Container Tracking

Goal #

See where a container or air shipment is right now, how far along the route it has got, and how much to trust the dates you’re looking at.

Before you start #

• A transport reference — a Bill of Lading, booking or container number for ocean, an Air Waybill number for air. Usually extracted from transport documents automatically; you can also enter it by hand.
• Transport type set to Ocean or Air. Road freight isn’t tracked.
• Nothing else. A draft is tracked too. An email from a sender you trust can start tracking without approval (see below). An emailed draft that waits for approval is registered when it is approved, and a draft you create by hand when you tick Start tracking now or click Start tracking later.

What tracking shows you #

Once a shipment is registered with the tracking service, the tracking panel displays:

• An interactive map showing the route and current position
• A progress bar with departure, transshipment, and arrival points
• ETA/ETD dates with delay indicators
• A timeline of events (port calls, flight legs, customs clearance, etc.)
• Carrier and vessel/flight information

Tracking data updates automatically via webhooks and periodic polling, so you always see the latest status.

Carrier Coverage #

Trackberry can follow most major container lines and air cargo carriers. The full, up-to-date list lives on the public Carriers we track page — it is refreshed every day from our tracking provider and shows what changed recently, so you can check coverage before you book.

Search it by carrier name, SCAC code (ocean) or IATA code and AWB prefix (air). If a carrier isn’t listed, the shipment still works normally — its tracking status simply shows as Untracked.

The page also has a Couriers section. It lists the 15 express couriers and parcel networks whose waybills Trackberry follows, such as DHL Express, FedEx, UPS and TNT, with what the waybill number looks like for most of them. See Courier waybills.

Setting Up Tracking #

The tracking service needs one number: a Bill of Lading (B/L), booking or container number for ocean, an Air Waybill (AWB) number for air. The transport document is only the usual way we get that number. A forwarder’s house B/L is never registered: tracking follows the master B/L when the house B/L prints one, and otherwise the container. See House B/Ls and LCL shipments.

When tracking starts on its own #

• A transport document is read. When a B/L or AWB is imported, Trackberry registers its reference straight away.
• An email from an approved sender carries a reference. If the email creates an air shipment with a valid AWB number, tracking starts without waiting for the air waybill document. An ocean shipment whose reference is a container number starts the same way, unless your organization waits for the transport document (see Choosing when ocean tracking starts). Trackberry waits until any attached documents have been read first, and a transport document that is already on the shipment decides instead.
• An emailed shipment is approved. Approving it starts tracking, except that an ocean shipment with only a container number still waits for its B/L when your organization waits for the transport document.

A B/L number found in an email body is not registered on its own, whichever way your organization starts tracking. It waits for the transport document, because a forwarder’s job number in the text can look like a B/L number.

Choosing when ocean tracking starts #

By default an ocean container number starts tracking as soon as an email brings it. The catch is that a container registered early is registered again when the B/L arrives. You are still charged once for the shipment.

An admin can change this under Settings → Shipments, in the Tracking card. Members can see the setting but not change it.

A shipment that is waiting shows the Tracking hasn’t started yet card with “Waiting for the B/L, as your tracking settings ask.” The card still offers Start tracking if you would rather start now.

When you switch back to Start immediately, Trackberry tells you how many shipments are still waiting for their B/L and offers Start tracking it (or Start tracking all when there are several). Starting them adds no charge. Without that click, a waiting shipment starts when its next email or document arrives.

Starting tracking yourself #

When a shipment could be tracked but hasn’t been, its page shows a Tracking hasn’t started yet card.

1. If the shipment has no reference yet, type it into B/L, container, AWB or courier tracking number.
2. Choose Ocean freight or Air freight. An AWB number is always treated as air and a container number as ocean, whatever you choose.
3. Click Start tracking.

To follow a parcel sent by courier instead, such as small cargo sent by FedEx with no B/L or AWB, type its tracking number and pick the courier from the Courier group in the list. Trackberry picks FedEx, UPS or DHL Express for you when the number’s check digit identifies one. The number is checked against that courier before anything starts. Once a courier is followed and the shipment has no B/L, container or AWB, the card gives way to the courier tracking (see Courier waybills).

