Which plastics from online shopping can be recycled?
Minimizing online shopping and waste consumption in the first place is at the top of the waste prevention hierarchy, but when stuck with a piece of packaging, have you ever wondered whether any of those plastic mailers were accepted for recycling? The good news is, a lot of the common items seen in online shipments are now accepted as Flexible Plastics and can be recycled at participating drop-off locations.
Below is a guide on online shopping recyclables and what is accepted for recycling under BC’s residential recycling program (and where to take them).
✓ Plastic Mailer Bags (without paper)
Many online orders these days are shipped in these plastic bags that are now fully accepted and recyclable at participating depots, London Drugs, community popup depots or in pink bins for communities that are already receiving curbside flexible plastics collection service. Simply remove any paper labels (as best you can) and drop off to any participating collection location:
✓ Plastic Air Pillows (remove air)
Some online orders also arrive with plastic sealed air pillows that help protect the products in the shipment from moving around or becoming damaged. Simply puncture the bag to first remove the air, and then recycle with other Flexible Plastics at participating depots, London Drugs, community popup depots or in pink bins for communities who are already set up with curbside flexible plastics collection service.
✓ Bubble-lined Plastic Mailer Bag (without paper)
Commonly seen with online shopping deliveries are also these bubble plastic mailer bags (sometimes referred to as bubble wrap). If the entire mailer is made of plastic like the photo below (with no paper layer) they are fully accepted under the ‘Flexible Plastics‘ stream in Recycle BC’s residential recycling program. Simply remove any paper labels where you can, and then recycle with other Flexible Plastics at participating depots, London Drugs, community popup depots or in pink bins for communities who are already set up with curbside flexible plastics collection service.
See Photo Examples of other recyclable Flexible Plastics here:
✘ NOT ACCEPTED: Bubble-lined Paper Mailers
Sometimes online orders arrive shipped in a paper bubble mailer. In these cases, since the plastic cannot fully be separated from the paper (too much residue remains on the plastic to be considered in acceptable scope at receiving & material recovery facilities), these are NOT recyclable.
If motivated, one may attempt to separate the plastic bubble sheet from the paper, and then recycle just the clean paper portion with regular paper recycling. The remaining bubble wrap sheet however will likely have too much paper and glue residues to be considered clean enough to recycle (considered garbage).
Otherwise these can only be reused or upcycled, or go in the garbage.
Commonly Confusing:
We’ve received some inquiries about a new(er) type of “paper-padded mailer” (usually a brown paper mailer with dots of thin white protective padding between the layers of paper). It appears this specific padding is intended to be designed in a manner to separate easily from the paper sheets during the paper pulping stage of common paper recycling processes.
For those participating in the Recycle BC program, these items are not considered contamination at this time in the program and can be recycled alongside other paper recycling (in your yellow bag at curbside, paper cart or single-stream recycling in your apartment or condo.
For some common online shopping packaging types, this list published by Amazon is fairly accurate (as of June 2026 as reviewed by our team).
