teus

TEU stands for twenty-foot equivalent unit, a standard measure of cargo capacity used in intermodal freight transport. It represents the capacity of a standard twenty-foot-long shipping container, and containers are commonly counted in TEUs to express overall capacity. A forty-foot container equals two TEUs, and a forty-foot high-cube container also counts as two TEUs. The alternative term FEU, forty-foot equivalent unit, is sometimes used, but TEU remains the basic unit for most calculations.

TEU is used to describe ship capacity, terminal throughput, and fleet size. Shipping lines quote vessel capacity in TEUs, ports report annual throughput in TEUs, and rail yards measure handling in TEUs. It is a unit of volume rather than weight, and does not by itself capture payload restrictions or weight limits of containers or equipment.

Container standards are defined by the International Organization for Standardization (ISO). The typical dimensions are approximately 6.058 meters (20 feet) long, 2.438 meters wide, and about 2.591 meters high for a standard height container; a 40-foot container is about 12.192 meters long with the same width and height. High-cube variants are taller, increasing capacity. The TEU concept emerged with the standardization of ISO containers in the 1960s, and TEU-based measurement became widespread in the following decades.

Limitations of TEU include its focus on volume rather than weight, and differences in container weight, density, and terminal handling that affect actual cargo capacity and operational efficiency.