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# LA/Long Beach ships awaiting berth

Container ships waiting offshore for a berth to open at LA/Long Beach, weekly, from MARAD and the Marine Exchange

_Data through week of Aug 24, 2026 · source last checked Sep 1, 2026 · page revised Sep 1, 2026_

> Ships awaiting berth at LA/Long Beach is 0 ships as of week of Aug 24, 2026, below its trailing-12-month normal of 1 ship. This is a ship QUEUE, not a dwell time. Well below the 2021 to 2023 congestion era, when the queue ran into the dozens.

Ships awaiting berth at LA/Long Beach fell to 0 this week, down 100% week over week and 100% below the five-year median (per MARAD). The friction read is Flowing, with the truck planning-time index at 2.19 (per BTS), below its trailing-12-month normal of 4.07. The West Coast ships-at-anchor count also cleared to 0 this week.

## Period moves and the seasonal vs-N-yr median (a prior-years comparison). The card verdict and the friction board use each series' trailing-12-month median, the friction rule.

| Period | Current | Prior | Change |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Week over week | 0 ships | 1 ship | -100.0% |
| Month over month | 0 ships | 1 ship | -100.0% |
| Year over year | 0 ships | 1 ship | -100.0% |
| vs 5-yr median | 0 ships | 1 ship | -100.0% |

## About LA/Long Beach ships awaiting berth

This page tracks the number of container ships waiting offshore for a berth to open at LA/Long Beach. It is a queue, a count of ships, and it is not a dwell time: a vessel in the queue has not yet reached a berth. The count comes from MARAD and the Marine Exchange and updates weekly, so it is the most current congestion signal on the site. A rising queue is an early warning that boxes will start to sit; an empty queue is shown as zero ships, never as a zero dwell.

## About this data

- Source: MARAD and the Marine Exchange, via BTS Supply Chain and Freight Indicators
- Series: Container ships awaiting berth
- Basis: Queue count, not a dwell time
- Geography: LA/Long Beach
- Unit: vessels
- Calculation period: Weekly reading
- Last observation: week of Aug 24, 2026
- Update frequency: Weekly

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Cite: LA/Long Beach: 0 ships awaiting berth as of week of Aug 24, 2026, weekly from MARAD and the Marine Exchange (via BTS). The Dwell. https://the-dwell.com/waiting/la-long-beach
Canonical URL: https://the-dwell.com/waiting/la-long-beach