SCFI Explained: Shanghai Containerized Freight Index and How to Read It
If you read any shipping market report, freight rate newsletter, or carrier earnings call, you will see the SCFI mentioned within the first few paragraphs. The Shanghai Containerized Freight Index is the single most quoted spot rate benchmark in container shipping, and its weekly print moves how carriers, forwarders, and large shippers think about pricing for the week ahead.
Yet most people who quote the SCFI cannot explain what is actually in the number. Is it a single rate? Is it an average? Does it cover all lanes or only the busy ones? Is it spot or contract? Does a 12 point move actually mean anything for the lane you are quoting?
This guide answers those questions. It explains what the SCFI is, who publishes it, how the index is constructed, what each sub index covers, and how to read a weekly print without overreacting to noise.
Key Takeaways
- The SCFI is a weekly spot rate index published by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange that tracks container export rates from Shanghai to 15 major destination regions.
- It quotes rates in USD per TEU for most lanes and USD per FEU for the two transpacific lanes, so headline numbers from different lanes are not directly comparable.
- The index reflects spot market pricing only, not the long term service contracts that large beneficial cargo owners ship under.
- SCFI is one of three indices most often quoted together: SCFI for Shanghai spot, CCFI for broader China contract weighted rates, and Drewry WCI for global spot.
- Week to week moves under 5 percent are usually noise. Sustained multi week moves of 10 percent or more, especially across multiple lanes, are the signal worth acting on.
What Is the SCFI?
The Shanghai Containerized Freight Index (SCFI) is a weekly index that tracks ocean container freight spot rates from the Port of Shanghai to 15 major destination regions around the world. It is published every Friday by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange (SSE), a government affiliated entity that has produced container shipping market data since 1998.
The SCFI in its current form launched in October 2009. It was designed to give the market a transparent, frequently updated benchmark for what shippers were actually paying in the spot market, at a time when long term contract rates were diverging sharply from week to week reality on busy China outbound lanes.
In simple terms: the SCFI tells you what it costs this week to put a container on a ship leaving Shanghai for Los Angeles, Rotterdam, Santos, Durban, or any of the other 13 covered destinations.
Who Uses the SCFI
Carriers watch SCFI as the public scorecard of their pricing discipline. A weak SCFI print on a major lane often signals that carriers will announce a general rate increase (GRI) for the following month to push rates back up.
Freight forwarders use SCFI as a directional reference when quoting customers and when reviewing whether carrier rate offers look high, low, or in line with the broader market that week.
Beneficial cargo owners (BCOs) and large shippers use SCFI trends during contract negotiation season to argue for rate adjustments and to time spot bookings when the index suggests rates have softened.
Analysts, journalists, and financial markets use SCFI as the most accessible weekly indicator of container shipping health. It is one of the few container freight numbers that gets quoted in mainstream financial press.
How the SCFI Is Calculated
The Shanghai Shipping Exchange collects spot rate data each week from a panel of around 30 participants. The panel includes major ocean carriers, large freight forwarders, and select BCO shippers active on Shanghai outbound lanes.
What the panelists report: The spot rate offered or transacted that week for shipping a 20 foot equivalent unit (TEU) of dry cargo from Shanghai to each of the covered destinations, all in surcharges included.
What is in the rate: SCFI is an all in spot rate. It includes the base ocean freight plus the standard surcharges that move with the market, including bunker adjustment factor (BAF), currency adjustment factor (CAF), and any active general rate increases or peak season surcharges. Origin local charges at Shanghai and destination charges at the discharge port are excluded.
Two units of measure: Most SCFI sub indices are quoted in USD per TEU. The two transpacific lanes (Shanghai to US West Coast and Shanghai to US East Coast) are quoted in USD per FEU (40 foot equivalent unit), because the trans Pacific market trades almost entirely in 40 foot containers. This means you cannot directly compare a Shanghai to Europe number against a Shanghai to USWC number without converting units.
The composite index: The headline SCFI number you see in press headlines is a weighted composite of the 15 individual lane sub indices. The composite was rebased to 1000 points on October 16, 2009. A composite reading of 1500 means container spot rates from Shanghai, weighted across the 15 lanes, are 50 percent higher than they were at the October 2009 baseline.
