Strait of Dover live traffic
English Channel ↔ North Sea
Normal traffic
150 transits on 13 September · 7-day average 167.3 per day
IMF PortWatch counts ships that complete a transit, from satellite AIS. Latest published day: 13 September 2026 (5 days behind today); the series is updated weekly. Next release expected around 22 September. Methodology
Daily transits since 2019 · IMF PortWatch
Bars: transits per UTC day. Line: 7-day average. Numbered markers: events from the timeline below.
Vessel types last 30 days · IMF PortWatch
On 13 Sep: Tankers 46 · Container ships 32 · Dry bulk 25 · General cargo 37 · Ro-ro 10
Latest news via Google News
- 14 Sep 2026, 09:12 UTC Riddlehaven Escape Rooms coming to Dover with 'Ghost Ship' and 'Airlock' Foster's Daily Democrat
- 13 Sep 2026, 11:12 UTC Fire on Isle of Inishmore Ferry at Calais Quickly Doused by Crew – No Injuries uknip.co.uk
Collected automatically from news media by keyword filters and not verified by StraitTraffic. Dated events that explain the numbers are in the timeline.
Vessels right now and our own transit count
Positions received in the last 30 minutes from shore-based AIS receivers, and transits counted by StraitTraffic from those signals. Independent of the official statistics above.
Our transits, last 30 days
Completed transits per UTC day. Today is partial.
Last 7 days: 889
Direction last 24h · our count
Last 7 days: English Channel → North Sea 386 · North Sea → English Channel 503
Ship types last 24h · our count
Recent transits UTC · our count
- 15:38 KALLIOPI S · Cargo → English Channel
- 15:34 AMADEUS SILVER · Cargo → English Channel
- 15:28 CELEBRITY · Cargo → English Channel
- 14:33 KAROLOS · Tanker → English Channel
- 14:20 SENATA · Cargo → English Channel
- 14:20 ECO CERBERUS · Cargo → English Channel
- 13:43 BIRGIT · Cargo → English Channel
- 13:36 VINDONISSA · Cargo → English Channel
About Strait of Dover traffic
The Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel, carries the traffic between the North Sea ports of Rotterdam, Antwerp and Hamburg and the rest of the world. Its traffic separation scheme is the busiest in the world, with cross-Channel ferries weaving through north-east and south-west bound lanes.
How transits are counted
A transit is counted when a vessel is seen in the Channel south-west of the strait, then in the strait off Dover and Calais, and then in the southern North Sea, or the reverse. Ferries between Dover and Calais or Dunkirk cross the lanes and are excluded. Official daily totals come from IMF PortWatch.
46 passages in the last 24 hours could not be confirmed and are excluded from the counts.