Spanish ports ranked by container traffic in 2025: the year in review

Spanish ports handled 18.6 million TEU in 2025, 2.8% more than in 2024 (502,161 TEU more). These are the final figures from Puertos del Estado’s statistical yearbook for the 28 port authorities.

It is the highest annual figure in the 2012–2025 series.

In the 2025 ranking, the ports moving up on 2024 are Málaga (from 9th to 7th); those moving down are Vigo (from 7th to 8th) and Bahía de Cádiz (from 8th to 9th). The top three positions are unchanged.

Transhipment TEU: 9.61 million TEU in 2025, 0.5% less than in 2024. Bahía de Algeciras ranks first on this measure, with 4.08 million TEU.

Valencia ranks first among port authorities with 5.66 million TEU in 2025 (3.4% more than in 2024). It is followed by Bahía de Algeciras (4.74 million) and Barcelona (3.73 million). Together, the three account for 75.8% of the total.

The largest increases were recorded by Málaga (+64.1%), Las Palmas (+16.7%) and Alicante (+7.0%); the steepest falls by Bilbao (−7.6%), Bahía de Cádiz (−4.5%) and Barcelona (−4.1%). The comparison is limited to port authorities that account for at least 1% of the total, so that an extreme swing at a small player does not distort the picture.

The rest of the top ten are Las Palmas (4th, 1.55 million, +16.7%), Santa Cruz de Tenerife (5th, 543,092 TEU, +6.7%), Bilbao (6th, 423,930 TEU, −7.6%), Málaga (7th, 355,464 TEU, +64.1%), Vigo (8th, 309,618 TEU, +3.9%), Bahía de Cádiz (9th, 211,747 TEU, −4.5%) and Alicante (10th, 193,420 TEU, +7.0%).

At the bottom of the table are Motril (178 TEU), A Coruña (7 TEU) and Pasaia (2 TEU), out of a total of 28 port authorities with data.

The distribution is highly concentrated: the top five account for 87.1% of the total and 4 port authorities are enough to reach 80%, while the other 18 port authorities further down share the remaining 4.9%. 17 of the 26 port authorities with a comparison grew compared with 2024, 8 of them by double digits, and 9 fell.

Of the 12 months of 2025 with data, 9 are above the same month of 2024 and 3 below; over the last three months (October, November, December) the figure is up 4.8% on the same months of 2024; the largest year-on-year difference was in November (up 10.4%); the highest point in the series was July, at 1.67 M, and the lowest December, at 1.41 M.

Between 2012 and 2025 the figure went from 14.1 M to 18.6 M, an increase of 32.3% over 13 years (+2.2% a year on average); the last year is the high point of the series and the low was 2013 (13.9 M).

The TEU (twenty-foot equivalent unit) is the standard measure of container traffic. Puertos del Estado counts every container handled, full and empty, and separates import and export boxes, domestic cabotage and transhipment containers, which arrive on one ship and leave on another without entering Spain. In Algeciras and Valencia transhipment makes up more than half of the total.

Puertos del Estado. To explore the data in detail, use PortStats · containers or see the original source.