News / A new era for shippers, with blanked sailings now a fact of life

Container shipping has entered a new era of structurally constrained capacity, as carriers routinely withdraw 10% to 14% of scheduled space through blanked sailings, according to new analysis from Sea-Intelligence.

The consultancy’s review of the first half of 2026 across the four main east-west trades – Asia-North Europe, Asia-Mediterranean, Asia-US east coast and Asia-US west coast – found that, while the extreme disruption of the pandemic years had faded, blanked sailings have become a permanent feature of network management, rather than an occasional response to weak demand.

Compared with the first half of 2019, carriers are increasingly relying on cancelling sailings to balance supply and demand, prompting the analyst to conclude that supply chain planners need to “recalibrate allocation and inventory strategies” around a lower baseline of available capacity.

On the Asia-USEC route, blanked capacity has shot up, from 273,725 teu in the first half of 2019 to 863,396 teu in the first half of this year. Asia-Mediterranean has seen withdrawn capacity more than double, from 224,143 teu to 580,484 teu, while Asia-USWC and Asia-North Europe both recorded around 1m teu of blanked capacity in H1 26.

And measured as a share of total scheduled capacity, Sea-Intelligence noted that the shift was equally pronounced.

In H1 19, blanked sailings accounted for just 6%-8% of capacity across the four trades. Today, every route sees blanked voyages in double digits, with Asia-USEC the most constrained, at 14%, followed by Asia-USWC and Asia-North Europe at 11%, and Asia-Mediterranean at 10%.

Sea-Intelligence argued that this represented a “fundamental change” in carrier behaviour, rather than temporary market adjustment.

Perhaps most strikingly, the growth in withdrawn capacity has significantly outpaced fleet expansion.

Between 2019 and 2026, scheduled capacity on the Asia-USEC trade increased 46%, but blanked capacity surged 215%; Asia-Mediterranean saw capacity grow 56%, compared to a 159% increase in withdrawn capacity; on Asia-USWC, capacity rose 16%, but blanked sailings increased 62%; and on Asia-North Europe, 20% capacity growth was against an 83% rise in withdrawn space.

According to the analysis, this demonstrates that the delivery of new vessels has not translated into proportionately more cargo space for shippers, as carriers have increasingly offset fleet growth through tactical capacity withdrawals.

However, while more capacity is being removed, the way carriers are doing it has become considerably more predictable.

During the pandemic, blanked sailings fluctuated sharply from week to week, but Sea-Intelligence found there was less volatility across the four trades, suggesting carriers have adopted “a more disciplined and consistent” approach to capacity management.

This created a market that was “restricted, but highly predictable”, said the analyst, allowing shippers to plan with greater confidence provided they account for permanently less available space.

It recommended supply chain planners assumed there would be structural capacity withdrawals of between 10% and 14%, depending on tradelane, and adjust their inventory policies accordingly.

It also warned that shippers relying heavily on the Asia-USEC trade should consider alternative routings and larger safety stocks, given that lane’s comparatively high level of withdrawn capacity.

James Hookham, director of the Global Shippers Forum, told The Loadstar: “Blanked sailings are just one of the ‘levers’ shipping lines pull to manage capacity when they have more slots than boxes to fill them.”

“The effect is to reduce the number of bookable slots available to shippers at ports where the service would have called, and rates therefore typically rise – or at least don’t fall as fast.”

Mr Hookham added that cancelled sailings were not “inherently problematic”, provided carriers acted independently.

“When decisions are taken in alliances of more than one carrier is the issue competition authorities need to be satisfied with,” he added.