The trend of vessel upsizing in the containership sector has been well reported, but the flexibility of much of the containership fleet has meant that different storylines have evolved across the trade lanes. Larger and larger ships cast an obvious shadow, but a wide range of capacity, in relative terms, isn’t always to be found where it might be most expected…

Big Guns Deployed

Boxships at the very upper end of the size range are generally deployed on the Asia-Europe trade. The average size of ships on this route (the largest across all trade lanes) stood at 13,936 TEU in August 2017. In recent times, the delivery of ‘megaship’ capacity, particularly of ships of 18,000+ TEU, resulting in the ‘cascading’ of smaller ships off this route, has driven an increase in the average size, and today the biggest ship deployed, at 21,413 TEU, is about 1.5 times larger than this average. This indicates a fair degree of clustering of the largest vessel types, gradually filling up the trade with them as far as possible.

Meanwhile, on the Transpacific, the average size of boxships deployed stood at 7,623 TEU in August 2017, with the largest ship deployed at 14,414 TEU, 1.9 times bigger than the average. After the opening of the new locks in Panama, rapid upsizing of services through the canal to the USEC took place, but on the other hand larger ships to the USWC and some Panamaxes remaining on the USEC trade have stretched the ratio.

New Homes

Meanwhile, on the non-mainlane East-West trades, the average size of vessels deployed stood at 6,161 TEU. But, following the introduction of new ships on trades involving the Middle East and ISC, on the back of new larger ships on the mainlanes, the largest ship is now 14,074 TEU (almost as large as on the Transpacific). That’s a ratio of 2.3, with these routes increasingly offering new homes for vessels over 12,000 TEU in size.

Elsewhere, the average size of ships on North-South routes stood at 4,632 TEU, with the largest ship 2.8 times bigger at 13,102 TEU. There aren’t many deployed there that big, but services have upsized rapidly via the stepping stones of around 5,000 TEU and 8,000 TEU.

Stretching Out

And last but definitely not least, in August the average size of boxships deployed on intra-regional trades stood at 1,783 TEU. Though the cascade of larger ships onto these trades can be limited by infrastructure capability, the biggest ship today is 6,250 TEU, generating a ratio of 3.5, the largest featured here. It may be the realm of the small ships, but intra-regional trading shows the widest, perhaps least clustered, range of deployment.

Looking In The Right Places

The ratio of the largest ship deployed compared to the average might not be a perfect metric, and on many trades there is a ‘tail’ of smaller ships, legacy or in niches, to consider too. But what is interesting, is that while upsizing and ultra-large ships capture the headlines, relative to the centre of gravity on each trade, it is the intra-regional arena where the widest spectrum of boxships is to be found.