IN Brief:
- Total Rotterdam cargo throughput rose 0.9% to 323.2 million tonnes in January–September 2026.
- Container units increased 0.1%, while container cargo by weight fell 2.2% and transhipment dropped 20%.
- Dry bulk increased 2.1% and liquid bulk 3.1%, with low river levels constraining some industrial cargo flows.
The Port of Rotterdam Authority has reported cargo throughput of 323.2 million tonnes in the first nine months of 2026, up 0.9% on the same period last year. Higher movements of coal, crude oil, petroleum products and other dry bulk outweighed declines in iron ore and scrap, agribulk, liquefied natural gas, container tonnage and conventional breakbulk. The overall increase therefore arose from uneven performance across different industrial cargo streams.
Container handling changed less when measured in twenty-foot equivalent units, or TEU, than when measured by weight. Rotterdam recorded 0.1% more TEU in January–September, but container cargo tonnage fell 2.2%. TEU measures nominal container capacity, not the weight of the goods carried. The two series can diverge when the balance of full and empty boxes changes or when loaded containers carry different weights; the port has not attributed the entire divergence to any single factor.
Rotterdam’s container traffic towards inland destinations increased by 7.2% while volumes transferred between ships fell by 20%. The hinterland rise was driven mainly by an 8.9% increase in imports of full containers; exports of full containers grew 1%. With inbound loaded traffic rising faster than exports, movements of empty containers also increased. These figures describe different transport functions at the port rather than the same cargo being counted as simultaneous growth and contraction.
Rotterdam attributes part of the transhipment decline to longstanding capacity constraints at its deep-sea terminals. Some cargo is being handled at other ports, creating space for containers destined for or arriving from the European hinterland. That is consistent with the reported 7.2% rise in hinterland volumes and 20% transhipment decline, but does not establish a uniform gain in terminal capability or eliminate the effects of congestion. The changes concern different cargo flows within the same port system.
Dry bulk throughput rose 2.1%, although individual materials moved in opposite directions. Coal grew 15.3%, principally because coking coal recovered from the exceptionally low 2025 level and thermal coal demand increased amid elevated gas prices associated with Middle East tensions. Iron ore and scrap throughput fell 5.9%, even though the port reports a 6% increase in German steel production. Higher industrial output consequently did not translate into a matching rise in Rotterdam’s ore and scrap cargo.
Low water levels on European rivers contributed to the mismatch. Reduced navigable depth limits how heavily inland barges can load without exceeding safe draught, affecting the economics and availability of raw-material transport to industrial users. The port says those restrictions raised costs and constrained supplies; steel producers consequently drew more heavily on existing inventories, while scrap exports through Rotterdam declined. The same disruption had already emerged separately in reporting on Rhine barge capacity, but these nine-month figures quantify a broader change in cargo composition.
Agribulk fell 11.4%, with the port attributing weaker import demand partly to stockpiling during 2025. Other dry bulk grew 15%, helped by raw materials for construction projects, including housing, energy infrastructure and railways in the Netherlands and Germany. These changes occurred alongside a 5.9% fall in iron ore and scrap, leaving the dry-bulk total dependent on the mix of individual commodities rather than a common increase in demand.
Liquid bulk throughput climbed 3.1%. Crude oil rose 2.1% as European refineries imported and processed more crude following disruption to oil-product supply from the Middle East. Petroleum product throughput increased 11.1% overall, but the flow was asymmetric: exports rose 31.9% while imports fell 6.9%. Liquefied natural gas throughput edged down 0.2%, so the liquid-bulk increase cannot be attributed to all energy carriers growing at once.
The remaining liquid-bulk segment fell 3.8%, despite stronger physical imports of biofuels and their feedstocks. The authority links that increase to changes in Dutch and German treatment of renewable-fuel accounting that require suppliers to deliver more physical material. Lower chemicals throughput more than offset the biofuel increase, against a background of weak chemical production in the Netherlands, Belgium and Germany during the first nine months of the year.
Conventional breakbulk weakened by 1.4% overall. RoRo cargo grew slightly, by 0.7%, while other breakbulk dropped 10.2% as European machinery and automotive manufacturing remained weak. These cargo streams depend on industrial orders, vessel services and loading equipment, while movements reported in TEU are measured on a different basis. The separate metrics prevent the small increase in total cargo tonnes from being read as broad-based growth in every segment.
Low river levels and pressure on deep-sea terminal capacity remain constraints on the movement of goods between Rotterdam and industrial customers inland. The authority has identified continued investment in road, waterway and rail links as a priority, but the first nine months’ throughput figures provide no measure of the effectiveness of those future projects. Its year-end results will establish whether the shift towards hinterland containers and the divergent movements in industrial bulk cargo continued through the fourth quarter.