The first update usually appears within a few minutes. Drafts you create by hand offer the same thing as a Start tracking now checkbox on the new shipment form. See Registering a Container Early.

Air waybill numbers are checked #

An AWB number you type is checked before it is saved or registered. This applies on the new shipment form, on Edit Shipment and on the Start tracking card, which checks it even when the number was already on the shipment. A valid number has a 3-digit airline prefix and 8 digits, like 016-12345675. Trackberry refuses a number when:

• it has the wrong length;
• the 3-digit prefix is a telephone country code, so it is probably a phone number;
• the last digit fails the IATA mod-7 check digit, so a digit is probably mistyped.

The error message says which of these applies. On Edit Shipment the number is only checked when you change it, so an older shipment with a bad number can still be edited. House waybills (HAWB) are the forwarder’s own numbers and are not checked.

Correcting a reference #

If the reference was read wrong, open the shipment, click Edit and change Bill of Lading / Transport Reference, then Save changes. Trackberry drops the old registration and registers the corrected number, so tracking follows the right shipment. A reference you type is protected: later documents won’t overwrite it. Shipments whose tracking was entered by hand keep it.

Past shipments #

Sometimes documents reach Trackberry long after the voyage ended. When they put the arrival more than 30 days before the shipment was created, the tracking card says Past shipment: documents archived, no live tracking. Carriers stop publishing once a voyage ends, so there is nothing to follow. These shipments are not registered and not billed.

If the dates on the documents are wrong, correct them and save, and tracking starts as normal. For an ocean or air shipment with a reference, you can also click Track anyway to track it with the dates as they are. It is then billed like any other tracked shipment. The details are in Past voyages are no longer tracked or charged.

Reading the Tracking View #

Once tracking data is available, a tracking panel appears on the shipment page.

Map #

The interactive map shows:

• Route segments — The path from origin to destination, including transshipment stops. It is drawn dashed because the route is the tracking service’s reconstruction of where the vessel goes. It is not a record of where it went. The stretch already covered uses a tighter dash than the stretch still to come.
• Location markers — Green for origin, amber for transshipment ports, red for destination
• Current position — A marker standing on the newest position we could confirm as a real AIS fix, a position report broadcast by the vessel itself (ocean only). Hover it to see when the vessel was confirmed there. The marker is an arrow that points along the route, so you can see which way the vessel is heading at a glance. Positions refresh about once an hour. Each one is stamped with the time the vessel was confirmed there, so the marker shows its real age instead of pretending to be live.
• Observed track — A solid violet line joining the positions where we have seen the vessel, with a dot at each one. Hover a dot to see when we first saw the vessel there. It is the only line on the map drawn from observed positions instead of estimates, which is why it’s the only solid one.

The observed track starts when a shipment is first tracked. We don’t reconstruct positions from before then, so a shipment already at sea builds up its track over the following days instead of showing one straight away.

For ocean shipments the tracking service tells us the exact time each AIS fix was taken, and whether the container is currently aboard a tracked vessel. That is why only confirmed fixes are plotted. Estimates are left off the map entirely: the vessel marker stays on the last confirmed fix rather than running ahead of the track to a position nobody observed. The progress along the route still reflects the carrier’s own estimate, which is why the marker can sit behind the point where the route changes from traveled to remaining.

Consecutive fixes are joined with straight lines. Because AIS fixes now arrive about hourly, the vessel barely moves between one fix and the next, so the straight line is close to the course it sailed. We never bend the track onto the carrier’s route to make it look neater. The route is the carrier’s plan, and where the two disagree, the plan would pull the track hundreds of kilometers toward a waypoint the vessel never went near. When there is a long gap between fixes, which is rare, the line may cut across a headland. That is an accurate record of what we saw, and it’s why the dots matter as much as the line.

For ocean shipments, the route follows actual shipping lanes. For air shipments, routes are displayed as curved arcs between airports.

Progress Bar #

Below the map, a progress bar shows how far along the shipment is:

• The origin (Port of Loading or departure airport) is on the left
• The destination (Port of Discharge or arrival airport) is on the right
• Any transshipment ports appear in between
• A ship or airplane icon shows the current position along the route
• Dates are shown below each stop — if the ETA has changed from the original estimate, both dates are shown with a delay badge (e.g., “2 days late” or “1 day early”)

AI-Predicted ETA #

For ocean shipments, Trackberry displays an AI-predicted arrival date below the destination port when the tracking provider’s machine-learning model has generated a prediction that differs from the carrier’s official ETA.

