Most shippers think ocean freight pricing is complicated because of the surcharges. It's not. It's complicated because the carrier and the shipper are playing two completely different games and Maersk just changed which one it's playing.
For years, Maersk was notably cautious about passing rate increases to customers. During the pandemic surge, while other carriers pushed spot rates aggressively, Maersk held back, betting that stable pricing would build shipper loyalty and insulate it from the inevitable correction. The data showed what actually happened: Maersk gave away revenue when rates went up, and when rates came down, they fell just as fast for Maersk as for everyone else. The strategy didn't work. So they changed it.
Maersk has changed the way it prices container freight, now tracking market movements more closely than it did during the pandemic. The practical expression of that shift is Maersk Spot, an airline-style pricing model that shows an all-in freight shipping rate in real time, guarantees space on specific sailings once payment is confirmed, and adjusts dynamically to demand. The product presents an integrated, all-in rate that includes most surcharges, leaving fewer moving parts between quotation and invoicing. For shippers tired of last-minute surcharges and booking roll-overs, the transparency is real. But so is the implication: when the market moves, your shipping cost moves with it immediately, not at the next contract renewal.
This matters for anyone who manages international freight shipping volume through annual contracts. The traditional model negotiate a rate once a year, absorb fluctuations through surcharges, worked when carriers preferred the predictability of long-term commitments. Maersk reported average loaded freight rates jumping 22% year-over-year and 32% sequentially to $2,746 per 40-foot container in Q2 2026, numbers that reflect a shipping market moving faster than annual contracts can track. A carrier that now prices like an airline will capture more of that upside in real time. The shipper locked into a contract negotiated before the Hormuz disruption is still paying last year's assumptions.
The broader question for supply chain leaders isn't whether Maersk's new pricing model is better or worse. It's whether your freight procurement strategy was built for a shipping market that now moves like this. Annual contracts made sense when ocean freight rates drifted slowly. In a market where rates jumped 32% in a single quarter, the shipper who understands the pricing mechanics of their carrier and builds a mix of contracted and spot shipping capacity accordingly, is negotiating from a fundamentally different position than the one who doesn't. For operations that also rely on intermodal or cross-border shipping to manage costs, the lesson is the same: the market has changed. The question is whether your strategy has too.