Suez traffic remains below normal as carriers return

Suez is coming back in pieces, not as a clean reopening. ARCANE's public chokepoint tracker printed: "Suez −35% 41.3 transits a day from Oct 19, 2026 to Oct 25, 2026, against a normal of 63.8."

Flexport reported on Oct. 30 that, as of October 21, Alphaliner said 63% of Far East-Europe capacity was back on the Suez in at least one direction and that every top-five carrier sent at least some ships through the canal. The measure does not say whether those ships also returned through Suez.

Flexport reported on Oct. 30 that Alphaliner measured Far East-Europe capacity using Suez in at least one direction. ARCANE counted Suez transits below normal from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25, while FreightWaves reported on Oct. 29 that some services still sailed around Africa on their return journeys.

FreightWaves reported on Oct. 29 that some services were using the Suez Canal on voyages toward Europe while continuing to sail around Africa on return journeys. The same sentence carried the reason: carriers were still cautious about the route.

A Suez Canal statement said Anders Boenaes, Hapag-Lloyd’s COO, explained that the gradual resumption of transits through the Suez Canal was already underway, with three liner services having resumed passage.

The same Suez Canal statement quoted Hapag-Lloyd CEO Rolf Habben Jansen saying: “Returning to transit the Suez Canal remains the attractive route, and we hope favorable conditions will continue to prevail, paving the way for the return of operations.” That is a carrier incentive wrapped in a condition.

The incentive is time. Flexport reported on Oct. 30 that each service returning to Suez frees ships and saves 7-10 days of transit to the first Mediterranean port, 10-14 days to North Europe and 10-14 to US East Coast ports.

Those saved days are the strongest reason to expect more attempts through the canal if conditions hold. A shipping line that uses the shorter route gets vessels back into rotation sooner, while a cargo owner sees inventory arrive sooner than it would after the longer route around Africa.

The same change can still hurt schedules before it helps them. Flexport wrote on Oct. 30 that when Suez transits stopped initially, vessels were out of position and bunched up, causing broad port congestion, and that the same effect was likely as transits resume.

That is why ports may feel the reopening before shippers feel stability. A route shift can shorten sailing time while sending ships into terminals in clusters, and that makes the recovery less like a switch being turned on than a fleet being re-sorted.

The Longer Route Still Shows Up

The wider chokepoint map still points to rerouting rather than a full return to normal. ARCANE printed a Cape of Good Hope count well above normal for the same week that Suez remained below normal, while Bab el-Mandeb and Hormuz were also far below normal.

ARCANE counted Cape of Good Hope transits above normal and Bab el-Mandeb transits below normal from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25. Those counts describe traffic at different points; they do not establish which ships took either route.

Malacca cuts in the other direction. ARCANE printed Malacca above normal for the same week, which suggests Asian flows were not simply frozen; they were moving through some routes while the Suez-linked chain remained impaired.

ARCANE counted Suez and Bab el-Mandeb transits below normal and Cape of Good Hope transits above normal from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25. The counts do not establish why any individual ship moved.

Fortune reported on Oct. 28 that discussions highlighted shifts in regional trade flows, including developments affecting navigation through the Suez Canal and alternative shipping routes. The account described the discussion but did not measure traffic on those routes.

Fortune reported on Oct. 28 that participants examined opportunities to increase transit cargo flows through the Kingdom to Gulf markets by developing dedicated facilities for storage, customs inspection, cargo collection and onward transport by truck. Those facilities were opportunities under discussion. The report did not say they had been built or that cargo was moving through them. It described a possible way to handle goods passing through the Kingdom, rather than an operating service. Storage and inspection were among the facilities participants examined, alongside collection and onward transport. The discussion therefore says what participants considered developing, without establishing whether any of those facilities will be developed.

The Conversation wrote on Oct. 29 that, like the Strait of Hormuz, the Suez Canal is a vital waterway for global trade. FreightWaves reported on Oct. 29 that some services used Suez toward Europe while sailing around Africa on their return journeys.

The canal is built for changing ship needs, not for a single era of trade. Breakbulk reported on Oct. 28 that DEME’s involvement in Egypt began when the Suez Canal was undergoing significant infrastructure improvements to accommodate changing vessel requirements and growing international maritime trade.

Breakbulk also reported on Oct. 28 that the relationship dated back to 1955, when the Belgian marine engineering company first participated in the modernisation of the Suez Canal. The infrastructure history is a reminder that the canal’s physical role can outlast periodic shocks, but it does not remove the short-term decision from carriers.

A separate shipping report published on Oct. 30 described the MV Grande Egitto as the newest addition to the Grimaldi Group’s modern vehicle-carrier fleet. That does not say the ship depends on Suez, but it shows another part of seaborne trade making fleet decisions while canal routing remains unsettled.

A Faster Route Can Still Bunch Ships

The best countercase is that the recovery is already well advanced. Flexport’s October 21 capacity figure is high enough to show that the largest carriers have stopped treating Suez as closed, and Hapag-Lloyd’s public comments point toward more normal operations if favorable conditions continue.

That concession should not be dismissed. Once a carrier has moved even part of a service back through Suez, the saved sailing time gives it an operating reason to add more voyages, and the first movers can force rivals to decide whether longer routes leave them with weaker schedules.

FreightWaves reported on Oct. 29 that some services used Suez toward Europe while sailing around Africa on their return journeys. ARCANE counted total Suez transits below normal from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25. Neither measure establishes how many services used the canal in both directions.

A household will not see a canal transit count on a bill. It would notice the effect indirectly if port bunching delays goods, or if shorter routes lower the time inventory spends at sea before reaching retailers. On the current evidence, both forces can operate at the same time.

An institution with freight exposure faces a different problem. Hedging or booking around the long route may become expensive if Suez use broadens, but assuming a full return can fail if services remain one-way and vessels bunch at destination ports.

Ports are exposed because the first effect of a route change is physical arrival timing. Flexport’s warning about vessels bunching as transits resume points to congestion risk at the same time that the shorter route releases ships back into networks.

Shipping lines are exposed because the decision is strategic. A carrier that waits too long may give up the sailing-time benefit, while a carrier that moves too early may send ships into a corridor it still treats with caution on the return voyage.

What Would Bring It Back

The public test is simple enough to state without pretending the answer is already known. ARCANE’s next Suez transit count should move up toward normal, and Flexport’s next capacity share should rise from the October 21 reading, if the reopening is becoming a real normalization.

A stronger signal would be two-way use. FreightWaves’ report that some services still sail toward Europe through Suez while returning around Africa is the cleanest marker of caution; that pattern has to fade before total transits can plausibly move back toward normal.

A weaker signal would be renewed bunching without a lasting increase in transits. Flexport’s congestion warning means the early phase of return can make ports look worse even as voyages shorten, so the first week of disruption after more services return would not by itself disprove the recovery.

Flexport reported on Oct. 30 that Alphaliner found Far East-Europe capacity back on Suez in at least one direction as of October 21. ARCANE counted total Suez transits below normal from Oct. 19 to Oct. 25. The capacity measure leaves the return journeys unresolved.