Because SCFI measures rates on containers leaving Shanghai, it is first and foremost an export index. Forwarders whose books are weighted toward China outbound volume should be reading this print every Friday against their own carrier rate sheet. If you run that flow inside Ocean Export Freight Management Software, you can log the SCFI number for the lane alongside each booking and see, over a rolling four week window, whether your quoted rates are drifting above or below the market.
The 15 Lanes Covered by the SCFI
The SCFI publishes 15 individual sub indices, each tracking one trade lane out of Shanghai. The two transpacific lanes are the most heavily weighted in the composite because they carry the largest container volumes.
| Lane Sub Index | Destination Region | Unit |
|---|---|---|
| Europe (Main ports) | Hamburg, Rotterdam, Antwerp, Felixstowe, Le Havre | USD per TEU |
| Mediterranean | Barcelona, Valencia, Genoa, Naples | USD per TEU |
| US West Coast | Los Angeles, Long Beach, Oakland, Seattle | USD per FEU |
| US East Coast | New York, Norfolk, Savannah, Charleston | USD per FEU |
| Persian Gulf and Red Sea | Dubai, Jeddah, and other regional ports | USD per TEU |
| Australia and New Zealand | Melbourne, Sydney, Auckland | USD per TEU |
| East and West Africa | Lagos, Mombasa, and other regional ports | USD per TEU |
| South Africa | Durban | USD per TEU |
| South America | Santos | USD per TEU |
| West Japan | Osaka, Kobe | USD per TEU |
| East Japan | Tokyo, Yokohama | USD per TEU |
| Southeast Asia | Singapore | USD per TEU |
| Korea | Busan | USD per TEU |
The exact lane composition has been adjusted modestly over the years as the Shanghai Shipping Exchange has refined the index, but the structure above represents the standard published set. The transpacific and Asia to Europe lanes carry the highest weight in the composite because they account for the largest share of Shanghai outbound container volume.
SCFI vs CCFI vs WCI: Which Index Should You Use?
SCFI is one of three indices that get quoted in the same conversation. They overlap but measure different things, and using the wrong one for a decision is a common analyst mistake.
| Index | Origin Coverage | Rate Type | Publisher and Frequency |
|---|---|---|---|
| SCFI | Shanghai only | Spot rates | Shanghai Shipping Exchange, weekly |
| CCFI | Multiple Chinese ports (Shanghai, Ningbo, Qingdao, others) | Contract weighted blend of spot and contract | Shanghai Shipping Exchange, weekly |
| Drewry WCI | 8 major global lanes including Shanghai, Rotterdam, New York, Genoa, Los Angeles | Spot rates | Drewry, weekly |
When to use SCFI: You want the cleanest weekly read on China outbound spot pricing. You are quoting a customer this week. You are watching for a GRI announcement.
When to use CCFI: You want a slower moving, contract weighted view of how Chinese export rates are trending across multiple origins. CCFI moves less violently week to week because long term contract rates dampen the swings.
When to use WCI: You need spot rate visibility on lanes that do not originate in Shanghai, especially backhaul lanes from Europe or North America back to Asia.
If you build your weekly rate management workflow in Rate Management Quoting Software for Forwarders, you can store both the SCFI weekly print and your carrier rate sheet alongside each other so quoting staff see the market reference at the same time they see the contract rate.
How to Read a Weekly SCFI Print
The SCFI is published every Friday during Shanghai business hours. The headline composite number is reported alongside the 15 individual lane sub indices and the week over week percentage change for each.
Step 1: Look at the Composite, Then Ignore It
The composite is a useful overall temperature check. A composite at 950 versus 1500 versus 3000 tells you broadly whether the market is soft, normal, or boom conditions. But the composite blends 15 very different lanes. A jump in the composite could be driven entirely by one or two transpacific lanes while every other lane stays flat. For any real decision, go straight to the sub index for the lane you care about.
Step 2: Read the Lane Sub Index for Your Trade
If you are quoting Shanghai to Rotterdam, read the Europe sub index. If you are quoting Shanghai to Long Beach, read the US West Coast sub index. Compare this week's number to last week's, last month's, and last year's same week. A single week change is rarely meaningful. A four week trend is.