The prediction appears as ✦ AI predicted: Jun 28 in violet beneath the ETA date. This is useful when the carrier ETA hasn’t been updated yet but vessel movement data suggests a different arrival.

The AI-predicted ETA is informational only — it reflects the tracking provider’s model output and may not match the final arrival date.

AIS ETA flag #

For ocean shipments, the ship’s own AIS can put the arrival well behind the carrier’s schedule. Carriers sometimes lag the ship by days. When it does, AIS suggests about +3 days appears in amber under the ETA. Click it to see the reasoning: the arrival the AIS reports at the ship’s next port, how far that is behind the carrier’s schedule, and the date that gives at your destination.

The flag appears only when all of these hold:

• the AIS-based date is more than 2 days behind the carrier’s;
• the AIS reading is less than 3 days old and the arrival it gives is still ahead;
• no transshipment lies between the ship’s next port and your destination, since a transfer to another vessel resets the delay;
• the shipment has not arrived.

It is an estimate, and carriers often win some of the time back. The ETA itself doesn’t change.

Status #

The tracking status tells you where the shipment is in its journey:

Event Timeline #

Click to expand the event timeline at the bottom of the tracking panel:

• Ocean shipments show container-level events: loaded on vessel, vessel departed, vessel arrived, discharged, gate out, etc. At some terminals the list also carries events the terminal reported itself, marked with a Terminal badge (see Terminal events).
• Air shipments show flight events: received from shipper, departed, arrived, customs cleared, delivered, etc.

Each event shows: - A status indicator — green for actual (confirmed), gray for estimated - The event location with a country flag - The date and time - Flight number (for air shipments)

House B/Ls #

A house B/L is a forwarder’s own bill of lading. It covers your cargo, but no shipping line can resolve its number, so registering it would track nothing.

Trackberry reads the signs from the document: a forwarder’s header, a signature “as carrier” by the forwarder, the forwarder’s own terms, and a number without a shipping line’s prefix. This applies to full containers as well as LCL.

• The house B/L is kept, not registered. It is filed under House B/L on the shipment.
• Tracking follows the master B/L when the house B/L prints one, and otherwise the container.
• A number that starts with a shipping line’s own code still counts as the line’s B/L on a full container.
• If a B/L is refused. On a shipment with one container, when the tracking service doesn’t recognize a B/L the first time it is registered, Trackberry files that B/L as the house B/L and tries again with the container.

LCL shipments #

A shipment is either FCL (a full container) or LCL (less than a container). An LCL shipment travels in a container the forwarder consolidates and doesn’t own. Trackberry reads the load type from your documents. You can also set it under Load type (FCL or LCL) on Edit Shipment, next to the House B/L and Forwarder reference fields.

For LCL, tracking works differently:

• The house B/L isn’t registered with the carrier. The carrier doesn’t know it, so tracking follows the consolidation container instead. The house B/L and the forwarder reference are kept on the shipment, and an email that mentions either one finds its way to the right shipment.
• Events after discharge are muted. Once the container is discharged, what happens to it is the forwarder’s business, not your cargo’s. Those events show faded and labeled Consolidation container, and a container marked delivered doesn’t mark your shipment delivered.
• The cargo is released later, at the CFS. See the next section.
• Free time doesn’t apply. See Free Time.

CFS release #

LCL cargo can be collected only after the forwarder unloads the container at its container freight station (CFS), usually days after the carrier discharges it. On an LCL shipment, the CFS release card records that date:

1. Pick the date under Release date.
2. Click Record release.

Trackberry also reads the date from a forwarder’s release notice when one arrives by email. A date you enter yourself wins over one read from an email, and once you remove it by hand, later emails won’t bring it back. Only dates that have already happened are accepted.

The date appears as Released at CFS on the timeline and in the shipment header, in place of the forwarder’s availability date.

