ZIM Line has caught up with its larger peers in terms of average ship size, according to
Alphaliner’s report today (28 August).
The Israeli carrier has upped its average ship size of 4,395 TEU in August 2023, to 5,748 TEU this month. This growth is in line with ZIM’s fleet expansion as it has chartered more larger ships.
Asset-light ZIM, now the ninth largest liner operator, has replaced many chartered Panamax ships with 5,300 to 7,900 TEU new buildings. Ten new 15,248 TEU vessels joined ZIM’s Far East – US East Coast ‘ZIM Container Pacific’ service between February 2023 and April 2024, further elevating the carrier’s average ship size by 31% from August 2023.
There are 6,278 fully cellular container ships in the world, amounting to 30.2 million TEU,
representing an average vessel size of 4,809 TEU, up from 4,645 TEU in August 2023.
The average vessel size is tied to the liner operators’ trading profiles.
European operators such as CMA CGM, Maersk or MSC all have extensive regional short-sea and feeder services with smaller ships, which pull down their average vessel size. Asian carriers with a high focus on the two biggest East-West trades from the Far East to Europe and to North America have much larger average vessel sizes.
With liner operators adding more ships to Far East-South America routes, where rates are at two-year highs, this trade has seen the highest growth in average vessel size, which went up by around 5% from August 2023. Many mainline operators have assigned 12,800 to 16,000 TEU vessels to Far East-South America routes.
Alphaliner average size of all ships trading between the Far East, Central America and the
East Coast of South America now stands at over 10,000 TEU, even exceeding the average
vessel size of 9,000 TEU on the Far East – US West Coast trade.