Sea-Intelligence (Nov 5th, 2026) – Increased Service Instability

Since the pandemic, we have seen a severe escalation in liner service instability across major deep‑sea trades, caused by increases in blank sailings, services phasing in/out, vessels delayed into the following week, and ad‑hoc extra‑loaders. We measure the instability as the standard deviation of the number of weekly offered services but express it as the percentage of the average number of services, to account for the change in number of offered services.

Figure1 shows the relative standard deviation of the post‑pandemic period (2020‑2026) in excess of the pre‑pandemic (2013‑2019) baseline. The most profound operational disruptions are currently concentrated on the Asia‑Europe trade lane, with Asia‑North Europe seeing an massive 78% increase in weekly service instability, while Asia‑Mediterranean recorded a 71% increase. The Transpacific network has also reached higher baseline of service instability, although it has absorbed the turbulence slightly better than Asia‑Europe. Service instability on the Asia‑North America East Coast trade lane recorded the smallest comparative growth, increasing by 26%, while Asia‑North America West Coast saw a 48% increase.  

This increased destabilization of liner networks causes cascading negative consequences for both cargo owners and maritime infrastructure. For shippers, this constant weekly shifting in available capacity makes it incredibly hard to plan their supply chains. More importantly, these unexpected changes create major bottlenecks at the arrival ports. When the number of arriving vessels and containers constantly goes up and down, it greatly increases the risk of sudden port congestion. This congestion can then lead to longer waiting times for vessels, in turn worsening schedule reliability and lengthening transit times.

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All quotes can be attributed to: Alan Murphy, CEO, Sea-Intelligence.