentional microplastic release, and notes that washing-machine filters can cut the volume released from laundering by up to 80%.

Is recycled polyester sustainable?

Recycled polyester is made from waste PET rather than new fossil-based feedstock, but it is mostly made from bottles rather than old clothes, it is still a synthetic fibre that sheds microplastics in the wash, and it remains a small share of all polyester.

• Scale: Textile Exchange puts recycled polyester at about 9.7 million tonnes in 2025, up from 9.4 million tonnes in 2024, while total polyester output rose from 77.7 to 82.5 million tonnes.
• The bottle question: the European Commission’s 2022 textiles strategy flags the accuracy of green claims for recycled plastic in clothing made from sorted PET bottles rather than fibre-to-fibre recycling. It says the practice risks misleading consumers and “is not in line with the circular model for PET bottles”, which can stay in a closed loop for food-contact packaging.
• Bottle recycling rates: Britannica calls PET the most widely recycled plastic, yet its current entry (as of 2026) says only about 20% of PET material is recycled in the United States.
• Fibre-to-fibre: the Commission encourages businesses to prioritise fibre-to-fibre recycling, yet textile-to-textile recycled fibre made up just 0.76% of fibre production in 2025, according to Textile Exchange.

Recycled polyester is one tool of sustainable fashion, not a synonym for it. It is also different from upcycled fashion and deadstock fabric, which reuse existing garments or unused cloth in their current form instead of breaking the material down into new fibre.