Ocean Oct 15, 2026 · 8 min read

Suez traffic passes half its pre-crisis level as a Saudi–Houthi war heats up next door

Suez is half back. Don’t price it as fully back. Container capacity through the Suez Canal averaged 753,000 TEU (twenty-foot containers) a week in early October. That is over 50% of 2023 levels for the first time, says BIMCO. Our view: the return is real, but it is happening beside a hot Saudi–Houthi war. Linerlytica expects a full return by Q1 2027. Freightos calls the Houthi escalation “uncertainty rather than a confirmed capacity shock”. Asia–Med spot rose 7% to $3,800 per FEU (forty-foot container), per FreightWaves. Keep Cape fallback clauses in 2027 contracts. Our call: unless a container ship is hit, Asia–North Europe spot dips below $3,000/FEU by end of December.

Suez is half back, and the Houthis are at war with Saudi Arabia: how forwarders should play both
In the first two weeks of October, container ships carried an average of 753,000 TEU a week through the Suez Canal. A TEU is a twenty-foot equivalent unit, the standard container measure. In the same two weeks of 2023, before the Red Sea attacks began, the figure was 1,457,000 TEU.
That makes it the first time since the crisis began that Suez container traffic has passed half its old level. Niels Rasmussen of BIMCO, the shipowners’ association, worked from Clarksons Research data. In his words: “this is the first time that transits have exceeded 50% of pre-disruption levels”.
The same week brought more bad news from Yemen. Houthi missiles and drones hit Saudi airports and energy sites. Saudi Arabia struck back. The two stories are pulling in opposite directions.

What we think it means

Our view: the Suez comeback is real, and it is now driven by the carriers’ own maths, not by headlines. It will keep going unless a container ship is attacked. But it is happening next door to a war that is escalating. A comeback like that can stop in a single weekend.
So forwarders should do two things at once. Plan for more capacity, shorter Asia–Europe voyages and softer rates. And build contracts and customer promises that survive a sudden switch back to the Cape of Good Hope.

The case for the comeback

The traffic numbers are moving fast. BIMCO says that from early February 2024 to mid-2026, Suez container capacity averaged 141,000 TEU a week. That is about 11% of the 2023 level. Today it is more than five times that.
Market share tells the same story. BIMCO looked at all container capacity that could go either through the canal or around the Cape. In early October, 36% of it went through the canal. From 2024 to mid-2026 the average was 8%. Before the attacks it was about 80%.
Traffic is also becoming two-way. Southbound sailings led the early return. Northbound capacity was 75% of southbound in the third quarter, and 81% in early October, BIMCO says. That matters. A carrier that only uses Suez in one direction is testing the water. A carrier that uses it both ways is redesigning its network.
The carriers have voted with their schedules. MarineLink, reporting BIMCO’s work, says routing changes have been announced for 16 services since early July. They include services from the Gemini Cooperation (Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd), the Ocean Alliance, the Premier Alliance and MSC. Seatrade Maritime reports that all four major east–west groups now run regular westbound Asia–North Europe services via Suez.
Linerlytica, a container market analyst, counts more than 50 ships of 4,000 TEU or more crossing the Red Sea each week. Seatrade quotes its forecast: “with a full-scale return to the Suez route expected by the first quarter of 2027.” Linerlytica also says “ONE and HMM will be the next carriers to join the Suez influx”. That would leave Evergreen, Yang Ming and Zim as the only major carriers still going round the Cape.

