Container schedule reliability fell to 49.9% in August 2026. What small forwarders can do
Sea-Intelligence puts global container schedule reliability at 49.9% for August 2026, the lowest since September 2022. What that means for a small forwarder and four steps to take.
Container shipping got less reliable through the summer of 2026. Sea-Intelligence, which tracks carrier schedules across 34 trade lanes and more than 60 carriers, reported that global schedule reliability fell to 49.9% in August 2026. That is the lowest figure since September 2022. Put plainly, about half of vessel arrivals were not on time.
Data table
| Dec 2025 | 62.8% |
| Jan 2026 | 62.4% |
| Feb 2026 | 59.0% |
| Jun 2026 | 62.6% |
| Jul 2026 | 56.4% |
| Aug 2026 | 49.9% |
The delays also got longer. For vessels that arrived late, the average delay rose to 6.81 days in August, up 0.60 days from July and the highest since March 2022. In July it was 6.06 days. Sea-Intelligence links the drop to severe port congestion in Asia.
Data table
| Jul 2026 | 6.06 days |
| Aug 2026 | 6.81 days |
Why this matters if you run a small forwarding desk
A customer does not care that the whole market is late. They ask you where their container is. When half of arrivals slip, the problem is not a rare exception any more. It is most of your week, and you cannot call every customer about every ship.
Route changes add to it. Published comparisons put the extra sailing time of the Cape of Good Hope route at about seven to ten days one way on Shanghai to Rotterdam, and seven to twelve days once port calls and service patterns are counted (Carra Globe). Carriers have also been moving services back and forth, so a booking can change its path after you confirmed it to a customer.
Four steps that work at small scale
- Sort by who needs a call, not by who booked first. A shipment that is two days late with a cutoff tomorrow matters more than one that is five days late with no deadline.
- Know the next step for each late shipment. Update the customer, ask the carrier for a new ETA, move the trucking slot, or check free time at the port. Write it next to the shipment so anyone on the team can act.
- Watch free time. Carriers publish demurrage and detention tariffs per container per day, and the free days differ by port and carrier. Read the tariff for your lane (for example the Maersk US import tariff) and note the last free day beside the ETA.
- Send one clear message. Customers accept bad news when it comes early with a new date and a plan. A ready-to-send update saves ten minutes per shipment.
Where Berthbell fits
Berthbell is built for this daily sort. You add your shipment list, and it shows which shipments are late or about to be, the one next step for each, and a message you can copy to your customer. It does not replace your carrier relationships and it does not claim to track every vessel everywhere. Try the demo with sample data to see the layout.
Sources
- Sea-Intelligence, Global Schedule Reliability Continues to Plummet in August (29 September 2026).
- Sea-Intelligence, July Global Schedule Reliability Drops to Lowest 2026 Level; June 2026 release.
- Carra Globe, Suez vs Cape of Good Hope transit times.
- UNCTAD, Review of Maritime Transport 2025 for the wider picture on route disruption.
Questions
What is schedule reliability?
The share of vessel arrivals that reach port on schedule, as measured by Sea-Intelligence across carriers and trade lanes.
How low did it go in 2026?
49.9% in August 2026, the lowest since September 2022, per Sea-Intelligence.