Mediterranean Shipping Company (MSC) is now the world’s largest shipping line by container capacity, unseating Maersk from that title.

The shakeup ends Maersk’s 25-year reign as the undisputed champion of cargo shipping based on data from the shipping analytics firm, Alphaliner.

MSC reached that milestone last Wednesday (January 5) when Alphaliner’s daily updating database recorded that MSC now owns or charters enough ships to carry the equivalent of 4,284,728 shipping containers, narrowly edging out Maersk’s total capacity of 4,282,840 containers.

MSC’s rise to the top of the leaderboard for shipping capacity reflects the investments that the world’s largest shipping lines are making with the billions of dollars in profits they’ve recorded during the pandemic. As supply chains normalise in 2022 and beyond, time will tell whether Maersk’s decision to invest in land-based logistics or MSC’s mega-ship strategy proves prescient.

The two shipping lines have made different bets on the future of their industry. Maersk has decided to shift its focus away from shipping and toward more profitable lines of business, like air freight, trucking, warehousing, operating port terminals, and selling logistics software. The company aims to reinvent itself as a one-stop shop for every step of the supply chain.

Building out a fleet of mega-ships

MSC has doubled down on its strategy of building out a fleet of mega-ships that can deliver cargo at the lowest possible cost. MSC CEO Søren Toft explains that,  “MSC has invested significantly in new and very efficient ultra-large vessels.”

MSC has surpassed Maersk on one key metric: the number of containers it can carry on the ships it owns and charters. This is the most important measure of a shipping line’s size because it means that MSC can move more cargo than Maersk can.

However, Maersk owns and charters more ships than MSC—although that isn’t necessarily an advantage. MSC’s strategy has been to buy the biggest container ships available because they can operate more efficiently than smaller ships.

While larger ships cost a bit more to operate, they can carry far more cargo, so if they’re fully loaded their routes will be more profitable than the routes of smaller ships.

MSC’s ships carry, on average, about 6,600 20-foot equivalent units (TEU), compared to Maersk’s average of 5,800 TEU, according to Quartz’s analysis of Alphaliner data.