The case for caution

Now the other side. On 20 July the Houthis “declared a naval blockade of Saudi Arabia”, FreightWaves reported. It was aimed at the Bab el-Mandeb, the narrow strait at the southern end of the Red Sea that every Suez-bound ship must pass.
Lloyd’s List Intelligence reported that the Bahri-owned VLCC (very large crude carrier) Amzan was hit by a projectile on 24 August, west of the Saudi port of Yanbu. The ship is Saudi-flagged. The Houthis did not claim that attack. Lloyd’s List said the target and the location matched their recent campaign against Saudi-linked ships. It also described carriers’ return decisions as provisional and reversible.
In September the Houthis tried to reassure everyone else. Seatrade Maritime reported that on 10 September the Houthis’ Humanitarian Operations Center said “maritime navigation in the international waters of the Red Sea is safe”, with an exception for Saudi vessels. Maersk and Hapag-Lloyd then announced four Asia–Europe strings would return to Suez from around 19 September.
Not everyone was comfortable. James Hookham, director of the Global Shippers’ Forum, said, according to Seatrade: “I am shocked by this announcement, in the apparent absence of any reassurances”. He added: “It doesn’t feel right”.
The war has since moved up a gear. FreightWaves reports that strikes on Riyadh’s King Khalid International Airport killed at least 14 people and injured more than 300. Saudi civil aviation “suspended operations at the King Khalid International Airport in Riyadh through Oct. 17”, CBS News reported. FreightWaves also reported that the Houthis “overnight hit the headquarters of Aramco, the Saudi oil producer, with missiles.”
Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree called Aramco facilities “a legitimate target for our forces”, according to CBS. He warned that “any strikes on the capital, Sanaa, will be met with a harsh and painful response”. The Saudi-led coalition has struck back. The Houthi-run al-Masirah network said “two airstrikes hit the Red Sea island of Kamaran”, off Yemen’s coast (CBS).
For shipping, the key line is in FreightWaves. The Houthis have tried since July to close the strait to Saudi-linked traffic, “although no broad closure of the waterway has been confirmed.” Freightos, the freight booking platform, describes the immediate effect as “uncertainty rather than a confirmed capacity shock”.

What happened last time

There is a precedent, and it is not encouraging. In December 2023 Maersk paused Red Sea transits. It then decided to resume them after the US-led naval coalition, Operation Prosperity Guardian, was set up, gCaptain reported. Days later, at the turn of the year, the container ship Maersk Hangzhou was struck by a missile and then attacked by Houthi small boats. On 2 January 2024 Maersk said: “We have made the decision to pause all transits through the Red Sea / Gulf of Aden until further notice,” CNBC reported. BIMCO’s figures show most container capacity stayed on the Cape route from then until mid-2026.
The lesson: carriers return gradually, but they leave in a day.

What it means for rates and lanes

More ships through Suez means shorter voyages. Shorter voyages need fewer ships to run the same schedule. That frees up capacity. BIMCO estimates that “rerouting away from the Suez Canal increased global container ship demand by about 10%.” Rasmussen adds: “That increase is now reducing quickly.”
That 10% is the cushion that has held rates up for nearly three years. As it shrinks, spot rates should drift down. Spot rates are the short-term prices for cargo booked now, as opposed to annual contract rates.
They have not collapsed yet. FreightWaves reports Asia–Mediterranean spot up 7% to $3,800 per FEU in the week before 14 October. An FEU is a forty-foot container. Both Asia–Europe trades remain above $3,000/FEU, about 70% higher than in October 2025. FreightWaves says congestion at ports in Northern Europe and the Far East is soaking up some of the freed capacity. BIMCO notes the Suez return has coincided with more port congestion in Asia, so the full effect is not yet clear. Seatrade adds that carriers on Asia–Europe services were “still attempting to raise spot rates in the second half of October.”
Our reading: those increases are fighting the tide. Congestion clears. Ships do not disappear.
For forwarders, this lands in four places:

Routing is now booking by booking. On the same lane, one carrier may run via Suez and another via the Cape. Evergreen, Yang Ming and Zim are still on the Cape, per Linerlytica. Check the routing on every booking and set transit-time promises to match.

2027 contracts. FreightWaves says carriers go into 2027 tender season with high rates. Some shippers expect rates to ease next year, as new ships arrive and more ships use the Red Sea route, and are wary of locking in. Our view: that caution is right. Push for shorter rate validity or index-linked terms, and spell out who pays if ships go back round the Cape.

Surcharges. Ask carriers to justify any Red Sea or war-risk surcharge on services that now sail through Suez. Then keep the clause that lets them return if the risk returns.

Saudi cargo. The Houthi campaign targets Saudi-linked ships and Saudi infrastructure. Cargo into Jeddah and other Saudi Red Sea ports carries more risk than cargo passing through to Europe. Air cargo for Riyadh needs a backup routing while King Khalid airport is shut.

Our call

Our prediction: if no container ship is attacked, ONE and HMM will announce Suez routings by the end of November. More than 40% of Suez-or-Cape capacity will be using the canal by the end of December, up from 36% now. And Asia–North Europe spot will fall below $3,000 per FEU by the end of December.
The risk to that call is one attack on one container ship. If that happens, we expect carriers to pause Red Sea transits within days, as Maersk did in January 2024, and Asia–Europe spot rates to jump again within a month.

Sources