Nearly 48,000 ships have docked at Turkish ports in the first nine months of the year, marking the highest level in the last seven years, according to a report on Tuesday.
The number of ships docking at ports stood at 47,630 in the January-September period, said a report by Anadolu Agency (AA) citing the General Directorate of Maritime Affairs data.
The report indicated that the number of ships calling at Turkish ports has continued its upward trend since the COVID-19 pandemic.
Earlier, in 2018, this number stood at 55,448. During the pandemic, the number of ships calling at ports dropped below 40,000, but rose again to 43,164 in 2022 and 45,605 in 2023.
Meanwhile, in the first nine months of this year, some 47,630 ships called at Turkish ports, marking a 2.8% increase compared to 46,317 in the same period last year. This figure represents the highest number of ship calls in the past seven years.
During this period, the gross tonnage of ships calling at ports amounted to 723.2 million gross tons. Of these vessels, 16,777 were Turkish-flagged, while 30,853 were foreign-flagged ships.
At the same time, the number of vehicles transported on international Ro-Ro shipping lines also increased in the first nine months of this year.
The number of vehicles carried by these vessels rose 4.2%, from 519,354 in the January-September period of last year to 541,003 in the same period this year.
A total of 269,620 vehicles arrived and 271,383 departed on international Ro-Ro routes during the first nine months of 2025.
Most vehicles using these international routes were transported to and from European ports. Of the more than 540,000 vehicles shipped on Ro-Ro vessels in the January-September period, 391,292 were transferred on European routes such as Trieste, Valencia and Marseille.
In the same period, 65,630 vehicles were transported between Turkish ports and Black Sea ports such as Tuapse, Novorossiysk and Constanta.
