Dar es Salaam Port Capacity in 2026: What Exporters Need to Plan For

Dar es Salaam handled 33.7 million tonnes of cargo in FY2025/26, up from 27.7 million tonnes the year before. Tanzania Ports Authority’s rated capacity is 14.1 million tonnes of dry cargo plus 6.0 million tonnes of bulk liquid. Put plainly: the port is running at or near its rated capacity, and that — not any single procedural change — is the thing exporters most need to plan around in 2026.

What’s being built to address it

The Egyptian firm EDECS began work in August 2026 under a DP World concession contract to modernize Terminal 1: seven new cargo yards totaling 90,000 square meters, plus supporting facilities. The results are already showing — Terminal 1’s monthly throughput hit a record 46,582 TEUs in July 2026, up from 13,779 TEUs in May 2024. Separately, four new berths (numbered 12–15) plus two more in the Malindi area are planned, aiming to grow the port’s total berth count from 12 to 22.

New oil reception and storage facilities are being added, along with a rail terminal inside the port itself, and the Malindi–Morogoro cargo rail link is expected to become operational in June 2026 — which, if it holds to schedule, would meaningfully shift some cargo off road transport.

What this means for your shipping timeline

None of this is finished yet. A port running near capacity while undergoing simultaneous terminal modernization, berth construction and rail integration is a port where congestion risk and variable lead times are the realistic near-term expectation, not the exception. If you’re planning export shipments through Dar es Salaam in 2026, build in buffer time rather than assuming pre-expansion transit times still hold, and confirm current berth/terminal status with your freight forwarder close to your actual shipping date rather than relying on a fixed lead-time assumption.