The Baltic has 2 port economies inside 1 sea. Russian terminals still post the largest tonnage figures, driven by crude and products, while Polish and Lithuanian ports take the container growth. Ranking by mass and ranking by boxes produce almost completely different lists, and 2026 has widened the gap again.
I put this table together because I kept seeing Baltic rankings that mixed 2025 tonnage with 2023 container counts and called the result current. Below are full year 2025 figures where the port has published them, first half 2026 where it matters, and a clear note wherever a number is approximate rather than reported.
Ranked by cargo tonnage, 2025
| Port | 2025, million tonnes | Year on year, percent | Profile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ust-Luga, Russia | 130.5 | -3.4 | Crude, products, coal, LNG |
| Gdansk, Poland | 80.4 | +4.0 | Fuels, containers, coal |
| Primorsk, Russia | 63.9 | +5.2 | Crude and products |
| Big Port of St Petersburg | 54.6 | +3.0 | Mixed, containers |
| Gothenburg, Sweden | Around 40 | Record boxes | Containers, ro-ro, energy |
| Klaipeda, Lithuania | 39.0 | Record year | Containers, ro-ro, fertiliser, LNG |
| Szczecin and Swinoujscie | 34.79 | +7.5 | LNG, bulk, ferries, containers |
| Rostock, Germany | Around 32 | Flat | Ferries, ro-ro, bulk |
| Gdynia, Poland | 25.7 | -4.4 | Containers, ro-ro, grain |
| Riga, Latvia | 16.8 | -7.0 | Bulk, general cargo |
| Tallinn, Estonia | 13.8 | +5.0 | Ro-ro, passengers, liquid bulk |
| Helsinki, Finland | 13.4 | Stable | Ro-ro, containers, passengers |
| Ventspils, Latvia | 8.53 | +3.6 | Bulk, liquid bulk |
Two entries in that table are approximations and I would rather say so than pretend otherwise. Gothenburg publishes container and ro-ro detail more readily than a single tonnage headline, and its annual mass sits around 40 million tonnes. Rostock reported 32.2 million tonnes in 2023 and 16.5 million by the middle of 2025, which brackets a similar annual figure. Everything else in the column is a reported full year number.
Ranked by containers, and the order changes
| Port | 2025, TEU | Year on year, percent | 2026 first half, TEU |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gdansk | About 2,800,000 | +23 | About 1,600,000 |
| Klaipeda | 1,308,687 | +22 | Close to 700,000 |
| Gdynia | Above 1,000,000 | +5.27 | Not yet published |
| Gothenburg | 934,000 | +4, a record | 226,000 in quarter one, -2.6 |
Gdansk is the Baltic container leader and not by a small margin: its terminals handled nearly 2.8 million TEU in 2025, of which 2,766,475 came through Baltic Hub alone, with containerised tonnage up 18 percent to 24 million tonnes. In the first half of 2026 the port lifted total cargo 9 percent to 41.7 million tonnes with containers near 1.6 million TEU.
Klaipeda is the faster mover in percentage terms. It closed 2025 with 1,308,687 TEU, 22 percent above its previous record, and containerised cargo near 13 million tonnes, up 29 percent. Through the first half of 2026 it handled almost 700,000 TEU with containerised tonnage of 7.2 million, up 12 percent, and it was the only major Baltic port to grow total volumes over that half year, lifting its share of the Baltic states port market to 44 percent.
Why the 2 tables disagree so completely
Ust-Luga tops the tonnage list with 130.5 million tonnes and appears nowhere in the container discussion, because almost all of its throughput is liquid and dry bulk. Add Primorsk and St Petersburg and the 3 Russian Baltic ports account for close to 249 million tonnes, more than every Polish, Lithuanian, Latvian and Estonian port in the table combined. Russian seaports as a whole handled 884.5 million tonnes in 2025, down 0.4 percent.
That mass is not the same as commercial relevance for most readers of this site. A European importer cannot book a container on a crude terminal. What the tonnage column tells you is where dredging, pilotage and ice class tonnage are concentrated. What the TEU column tells you is where your box will actually be discharged. I have watched procurement teams choose a Baltic gateway from a tonnage ranking and then discover the port they picked has 1 container crane.
