The figure marked the first drop in shipments since February and missed a Bloomberg forecast of a 2.9 percent rise.

Imports in the same month rose 1.0 percent, China's General Administration of Customs said. That was short of the 2.7 percent estimated in the Bloomberg forecast.

China and the United States reached a detente in their trade war last week after Xi and Trump met in South Korea.

That brought a precarious end to months of tit-for-tat measures between the economic and technological powerhouses as the leaders agreed to suspend a raft of measures for one year.

Washington halved a blanket tariff on Chinese goods to 10 percent, while Beijing loosened restrictions on exports of rare earth technologies -- a sector it dominates.

China also lifted extra tariffs on US agricultural products including soybeans, critical to American farmers who are a key part of Trump's base.

China's imports from the United States fell 11.6 percent month-on-month in October, the customs data showed, while its exports in the other direction rose 1.8 percent.

Chinese exporters had been "frontloading their trade in order to avoid high tariffs in the US", Zhiwei Zhang, economist at Pinpoint Asset Management, said in a note.

"It seems the frontloading finally faded in October. As the trade war is put on hold for one year, exports will likely normalise," Zhang added.

But, he warned: "Now that export momentum weakens, China needs to rely more on domestic demand."