Step 3: Convert the Unit if You Need To
The two US sub indices are in USD per FEU. Most others are USD per TEU. If you are mentally comparing the cost of a 40 foot container to Europe vs the cost of a 40 foot container to LA, double the Europe TEU number to approximate the FEU. This is a rough conversion because the actual FEU rate on Asia to Europe is typically slightly less than 2x the TEU rate due to economies of scale, but it gets you in the right neighborhood.
Step 4: Set Your Noise Threshold
Week to week moves of plus or minus 3 to 5 percent on a single lane are usually noise driven by the specific carriers reporting that week and the timing of GRI implementations. A 12 to 15 percent jump in one week, or a steady directional move of 8 to 10 percent per week sustained across three or four weeks, is the kind of move worth acting on.
Step 5: Cross Check Against Other Indicators
A SCFI move that lines up with a Drewry WCI move on the same lane, plus a carrier GRI announcement, plus visible blank sailing activity, is a strong signal. A SCFI move that no other index confirms is more likely a reporting artifact.
If your operation tracks freight rates as part of margin analysis, pulling SCFI weekly into Freight Analytics Software for Forwarders alongside your own quoted vs sold rates makes the noise easier to filter out, because you can see your own pricing trend on the same chart as the public benchmark.
What Drives the SCFI Up or Down
The SCFI moves for the same reasons that any spot freight rate moves: supply and demand on each lane.
Demand Drivers
- Peak shipping season: Demand from US and European retailers ahead of the back to school and holiday shopping seasons typically pushes transpacific and Asia to Europe rates higher from roughly August through October.
- Pre Chinese New Year rush: Chinese factories ship aggressively in the four to six weeks before Lunar New Year shuts down production, lifting rates on most Shanghai outbound lanes.
- Sudden demand shocks: A weaker dollar, a tariff announcement that triggers front loading, or unexpected retail demand can pull rates up faster than capacity can be added.
Supply Drivers
- Vessel capacity additions: When carriers take delivery of new ultra large container vessels and deploy them on Asia to Europe or transpacific, capacity rises and rates trend down.
- Blank sailings: When carriers void scheduled departures to soak up excess capacity, effective supply tightens and rates firm up.
- Canal and chokepoint disruption: Suez Canal restrictions, Panama Canal draft limits, or Red Sea routing changes that force vessels around the Cape of Good Hope effectively reduce supply and push rates higher.
Carrier Pricing Actions
- General rate increases (GRIs): Announced rate floors that carriers attempt to push through, typically at the start of the month. GRI success or failure shows up in the next SCFI print.
- Peak season surcharges (PSS): Additional fees layered on during high demand periods.
- Bunker fuel adjustments: BAF moves reflect fuel cost pass through, which flows into the all in rate that SCFI captures.
Limitations of the SCFI
The SCFI is the most useful weekly container freight benchmark in public circulation, but it has real limitations worth knowing.
Shanghai only origin: The index measures rates out of one port. If your shipment originates from Ningbo, Yantian, Shenzhen, or any other Chinese port, the SCFI is a directional reference, not a precise quote. Lane dynamics differ by origin port.
Spot only: The index does not reflect what most large BCO shippers actually pay. Long term service contracts cover the majority of high volume container shipping and frequently price 20 to 40 percent below or above spot depending on the contract season. A BCO with a strong 12 month contract is insulated from spot volatility that shows up in SCFI.
Sample size and panel composition: The roughly 30 reporting panelists are a fraction of the total market participants on each lane. The panel composition can shift the print, especially on smaller lanes where one large reporter has outsized influence.
Reporting lag: The Friday print reflects rates that panelists are quoting or transacting that week. By the time the print is published, the actual market may have already moved.
Dry cargo only: The SCFI tracks standard dry containers. Reefer, hazardous, oversized, and special equipment rates are not in the index and move on their own dynamics.
Excludes origin and destination charges: The all in SCFI rate covers ocean freight plus the standard surcharges that move with the market. It does not include port terminal handling, origin warehouse fees, customs, drayage, or destination delivery, which can add 30 to 50 percent to the landed cost of a container.
