Seatrade Maritime: Boxes drive throughput growth at Port of Hamburg

The Port of Hamburg recorded throughput growth of 3.4% on-year in the first nine months of 2025, reaching 86.8m tonnes. Growth was driven by container throughput where an increase of 8.4% on-year brought container handling to 6.3m teu.

“Complications in trade” weighed on US volumes, resulting in a 23.9% drop in container trade between Hamburg and the US to 395,000 teu. The fall in US trade was more than offset by increased trade with Asia and Europe, which grew by 11% and 14%, respectively. Trade with China reached 1.8m teu, a 7.9% increase on-year, while Malaysia’s 273,000 teu was a 89.8% increase on-year.

Other cargo types had softer performances compared to 2024. Bulk cargo throughput of 24.6m teu was 0.8% lower, although an uptick in third quarter grab cargo throughput of 9.4% on-year was a positive sign, driven by stronger coal and ore imports of 16.4% and 3.8%, respectively. 

Agribulk throughput fell by 10.3% to 4.2m tonnes in the first nine months, while break bulk volumes of 0.8m tonnes were down 7.4%. Liquid cargoes grew by 7.4% to 7m tonnes.

In July to September, container growth was supported by new liner services to Southern Europe, the Mediterranean region, and South America calling at Hamburg. Transhipment maintained the strong growth on-year seen in the first six months of the 2025 of 22.5% to 2.4m teu.

Rail volumes at the port remained high as in 2024, down by 0.5% to 2m teu, marked by a trend of high utilisation of container train capacity, the port said.