Terminal events #

For some ports Trackberry also asks the terminal itself, not only the carrier. Today that covers APM Terminals at Algeciras, Valencia, Barcelona and Rotterdam (Maasvlakte II), as well as berthing times at Hong Kong. The public Terminals page lists every terminal we read data from.

When an APM Terminals terminal is the port of discharge, these events join the timeline, each with a Terminal badge (hover it to see which terminal reported it):

• Discharged from vessel
• On hold at terminal and Hold released at terminal
• Available for pickup
• Container stripped
• Gate out from terminal

Trackberry starts asking the terminal shortly before the ship arrives (about three days ahead) and keeps asking until every container has left the terminal, for up to a month after arrival. A discharge the terminal reports takes precedence over the carrier’s for free time (see Free Time).

Courier waybills #

Importers often courier the original documents ahead of the cargo. When a courier waybill is uploaded, Trackberry reads its number and follows the envelope. About 15 couriers are supported, among them DHL Express, FedEx, UPS, TNT and Aramex. The Carriers we track page lists all of them.

• A Courier tab on the tracking card. When the shipment also has a B/L, container or AWB, the card has two tabs: the cargo and the courier (Original documents). When it has none of those, the courier is shown alone as the shipment’s tracking.
• Status in the documents list. The courier waybill document shows where the envelope is, for example Delivered or In customs, next to the document.
• One waybill, several shipments. An envelope that covers several shipments is tracked once and shown on each.

Courier tracking doesn’t start while the shipment waits for approval, or once it’s archived; otherwise it starts straight away. If the courier doesn’t recognize the waybill number, the tab says so. Before it starts, Trackberry checks the number against the courier’s format and check digit, and looks for the real tracking number on the label if the first one it read doesn’t fit.

Multi-leg Routes & Transshipments #

Many shipments don’t go directly from A to B — they pass through intermediate ports or airports where cargo is transferred to another vessel or flight. Trackberry handles this automatically.

How Routes Are Built #

Trackberry constructs the full route from multiple sources:

1. From documents — Packing lists, phytosanitary certificates, and transport documents provide origin and destination information
2. From tracking data — The tracking provider reports transshipment ports and intermediate stops
3. Route reconciliation — Trackberry chains legs into the correct sequence, deduplicates overlapping segments, and fills in missing details

What You See #

The route is displayed as a vertical timeline on the shipment page:

• Green dot — Origin (Port of Loading / departure airport)
• Amber dots — Transshipment ports or intermediate stops
• Red dot — Destination (Port of Discharge / arrival airport) with ETA

Each segment between stops shows: - Transport type icon (ship, plane, or truck) - Transport mode label (Ocean freight, Air freight, Road freight) - Vessel name, flight number, or truck reference - Carrier name

The header shows the total number of legs (e.g., “Route · 3 legs”).

Transport Types #

A single shipment can combine different transport modes. For example, a shipment might travel by truck from the packing house to the port, then by ocean to the destination port, with a transshipment at an intermediate port:

🚛 Road — Packing house → Port of Loading
🚢 Ocean — Port of Loading → Transshipment Port
🚢 Ocean — Transshipment Port → Port of Discharge

Ocean vs Air Tracking #

CO₂ Emissions #

Trackberry displays a CO₂ emissions figure on the shipment detail page for both air and ocean shipments.

A figure comes from one of two places, and the page says which:

• Carrier-reported — some ocean tracking providers publish a figure for the voyage. Where one is available, that is what you see, unlabeled.
• Estimated — everywhere else, Trackberry works it out from the great-circle distance between the tracked ports or airports and the shipment’s cargo weight, using distance-banded emission factors. Shorter legs are less fuel-efficient per tonne-kilometer than longer ones, and a route with a transshipment is calculated leg by leg, not from its total distance. These figures are labeled (estimated).

Air is always estimated, since carriers don’t report a per-shipment figure. Ocean is estimated whenever the provider tracking that shipment doesn’t supply one.

The figure is shown in tonnes (e.g., 🌍 1.50 tonnes) in the transport details section alongside the ETA. It represents the estimated carbon footprint of that leg of the journey.

CO₂ data is also available as an optional column on the shipments list — see Customizing Columns for details.