Reading SCFI as a Forwarder vs as a Shipper
If you are a freight forwarder: SCFI is your weekly check on whether your carrier rate offers are competitive. If your carrier sheet is consistently 15 percent above the SCFI sub index for that lane, you have a negotiation conversation to have. If your sheet is 15 percent below, your carrier is signalling either soft demand or a strong incentive to keep your volume.
If you are a BCO or shipper: SCFI is your reference for when to push spot bookings vs honor contract bookings. When SCFI is well below your contract rate, ship spot for non critical loads. When SCFI is well above your contract rate, prioritize moving your committed volume under contract before carriers start to short ship.
If you are negotiating a 12 month service contract: SCFI history is your evidence base. A 12 month moving average of the lane sub index gives you a defensible reference point for what the spot market actually paid during the contract you are about to sign. Carriers will quote their own averages. Bring yours.
Importers moving cargo the other direction, from Shanghai into North America or Europe, use SCFI as an early warning signal on landed cost. When the lane you buy on is trending up two weeks in a row, that is the time to accelerate purchase orders under your contract allocation rather than exposing new POs to spot. Teams that run this discipline inside Ocean Freight Management Software tie the SCFI reading directly to shipment level cost so the pattern shows up in margin reporting the same week, not two months later at close.
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Frequently Asked Questions
What does SCFI stand for?
SCFI stands for Shanghai Containerized Freight Index. It is a weekly spot rate index published by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange that tracks container export rates from the Port of Shanghai to 15 major destination regions around the world.
Who publishes the SCFI and when?
The SCFI is published by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange (SSE), a government affiliated entity headquartered in Shanghai. The index is released every Friday during Shanghai business hours and reflects spot rate data collected from a panel of around 30 carriers, forwarders, and shippers active on Shanghai outbound lanes.
What is included in the SCFI rate?
SCFI is an all in spot rate that includes the base ocean freight plus the standard surcharges that move with the market, including bunker adjustment factor (BAF), currency adjustment factor (CAF), and any active general rate increases (GRIs) or peak season surcharges. It excludes origin port handling, destination terminal charges, customs, drayage, and inland delivery.
What is the difference between SCFI and CCFI?
SCFI tracks spot rates from Shanghai only and is a pure spot index. CCFI (China Containerized Freight Index) covers multiple Chinese ports and blends spot and contract rates into a weighted average. CCFI moves more slowly and smoothly week to week because long term contract rates dampen the swings, while SCFI captures the full volatility of the spot market.
What is the difference between SCFI and the Drewry WCI?
SCFI is published by the Shanghai Shipping Exchange and only tracks rates out of Shanghai. The Drewry World Container Index (WCI) is published by Drewry, a London based maritime research firm, and tracks spot rates across 8 major global trade lanes including Shanghai but also lanes that do not touch China at all. Use SCFI for China outbound visibility. Use WCI for global spot coverage including backhaul lanes.
Why are SCFI rates quoted in different units?
Most SCFI sub indices are quoted in USD per TEU (20 foot equivalent unit) because that is the standard reporting unit in most trade lanes. The two transpacific sub indices, Shanghai to US West Coast and Shanghai to US East Coast, are quoted in USD per FEU (40 foot equivalent unit) because the transpacific market trades almost entirely in 40 foot containers. Always check the unit before comparing two lane numbers.
What is a normal SCFI composite reading?
The SCFI composite was rebased to 1000 points in October 2009. Readings between roughly 700 and 1200 generally reflect a balanced or soft market. Readings of 1500 to 2500 reflect a strong market. The pandemic era spike pushed the composite above 5000 in early 2022 before normalizing back into the 900 to 1500 range. Context against historical ranges matters more than the absolute number.
Can I use SCFI as a quote for my shipment?
SCFI is a directional reference, not a quote. It tells you what the broader spot market looks like for Shanghai outbound shipments on a specific lane that week. Your actual booked rate will depend on your carrier relationship, container type, cargo specifics, current capacity on the vessel, contract terms, and the booking week. Use SCFI to sanity check carrier offers, not as a price you can book at directly.
Does the SCFI cover backhaul lanes from Europe or America to Asia?
No. The SCFI exclusively measures export rates from Shanghai to other destinations. It does not cover backhaul or import rates into Shanghai or into China generally. For backhaul visibility, use the Drewry WCI, which publishes lane data on both head haul and backhaul flows.
