What Are Cow Hides? Cowhide Leather vs Hair-On Hides

Cow hides are the skins of cattle, and they come from the food industry. The word covers two products. One is the natural hide with the hair left on, sold mainly as rugs. The other is the leather made by tanning it.

Cattle hides are the largest single source of leather, at about 65% of production. This page is part of our guide to where leather comes from and how it is made.

Two meanings of "cowhide"

Both are real animal hide. A product sold as cowhide leather is tanned cow skin. The word cowhide alone does not say which layer of the hide was used (see below).

Where cow hides come from

After a cow is killed, its skin is removed, salted and sorted by size and colour. The salt stops decay, and the hides are dried for 3 to 6 days before going to a tannery.

The UNIDO Leather Panel calls hides and skins an end product of animal production, "more correctly a by-product". Sheep, goats and pigs supply most of the remaining leather. See other animals used for leather.

Cowhide, calf skin and kips

"Hide" is the trade word for the skin of a large animal, and cowhide is the standard example. Cattle skins are also sorted by size, but the cut-offs differ by source:

FAO's trade classification uses a different split, at 16 kg (about 35 lb) for fresh or wet-salted whole bovine hides. The two sets of numbers disagree, so treat any single cut-off as local. More detail is in hides, skins and kips.

On the Stridewise channel, tanner Edwin Gallun explains how calfskin differs from adult cowhide, including why calf skins have a finer grain and come from veal production. He describes calf by the animal's age rather than by the weight classes in the table above, and his views on durability are his own.

Inside a cowhide: grain and split

Only part of the hide becomes leather. The thin outer epidermis, about 1% of the skin's thickness, is removed, and the corium underneath is the real leather-making layer. During preparation the hide may be split into layers:

• Full-grain keeps the whole outer grain surface.
• Top-grain includes the grain layer.
• Split leather comes from the lower corium once the grain is taken off, and suede is made from its underside.

"Genuine leather" on a cowhide label is not a grade; it often means processed split. Grades are compared in our leather types guide.

Is cowhide rawhide?

Not usually. Rawhide is a hide that was never tanned. It is cleaned, stretched and dried until hard. Cattle are one of its sources, along with buffalo, deer and elk, but most cowhide is tanned into leather. See hide vs leather for the three states side by side.

What cow hides are used for

Hides in general go mainly into footwear, upholstery and leather goods. Hair-on cowhides become rugs, and the best ones keep their natural colours. Dyeing to look like tiger or zebra skin is usually reserved for lower-quality hides.

In clothing, one maker describes cowhide as firmer than sheepskin. Leather Collection men's leather jackets use cowhide for biker and cafe racer cuts, and sheepskin or lambskin for softer shirt and bomber styles. Its motorcycle gear is made from cowhide, with kangaroo as an option on some suits.

Are cow hides ethical?

Sources disagree, so here are both sides. The UNIDO Leather Panel describes hides as a by-product and a renewable resource that is often wasted. Animal rights activists generally oppose using hides for clothing. Tanning also carries an environmental cost: one tonne of hide can generate 20 to 80 m³ of wastewater.

FAQ

Is 100% cowhide real leather?

If it has been tanned, yes. Cowhide leather is leather made from the skin of a cow. The label does not tell you the layer, so look for full-grain or top-grain if that matters.

Are cow hides expensive?

We have no sourced price data. Quality does vary: dyed hair-on cowhides are usually the lower-quality hides.

Do cows need to be killed for leather?

Cowhide comes from cattle killed in the food industry; the skin is removed after slaughter.