A full container load is the whole steel box, taken to yourself and packed to your own plan, and its price is not one figure but three legs with a stack of port charges between them. Two rules gate the move before it ever sails: the packed weight has to be declared to the carrier before loading, and a commercial export has to be filed with the government before the box goes aboard. Both were read from their own published pages on 2026-08-08. No dollar figure sits on this page, because a container is quoted by a person against the ports, the commodity and the date.
Haul to the port, cross the water, haul to the door. Each leg has its own price and its own clock.
The mistake behind most container sticker shock is treating the ocean rate as the price. It is one line of several. A door-to-door full container load is an inland haul to the origin port, the sea crossing between two ports, and a second haul from the destination port to the consignee, and each of the three is bought from a different party at a different rate.
A truck collects the loaded box from your dock or packs it at a yard and delivers it to the terminal. That short road leg is drayage, priced like any local trucking move, and it carries the same questions about dock access, chassis and waiting time.
The line-haul across the water, quoted per box between a named origin port and a named destination port. Season, trade lane and equipment availability move it more than distance does, and it is the figure people mistake for the whole quote.
Nothing arrives at a door because it crossed an ocean. Another truck takes the container off the terminal and delivers it, and terminal handling plus port free-time rules decide what the wait costs before that truck can even collect it.
The free-time part is where a cheap-looking quote settles at a different number weeks later. A box that sits past its allowance at either terminal runs up charges the ocean rate never mentioned, and the mechanics of that clock are set out on the detention and demurrage guide. A container price that covers one leg is not a landed price, which is the first reason a person builds it rather than a form.
When you take a full box you pack it yourself, and packing it makes you the party who has to tell the carrier what it weighs. The rule is known in the trade as VGM, and it is not advisory. Maersk sets out the container-weight requirement under the Safety of Life at Sea convention on maersk.com, read 2026-08-08.
| Question | What the rule says |
|---|---|
| Who supplies the figure | The shipper is the responsible party for providing the container's gross mass to the ocean carrier before the box is loaded |
| What the figure includes | The cargo, plus the dunnage and bracing inside, plus the tare weight of the empty container carrying it |
| What happens without it | A packed container is not allowed aboard the vessel until the mass has been provided to the carrier or terminal before the load list cut-off |
| Since when | An amendment to the SOLAS convention that took effect on 1 July 2016 |
The operational effect for a first-time shipper is a deadline that lives before the sailing, not on it. Whoever weighs and declares the box needs the finished packing done in time to get the figure to the carrier before the cut-off, and a container that misses the cut-off waits for the next vessel. It is the container equivalent of the mistake people make with a pallet, planning the move around the departure date instead of around the paperwork that has to precede it.
Shipping a container overseas from the United States is an export, and a commercial export is reported to the government before it leaves. The International Trade Administration sets out the Electronic Export Information filing on trade.gov, read 2026-08-08. It is filed electronically in the Automated Export System, and the proof of filing has to reach the carrier before the box is loaded.
Two points decide whether it applies to your load. The filing is required when the value of the goods under a single Schedule B classification passes the threshold the Foreign Trade Regulations set, and it is required for anything that needs an export license regardless of value. Most full-container commercial loads clear that threshold comfortably, so the practical answer for an FCL export is to assume the filing applies. The trade agency names the responsible filer as the US Principal Party in Interest, meaning the exporter, or an authorized agent acting for them, and states that the filer provides the proof of filing to the carrier so it can be cited on the commercial loading document before loading.
This filing is the United States export side and is separate from two other things a cross-border box needs. The terms of sale that decide who clears customs and pays duty at each end are the Incoterms rules, covered on the international pallet guide, and the security filing an importer owes at the destination is a different document again, described on the less than container load guide alongside the published box capacities. A container move touches all three, which is why the paperwork is quoted and planned rather than assumed.
A full container earns its price only when you can fill most of it. Three other paths cover the loads that do not, and naming them here saves a quote that was the wrong question.
Buy space by volume in a shared container instead. That is less than container load, sold by the cubic meter with consolidation at both ends, and the LCL guide gives the box capacities to measure your volume against and the crossover to watch.
A container that stays in the country can ride the rail for the long middle, with a truck at each end. That is intermodal, and it competes on lanes long enough for the rail leg to absorb two lifts and two drays.
A single palletized shipment crossing a border prices on chargeable weight and needs treated wood under it. The cross-border pallet guide walks the wood stamp, the volumetric divisors and the terms of sale.
Some people searching this phrase do not have goods to move at all. They have bought a used shipping container for storage, a workshop or a build, and they need the box itself delivered. That is not an ocean move and not a full container load in the sense above. An empty twenty or forty foot container is flatbed or tilt-bed cargo, set down by a truck with a roll-off or tilt deck, and its price turns on the distance and on whether the truck can reach the spot and place the box where you want it. Level ground, overhead clearance and a straight approach for a long trailer matter more than the miles. Send the drop location and the box size through review and a person prices that as the road move it is.
A person prices it, because the inputs that set the number are not things a rate form can guess. What to have ready when you send it in: the origin and destination, named as ports or as door addresses; the box size you need, whether a twenty foot, a forty foot or a forty foot high cube; the commodity and what it is made of; the packed weight; the ready date; and the terms of sale if you have agreed them with the other side. With those, a quote comes back covering the legs and the port charges together rather than the ocean rate on its own.
Parcel-sized boxes go the other way and are faster for it. The calculator prices United States domestic parcels live and says plainly when a shipment is outside what it can handle.
Carrier rules and federal filing requirements are revised without notice, and destination countries add their own import rules on top. The wording above is what those two pages published on the date shown. Confirm the current versions, and the destination's own rules, before booking.
FCL means you take a whole container to yourself and fill it. LCL means you buy space by volume inside a container you share with other shippers. A full box is usually the cheaper unit once your load can fill most of it, and the shared option carries handling at both ends that a full container does not.
VGM is the packed container's confirmed gross mass, the cargo plus dunnage and bracing plus the empty container tare. Maersk states the shipper is the party responsible for providing it to the ocean carrier, and that a packed container is not loaded aboard a vessel until that weight has been provided before the load list cut-off (maersk.com, read 2026-08-08).
For a commercial export the Electronic Export Information is filed in the Automated Export System by the US Principal Party in Interest or an agent, with proof of filing cited on the loading document before the box is loaded. It applies above the value threshold set per Schedule B classification, or whenever an export license is required (trade.gov, read 2026-08-08).
In three legs and a stack of fees. There is the inland haul to the origin port, the ocean leg between ports, and the delivery haul at the far end, with terminal handling and port free-time rules sitting on top. A rate for the ocean leg alone is not the landed number.
No. The calculator prices United States domestic parcels. A container move is quoted by a person against the ports, the commodity, the packed weight, the box size and the ready date, so send those through freight review.