The 2026 direction of travel differs too. Loadings at Ust-Luga and Primorsk fell 10 percent and 9 percent respectively in June 2026, while Gdansk and Klaipeda posted first half growth. Sanctions enforcement, insurance friction and inspection regimes are doing to Russian Baltic volumes what no commercial competitor managed in 20 years.
Latvia lost a transit economy, Lithuania gained one
The sharpest structural story in this sea is Latvian. Rail freight through Latvia fell to 3.58 million tonnes in the first half of 2026, 18.7 percent below the same period of 2025, and the country's transit business has contracted by roughly 90 percent from its peak. Riga slipped 7 percent to 16.8 million tonnes in 2025. Ventspils, once a major oil outlet, handled 8.53 million tonnes.
Lithuania went the other way. Klaipeda replaced transit volumes with containers, ro-ro, LNG and fertiliser, and its 44 percent regional share in the first half of 2026 is the highest it has held. The difference between the 2 countries was not luck: Klaipeda invested in container handling and ferry capacity before the transit collapse, and Latvia's terminals were purpose built for a commodity flow that stopped.
Estonia sits between them. Tallinn grew 5 percent to 13.8 million tonnes in 2025 on ro-ro and passenger traffic, though its first quarter of 2026 was down 7.9 percent at 3.07 million tonnes. Rail links across the region are covered in our Rail Baltica freight guide.
Cape Pomerania, the 2.3 billion euro bet
Poland began building a deepwater container terminal at Swinoujscie in July 2026, branded Cape Pomerania. The budget is 10 billion zloty, about 2.3 billion euro. The design calls for 2 million TEU of annual capacity, 2,900 m of quay, a 17 m approach depth and a 70 km fairway wide enough for 400 m vessels, with completion at the turn of 2029 and 2030. The first works are a technical access road expected to take 10 months.
The project has already failed once. A 2023 preliminary agreement with a consortium of DEME Concessions and QTerminals covered a 30 year lease, and it was abandoned after a partner could not close financing. That history is the reason I treat the 2029/30 date as an ambition rather than a schedule. If it does open on time, the Baltic gains a second 2 million TEU class gateway roughly 350 km along the same Polish coast from Gdansk, which is a lot of capacity for 1 country.
How to read Baltic port numbers
- Check the year on every line. Baltic rankings circulate with 2019 Russian figures beside 2025 Polish ones, which flatters the wrong ports.
- Separate tonnage from TEU before comparing anything. Ust-Luga and Gdansk are not competing for the same cargo.
- Watch the first half of 2026 rather than 2025 totals. The divergence between Polish and Lithuanian growth and Russian decline opened up inside this year.
- Treat approximate figures as approximate. Gothenburg and Rostock tonnage in this table is bracketed, not reported.
- Remember ice class and draught. Northern Baltic calls in winter carry requirements no tonnage table shows. Our icebreaker ranking covers the fleets behind them.
- Compare against the wider region. The largest Baltic container port would sit mid table in our European port ranking.
Common questions
What is the biggest port on the Baltic Sea? By tonnage, Ust-Luga at 130.5 million tonnes in 2025. By containers, Gdansk at nearly 2.8 million TEU.
Which Baltic port is growing fastest? Klaipeda, up 22 percent in containers in 2025 and the only major Baltic port to grow total volumes in the first half of 2026.
How large is Baltic Hub? The Gdansk terminal alone handled 2,766,475 TEU in 2025, which is more than any other single Baltic facility.
Why are Latvian volumes falling? Transit traffic that once crossed Latvia has largely stopped, with rail freight down 18.7 percent year on year in the first half of 2026 and port transit down roughly 90 percent from its peak.
When will the new Polish deepwater terminal open? Construction started in July 2026 with completion targeted at the turn of 2029 and 2030, for 2 million TEU of capacity at Swinoujscie.
Are Russian Baltic ports still growing? Not in 2026. Ust-Luga and Primorsk loadings fell 10 percent and 9 percent year on year in June 2026, after Ust-Luga had already declined 3.4 percent across 2025.
Sources: port authority annual releases for 2025 from Gdansk, Gdynia, Klaipeda, Szczecin and Swinoujscie, Gothenburg, Tallinn and Ventspils, IAA PortNews reporting on Russian seaport throughput for 2025, Latvian rail freight reporting for the first half of 2026, Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air loading data for June 2026, plus Polish government and port authority material on the Cape Pomerania construction start of July 2026. Figures reflect publications available on 31 August 2026.