Cargo Type & Frozen Badge #

Trackberry detects the cargo type from transport documents:

When a transport document indicates frozen cargo, Trackberry displays a ❄️ badge with the set temperature next to the container number on the shipment list, dashboard, and trading view. This helps you quickly spot temperature-sensitive shipments.

Automatic Updates #

Tracking data stays current through two mechanisms:

1. Webhooks — The tracking provider pushes updates to Trackberry the moment something changes (e.g., vessel departure, ETA revision, arrival confirmation). This is the primary update method.
2. Periodic refresh — As a backup, Trackberry polls for updates every hour to catch anything a webhook might have missed.

Archived shipments are not polled. Once a shipment is archived, by hand or automatically, Trackberry stops asking the tracking service about it. The one exception is an archived shipment that supplies tracking data to a live shipment with the same B/L. Unarchiving a shipment puts it back on the hourly refresh. See Shipments List & Archiving.

How fresh is this data? #

Under the Live Tracking heading, a small dotted-underline stamp reads Carrier updated 3 hours ago — or No carrier updates yet when nothing has arrived. Hover it and Trackberry shows every clock in the chain, because “how old is this?” has more than one answer:

These rows let you tell a quiet shipment from a broken one. If the tracking service is still reaching the carrier but the carrier hasn’t published anything, the data is up to date and there is just no news. Carriers publish milestones at port calls, so weeks can pass mid-voyage with nothing new.

For ocean shipments the service reports one freshness time covering both questions, so the two cannot be told apart from the rows alone. The vessel position settles it: a ship still moving on AIS while the carrier rows stand still is a quiet shipment, not a broken one.

The vessel position does not depend on the carrier. It comes from a separate AIS feed that keeps updating whether or not the carrier has said anything, so the marker on the map can move while the four carrier rows stand still. For ocean shipments the tracking service gives us the real time of each fix, so the last row shows the position’s real age. Treat the marker as recent rather than live: near coasts AIS updates every few minutes, but mid-ocean a vessel can cover a couple of hundred kilometers between satellite fixes.

If a clock stops, Shipment Monitoring raises an alert about it.

Check now #

Signed-in users get a Check now button in that same popover. It asks the tracking service again straight away and swaps the stamp for a spinner while the check runs.

It cannot make the carrier publish anything new, so the carrier dates rarely change — though it can pick up a newer vessel position. It’s most useful right after a shipment is created, or when the shipper has told you something the tracking hasn’t caught up with yet.

Where the destination is a port we read terminal data for, the same button also asks the terminal, but only when the ship is close to or at the terminal.

Check now is hidden when there’s no transport reference to check, on public tracking pages, and once tracking is complete.

When tracking is complete #

Once a shipment has arrived or been delivered, its journey is over and no clock will move again. The freshness popover switches its heading to Tracking is complete and explains that none of the dates will change. The Check now button disappears, and monitoring stops raising staleness alerts for it.

Shipments sharing a Bill of Lading #

Several shipments can carry the same B/L or AWB number. Trackberry registers that reference with the tracking service once, and the other shipments read the carrier’s facts (position, milestones, ETA) from the registered one. You see the same live tracking on all of them, and you’re only billed for a single registration.

Public Tracking #

The tracking map and status are also visible on the public tracking page — anyone with the tracking link can see the live position and status of the shipment without logging in.

FAQ #

How quickly does tracking data appear after entering a reference? Usually within a few minutes. The shipment needs to be registered with the carrier’s system first. If the reference isn’t found immediately, Trackberry will retry automatically.

What if the tracking shows “Not Found”? The reference number may not yet be in the carrier’s system (common for future bookings), or it may be incorrect. Double-check the reference and try updating it.

Can I track a shipment that’s already en route? Yes. Enter the B/L or AWB number and Trackberry will fetch all available historical data, including past events.

Does tracking work for all carriers? Tracking coverage depends on the carrier. Most major ocean carriers and airlines are supported — see the full list of carriers we track, refreshed daily. If a carrier isn’t covered, the tracking status will show as “Untracked”.

How accurate is the ETA? ETAs come directly from the carrier and are updated as the voyage progresses. They can shift due to weather, port congestion, or schedule changes — Trackberry shows both the original and revised dates when they differ.