Universal Cargo’s Top 10 International Shipping Blog Posts of 2025

2025 is drawing to a close, and that means it’s time to look back at the Top 10 Universal Cargo blog posts of the year! It’s always a fun exercise to count down the top 10 – David Letterman style (you remember David Letterman’s Top 10, right? Right? I’m not THAT old).

The biggest international shipping news stories of the year tend to be well-represented in this list. Plus, a guest post or two often make the top 10. Occasionally, a guest post makes it all the way to the top, or pretty darn near. It will be interesting to see if that happens again this year.

2025 was an eventful year, to say the least. Donald Trump returned to the presidency, which brought tons of news to the international shipping industry between tariffs, trade deals, peace deals, and more. I can guarantee that will impact the top 10 list. But which stories were the ones shippers and other readers of our blog were most interested in? We’ll have to see with the countdown.

So no more wasting time, let’s count it down from Number 10 to the Number 1 most read blog post published by Universal Cargo in 2025….

#10 – New Trade & Rare Earth Deals with Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, & Japan

The Trump Administration made a slew of trade deals in 2025. However, blog posts about them do not dominate the top 10 list. In fact, only the blog post covering the trade and rare earth deals with Malaysia, Cambodia, Thailand, Vietnam, and Japan made the list. Of course, there was a whole list of countries covered in this one post. Still, it barely squeaked onto the list at Number 10, so our top shipping blogs of the year list almost didn’t even include any trade deals.

#9 – The Best Countries for Sourcing Cost-Effective Products

Only one guest post made the list this year, but I’m glad it made it. We love getting to feature guest writers in our blog. Congratulations, Michael Carter, on making the top 10 list at Number 9! His article was highly relevant for 2025, covering the most cost-effective countries from which to import products, especially given how much tariffs impacted international trade this year.

#8 – Shipper’s Questions About Trump’s Tariffs on China, Vietnam, & Indonesia

A shipper sent an email with questions regarding tariffs in China, Vietnam, and Indonesia, so we turned the answers into a full blog post, figuring others likely had the same questions. Who knew that post would end up being one of the top 10 for the year?

#7 – Is Shipping About to Return to the Red Sea? What It Means for Freight Rates

There was no surprise that this topic would make the list somewhere. When container shipping will return to the Red Sea – and, thus, the Suez Canal – has been a big thing to monitor in 2025. The peace deal President Trump facilitated between Israel and Hamas also brought a halt to Houthi attacks in the Gulf of Aden and Red Sea. But how confident are ocean freight carriers in the safety of those waters? And how reluctant are they to return, when that will free up capacity and add downward pressure to freight rates?

#6 – Watch Out! Chinese Exporters Attempting to Skirt Tariffs with Fraud, Making U.S. Importers Complicit

Tariffs have to be the biggest international shipping news story of 2025, right? I guess they’re technically many stories over the year that culminate into one giant story. Tariff-related posts definitely make the top 10 list a few times, but I’ll give you a little spoiler: it’s not a tariffs post that will come in at number one. Number 6 is an important post though. U.S. importers could unwittingly find themselves in trouble by becoming complicit in fraud by Chinese exporters to get around tariffs.

#5 – “We’re Taking It Back” – Exactly What Trump Said About the Panama Canal

This year has been so jam-packed with news, and the Trump Administration has been so active, I nearly forgot about the story that came in at Number 5 on our list. Going all the way back to President Trump’s inaugural speech, he talked about taking back the Panama Canal. And though it’s been overshadowed, I don’t think the story with the Panama Canal is over.

#4 – ILA Contract Negotiations Resume Today But Secret Meeting Sunday Adds Complication – ILA Strike Watch 2025

Speaking of forgetting, did you remember the ILA contract negotiations and strike story was still happening in early 2025? As that ugly situation dragged into this year, it looked like it could have been the biggest international shipping news story of 2025. The ILA Strike Watch did dominate the 2024 version of this list. Only one post from it made it into the Top 10 this year, but it is all the way up at Number 4. The contentious contract negotiations were resolved in January, so this didn’t linger long into 2025.

#3 – 400+ Product Types Added to 50% Steel & Aluminum Tariffs – Full Product Code List Here

Tariffs make their final appearance in this countdown at Number 3. That means the Supreme Court weighing the legality of the president’s use of tariffs surprisingly does not make the list. I would have expected that story to not only make the list but rank high on it. Alas, I was wrong. This list is completely up to you, our readers, and what stories you think are most worth clicking on.

#2 – U.S. DoD Blacklists Cosco as Chinese Military Company

The second biggest surprise to me with this year’s list is the DoD blacklisting Cosco as a Chinese military company making it all the way to the second-most viewed blog post of the year. This was a fairly big piece of international shipping news. However, it wasn’t overly surprising. Cosco is state-owned by the People’s Republic of China, and the Trump Administration was expected to make stances against China. Plus, the Chinese military company list tends to be thought of as a “name and shame” list more than anything. Despite Cosco being one of the largest ocean freight carriers in the world, this isn’t a story that has nearly the kind of impact tariffs have, yet it beat out all the tariff posts for most views.

#1 – How the Government Shutdown Affects Shippers Importing & Exporting Goods

Universal Cargo’s top international shipping post of the year is the government shutdown’s impact on importing and exporting. With the shutdown being the longest in U.S. history, it’s fitting that this post made it all the way to Number 1. This year’s list really highlighted the international shipping news stories of the year well. Let us know if anything here surprised you or if you think stories or posts that didn’t get the views were overlooked by readers and should have made the list.