Amid the ongoing race to beat rising tariffs, the Port of Los Angeles logged an all-time record in cargo movement for a single month in July, Executive Director Gene Seroka said on Wednesday, Aug. 13.
The July total — surpassing 1 million TEUs — topped the last monthly record set in May 2021 by 8,000 containers, Seroka added.
The port handled 1,019,837 twenty-foot equivalent units ( or TEUs) in July, 8.5% more than the same month last year. Retailers and manufacturers brought in goods at an elevated pace because of concerns over higher tariffs slated for later this year.
July saw 107 vessel calls at the port, Seroka said, 30% more than the average recorded over the past five years.
The record activity at the 117-year-old port was largely fueled, he said, by importers still “hustling to bring in cargo” ahead of planned tariffs.
“Shippers have been front-loading their cargo for months to get ahead of tariffs and recent activity at America’s top port really tells that story,” Seroka said. “Port terminals in July were jam-packed with ships loaded with cargo, processed without any delay — much to the credit of our dedicated longshore workers, terminal and rail operators, truckers, and supply chain partners.”
As for what is ahead for the second half of the year, peak season may have already arrived, Seroka said.
“It seems likely that goods coming into the United States might have already peaked,” Seroka added. “A lot of inventory is already here.”
New tariffs on more than 90 countries went into effect about a week ago, Seroka said, with the ongoing fluctuations in tariff amounts and the timing resulting in an ongoing exercise within the industry of drawing up simulation models to anticipate what comes next.
“It’s been a roller coaster all year long,” Seroka said, “and the ride is not over yet.”
Seroka’s guest for the monthly virtual news conference was Zachary Rogers, lead author of the Logistics Managers’ Index and assistant professor of supply chain management at Colorado State University.
The large amounts of inventory already in the U.S. has “really put a stress on the warehouse network,” Rogers said. “There are a lot of costs associated with holding on to goods.”
While orders surged early in order to get merchandise before tariffs hit, Rogers said, retailers also don’t want that excess on their books, resulting in warehouses having to hold onto the cargo until it is needed.
As more of that inventory begins to move to the retail sector with holidays approaching, he said, it could impact prices.
Consumers “haven’t seen big price increases yet,” Rogers said, but indicators show “we are going to be seeing that more at the consumer level.”
Normally, peak season in the shipping industry hits in late summer as goods begin to arrive for back-to-school shopping and the fall and winter holidays.
But peak season this year, Rogers said, “is happening in sort of a bifurcated way so there’s a lot of activity upstream in the supply chain but we haven’t seen much downstream.”
That will change — and probably impact prices, he said — as those stored goods, including for the upcoming holidays, begin to move out from where they sit in warehouses and more quickly onto retail shelves.
“It will be interesting to see what happens next,” Rogers said, adding he’d expect a “quieter period” coming up at the port and without a traditional peak season spike usually seen in late summer.
“Everything already is here for the holiday season,” he said.
The uncertainty surrounding tariffs, Rogers said, “has sort of paralyzed decision makers in the supply chain, but we are not running out of stuff. That speaks to a robustness (in the supply chain). We’re not seeing empty shelves.”
Seroka, meanwhile, said he also anticipates a cargo slowdown for the second half the year following the record numbers in July.
The July loaded imports came in at 543,728 TEUs, 8% more than last year and the most imports in a month at the port. Loaded exports landed at 121,507 TEUs, a 6% improvement from 2024. The port also processed 354,602 empty container units, 10% more than last year.
Seven months into 2025, the Port of Los Angeles has handled 5,975,649 TEUs — 5% more than the same period in 2024.
Current and historical cargo data, including fiscal year-end totals, are available at the Port of L.A. website.
The Port of Long Beach also saw its most active July on record. It was its third-busiest month in that port’s 114-year history.