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Sea freight: Connecting global markets across the high seas

Ship your goods from A to B using sea freight as a cost-effective and sustainable option. Our wide port network, our own fleet and proven expertise in tailor-made solutions ensure your goods arrive at their destination reliably and safely by sea.

Discover our sea freight solutions

Using sea freight, you can move your cargo across the globe with the backing of our long-standing partnerships with major port operators and shipping lines, complemented by our own fleet of vessels. We provide a full range of solutions tailored to your sea freight requirements, including LCL, FCL and buyer’s and seller’s consolidation. From river-sea transport and charter solutions to tanker supply and disposal services, along with customs clearance support, we cover all your sea freight logistics needs.

Sea transportation at a glance

With LCL, you can ship your sea freight in a cost-efficient way, even for smaller shipments. Through shared container capacity, you achieve substantial shipping cost savings. Designed for flexible transportation needs, LCL provides a cost-efficient solution while maintaining reliability. Suitable for smaller importers and exporters, LCL enables you to move smaller quantities and adjust to market demand. This allows you to expand your business through sea transport and reduce expenses simultaneously, as LCL is more cost-effective than air or rail transport.

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Shipping sea freight via FCL is the ideal option when shipment volumes between fixed origins and destinations allow for optimal use. Take advantage of tailor-made container shipping solutions designed for your needs, continuous shipment tracking and paperless booking and shipping instructions for distribution to sea shipping companies.

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By combining LCL shipments into a single full-container load (FCL) through buyer’s and seller’s consolidation, this sea freight transport method lowers costs, enhances visibility across the supply chain and improves cargo management, making it ideal for streamlined, cost-effective global logistics.

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Short sea transportation serves as an effective link between industrial regions and markets. Regular liner services between key port locations offer time and cost savings along with environmentally friendly transport solutions. Through door-to-door services for sea freight, we bring goods directly to you in a fast and reliable manner. Our just-in-time deliveries also ensure that the desired goods or materials reach your production on time.

We specialize in providing you with comprehensive transport services for offshore projects. Whether it involves the safe transfer of your crew by ship or helicopter or reliable supplies for your employees on offshore platforms, we’ve got you covered. Our expertise in groupage services allows us to combine shipments for different platforms, reducing costs and minimizing environmental impact. We also provide customized solutions for complete wind farm campaigns.

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Your benefits

Sea transport is a particularly environmentally friendly transport solution.

With regular departures and binding transit times, sea freight is an exceptionally reliable option. Take advantage of optimized, stable supply chains and continuous availability.

Leverage our intercontinental transport services to support trade routes and markets across the deep-sea transport sector.

We manage the entire coordination process for your shipments, covering pre-carriage and on-carriage, and ensure adherence to all relevant regulations at all times.

Why choose Rhenus for sea freight solutions

  • Extensive network to support you worldwide. Benefit from our gateway services that are global in reach and local in focus
  • Strong relationships with all major shipping companies as reliable partners
  • Complete services along the supply chain with solutions from a single source
  • Flexibility through our customized industry solutions
  • Enhanced security through real-time shipment tracking across the entire transportation process
  • Digital efficiency with our paperless booking system and digital platforms, improving transparency and control

Value-added services for ocean freight

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Sea freight handling

We cover all your requirements for sea freight handling, whether it involves smart storage, repacking, neutralizing, sorting, smart monitoring, labeling, shipment inspection or palletizing.

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Document solutions for sea freight shipments

Document solutions for sea freight shipments: Take advantage of our proof of delivery and invoices in paper form instead of electronic transmission. These documents are essential in the transportation process, as they verify that your shipment has been delivered correctly. Courier services also enable quick and reliable delivery of confidential documents to different countries. If you require digital data to optimize your operations, we provide customized reporting solutions for effective data management.

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Customs clearance

We ensure your sea freight shipments pass through customs efficiently. We always comply with the latest customs regulations. Whether you are importing or exporting goods, we stand by your side throughout the process. We take care of customs clearance either directly with our own experts or together with reliable partners. You can trust that your shipments are in good hands.

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Marine cargo insurance

Our tailor-made transport insurance solutions safeguard the value of your freight. We protect your sea freight against all risks of physical loss or damage during transportation by land, sea or air. This enables you to effectively manage the financial consequences of damage. We recognize that transport routes differ in safety and goods vary in their vulnerability to damage. Nevertheless, with our insurance services, you are always on the safe side.

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E-solutions for your sea freight

We seamlessly integrate your IT systems with our own to automate the exchange of important business data such as shipping orders or status codes. This allows you to rely on optimized processes. Our solution ensures that structured data is transferred directly between computers based on a defined standard, eliminating manual intervention. As a result, you benefit from improved data quality, fewer errors and faster transaction processing.

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Ocean Freight Insights: September 2025 Market Update

Your snapshot of global ocean freight.

Explore shifts in demand, capacity, and rates across key trade lanes — plus how tariffs, port congestion, and vessel deployment are shaping supply chains. Gain insights to understand today’s market, plan smarter amid uncertainty, and build a more resilient logistics strategy.

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Do you need a reliable and strongly connected partner for sea freight logistics?

Contact our experts, who will be happy to deliver extensive guidance and support.

Frequently asked questions

Sea freight describes the transport of goods by sea, in other words, by ship. It is suitable for various types of goods, including raw materials such as coal and oil and finished products like cars and electronics. Companies frequently rely on sea freight to ship large quantities over long distances because it is typically more cost-effective than alternative transport options such as air freight or land transport, particularly for long distances.

Generally, air freight tends to be more expensive than sea freight, primarily because of higher operational costs of airplanes compared to ships, along with the limited capacity of planes compared to cargo ships. Air freight is commonly chosen for urgent shipments or for goods that need rapid delivery, whereas sea freight is often preferred for higher quantities of goods across longer distances, as it is usually more cost-effective.

You have the option to use full charter services or general cargo transport. We are able to handle any cargo type, from containers to bulk and general cargo, including dangerous or liquid goods as well as heavy and oversized project cargo. For deep sea transport, we rely on long-standing relationships with reputable shipping lines to charter vessels and ensure on-time delivery of your goods worldwide. For smaller deep sea shipments, we consolidate your freight onto one vessel and deliver it to your selected destination. Sea freight consolidation helps you reduce costs.

Through our consolidation services, buyers can merge their LCL shipments with orders from various suppliers to achieve cost savings. Individual shipments are consolidated at a single hub and shipped in a shared container as an FCL shipment, which is then delivered to the destination. When acting as a seller, we can combine your shipments from one origin point into an FCL container and ship them directly to the port of destination. At that point, the consignments are unloaded and distributed to the correct recipients. This reduces time and workload in your sea freight operations while giving you greater transparency and control over your transport chain.