30 American Journal of Transportation American Journal of Transportation ajot.com Top containership operators in 2026 By George Lauriat, AJOT (OPERATORS – continued on page 34) Chart Toppers Containership ownership is top heavy. The top ten con- tainer ship operators manage over 84% of the TEU (twen- ty-foot equivalent) capacity and operate 54.5% of the ships of the containership fleet (using numbers extrap- olated from Alphaliner’s Top 100 list). This is a staggering amount of TEU capacity jammed into a very short list at the top of the chart, which begs the question has the industry become too top heavy? Are the mega-car- riers wielding too much power in their role as the primary con- veyance of freight in the global supply chain? Certainly, many interna- tional shippers think so. But it is a far from easy question to answer, even as the basic math paints a highly sugges- tive rejoinder. Even among the top ten containership operators, there is a significant divide in size when it comes to TEU capac- ity with the top four contain- ership operators compared to the rest of the top ten. In the top ten, Mediterranean Ship- ping Company, better known as MSC, is the world’s larg- est containership operator deploying 987 ships and over 7.2 million TEUs. Maersk is second at 732 ships with a capacity of over 4.6 million TEUs while the CMA CGM group checks in with a fleet of 723 ships at just under 4.3 million TEUs and in the fourth position is COSCO at 554 ships of nearly 3.6 mil- lion TEUs. They are the only container ship operators with over 500 ships and over 3 mil- lion TEUs. To show just how big the disparity is among the top ten alone, at the bottom of the ten, Zim Line’s capac- ity is just 700,000 TEUs — a large number but dwarfed by COSCO’s nearly 3.6 million TEUs in the number four slot. And the steep fall off in TEU capacity really shows after Pacific International Lines (PIL), number twelve on the list, which operates 100 vessels of 443,154 TEUs. At number twenty-two Emirates Shipping Line with 24 vessels at 102,976 TEUs is the last containership operator with over 100,000 TEU capac- ity. And FESCO at number thirty-six with 51,831 TEU capacity is the last on the list with over 50,000 TEUs while Salam Pacific Indonesia Lines with 31,000 TEUs of capacity is the last of the over 30,000 TEU carriers. The Power of Alliances Many international ship- pers and regulators think that the mega carriers are wielding too much power. Certainly, the top ten containership operators wield a great deal of influence over the global movements of containerized freight as they are also the con- stituent members of the pri- mary ocean carrier alliances: Gemini consisting of Maersk (2) and Hapag Lloyd — and soon Zim Lines (10) which is being acquired by Hapag Lloyd; The Premier Alliance, which includes ONE (Ocean Network Express) (6), Hyun- dai Merchant Marine (8) and Yang Ming Marine Transport (9); Ocean Alliance made up of CMA CGM (3), COSCO (4) and Evergreen Line (5); and MSC which is large The YM Willpower completes first LNG bunkering in Singapore OCEAN CARRIER REVIEW 2026 OCEAN CARRIER REVIEW 2026
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