Container shipping is thinking small again

The global containership orderbook is closing in on the 13m teu mark, but carriers are increasingly turning away from megaships and toward smaller and mid-sized tonnage, according to new data from Alphaliner.

The consultancy puts the cellular containership orderbook at 12.98m teu across 1,592 vessels — equivalent to 38.3% of the in-service fleet. While that remains historically large after years of record contracting, the profile of new orders has shifted sharply: since July 2025, around 74% of all orders have been for ships below 6,500 teu, compared with less than 30% in the preceding 12-month period.

The change follows a post-pandemic wave dominated by neo-panamax and megamax vessels as carriers chased economies of scale on the main east-west trades and fought for market share. Now, operators are increasingly focused on regional and feeder markets, where ageing fleets and growing cargo volumes are creating demand for replacement tonnage. Alphaliner notes strong ordering for 1,200 teu feeders and 1,800 teu bangkokmax ships — nearly 150 in the latter class over the past year — along with more than 100 vessels of around 3,100 teu, while the 5,000-6,500 teu range remains particularly popular.

The trend has carried through 2026: despite 329 ships ordered in the first half, representing 1.89m teu, the second quarter is expected to close without a single order for a mainline vessel above 16,000 teu — something not seen since early 2024. Even so, the consultancy cautions that the overall orderbook is still skewed toward larger ships because of the huge volume of megaship orders placed in 2023 and 2024; once those deliver, capacity in the 18,000+ teu segment will have almost doubled. At the smaller end, Alphaliner argues ordering still falls short of replacement needs, with the current sub-6,500 teu orderbook not yet matching the capacity of vessels approaching 25 years of age — suggesting more feeder and regional orders are likely in the years ahead.