Port of Los Angeles tops 1 million TEUs for second straight month

The Port of Los Angeles handled 1,026,872 TEUs in October 2026, a record for the month and the second-highest monthly container volume in the port's history. The figure marks the first time the busiest US container gateway has cleared 1 million TEUs in two consecutive months, following September's all-time high of 1,042,652 TEUs.

The port has now passed the 1 million-TEU mark three times in 2026. Between June and October, throughput reached nearly 5 million TEUs — the strongest five-month stretch in its history, and a pace roughly equivalent to moving a mid-sized European port's annual volume in a single quarter.

What is driving the volumes?

Executive Director Gene Seroka attributed the sustained activity to consumer spending, inventory replenishment and changes in trade policy. Disruptions along other global shipping routes have also pushed cargo toward the San Pedro Bay complex, he indicated.

Seroka credited the port's ability to absorb consistently high volumes to coordination between terminal operators, shipping lines and supply chain partners. That claim deserves scrutiny: coordination explains fluidity, not demand. The demand itself is coming from importers — and the composition of October's traffic tells a more uneven story than the headline number suggests.

How did imports, exports and empties diverge?

• Loaded imports reached 538,620 TEUs, up 25% year-on-year and 30% above the port's five-year October average.
• Loaded exports fell 7% year-on-year to 114,981 TEUs, underscoring the widening imbalance between inbound and outbound flows.
• Empty container movements hit a record 373,271 TEUs — the second consecutive monthly record — as carriers repositioned equipment to Asia for future sailings.

The empty-box figure is the tell. Carriers are not repositioning 373,000 TEUs of equipment east on a hunch; they are betting that the import surge into Los Angeles has legs. For shippers, that repositionment pattern typically tightens equipment availability for US exporters — a concern the export decline of 7% only reinforces.

Where does 2026 stand overall?

Ten-month throughput now stands at 9,108,497 TEUs, up 5% on the same period in 2025 and 9% above the five-year average. In practical terms, the port has already moved more containers in ten months than it did in all but a handful of its previous full years, having handled approximately 10.2 million TEUs across 2025 — its 26th consecutive year as the country's busiest container port.

The second-half strength has held despite continued uncertainty surrounding international trade and shipping routes, though Seroka's office offered no guidance on how long the replenishment-driven demand can persist once inventories normalize.

What comes after the cargo surge: the 2028 Olympics

The port is already planning for a different kind of peak season. During the monthly cargo briefing, Seroka was joined by Reynold Hoover, CEO of LA28, the organising committee for the 2028 Olympic and Paralympic Games. The port will serve as the Olympic sailing venue, with planned improvements along the LA Waterfront, and the two organisations are coordinating how to host the event without disrupting commercial operations.

Running one of the world's largest container gateways alongside an international sporting event is untested territory; no US port has done it at this scale. The planning begins while cargo volumes remain near record levels, and the empty-container repositionment now under way signals that carriers expect trans-Pacific demand to stay elevated into the new year.