Comparison · a port written by terminal against a port written once · read 07/28–08/01/2026

New York is priced terminal by terminal and Norfolk as a single port, so the $85 between their medians is smaller than the gap one carrier writes inside New York

⚑ The short answer

New York and New Jersey carries fourteen rate lines across the nine import tariffs and Norfolk carries nine. Both ports are named: thirteen of New York’s fourteen name it, and six of Norfolk’s nine do, across five carriers — COSCO, Yang Ming, HMM, ONE and Hapag-Lloyd twice. The $85 between the medians, $355 against $270, is a real difference in price.
New York is written terminal by terminal and Norfolk once per carrier, and that grain rather than naming is what separates them. Maher, APM, Port Liberty, PNCT and Newark each carry their own figure on the New York side, while Norfolk is priced as one port. Hapag-Lloyd shows it inside a single document: $465 at Maher against $625 at every other New York terminal, and one number, $310, for Norfolk.
New York runs from $80 to $625, a spread of 7.8 times and the widest in this reading, while Norfolk runs $165 to $310, or 1.9 times. The $160 that one carrier writes between two New York terminals is larger than the $85 between the two ports, which is why the port is the smaller of the two decisions a reader makes here.
Norfolk still moves with Savannah rather than with New York: six of its nine lines are the same carrier at the same rate — $165, $250, $260, $265, $270 and $300. The two part company on Hapag-Lloyd, which prices Norfolk at $310 and Savannah at $265, and on ONE, which names Norfolk and not Savannah. Their medians finish $5 apart.

Both ports named — five carriers name NorfolkOne carrier writes $160 between two New York terminalsEvery line-only row in the reading sits on one side

Port of New York and New Jersey is named in thirteen of its fourteen rate lines, and Port of Virginia — Norfolk in every one of those documents — in six of its nine. Both ports are written down. What differs is how finely: New York by terminal, Norfolk by port.

How this comparison is built · what we are paid

Both medians are the same kind of number: all-in rows, over lines that name their port. The $85 between them is a price difference and this page says so rather than explaining it away.
Medians are over all-in rows only. Five rows in this comparison bill line demurrage alone, all of them on the New York side, and they are shown, marked and excluded.
The port the carriers call Norfolk is the one this catalogue profiles as Virginia. Both names appear here because a reader holding a tariff will search for the first.
Neither port has paid to appear here, and no link on this site is a referral link.

The two ports as the tariffs treat them.
	New York and New Jersey	Virginia · Norfolk in the tariffs
Named separately in the nine tariffs	yes — twelve lines	no — not one line names it
Median first paid day	$360the highest median we read, over twelve linesnine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026	$270four carriers name this port outrightnine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026
Range and spread	$80 – $625 · 7.8×the $80 end is line demurrage only and the $625 end is not, so the spread is wider than any single invoice can benine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026	$165 – $310 · 1.9×nine lines, and every one of them covers the line and the terminal in one ratenine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026
The authority’s own tariff	found, not readdockage, wharfage and demurrage — it ranks in the port’s own results	not checked yetnever located
Singled out by a carrier for free time	yes — COSCO gives four days here against five elsewhereread 07/28/2026	not applicableno carrier names it at all

What an empty-looking cell means: found, not read — the document exists and is identified, but we have not opened it not checked yet — we have not read the document yet not applicable — the measure does not apply to this row

Newark is not a third port. The one row written under the Newark name — Maersk at $455 — sits among the same fourteen lines and is neither the cheapest nor the dearest of them; the dearest all-in row in the entire reading is Hapag-Lloyd at $625, for New York terminals other than Maher. One port authority across two states, not a choice between ports.

The variable is how finely the tariff writes your port down

The deciding variable is how finely your carrier’s tariff writes your port down, and the two sides of this pair sit at opposite ends of it. New York is priced terminal by terminal; Norfolk is priced once, as a port.

Hapag-Lloyd proves it inside one document: $465 at Maher and $625 at every other New York terminal, and a single $310 for Norfolk, written twice. The $160 that one carrier puts between two New York berths is larger than the $85 between the two ports.

What sits behind each median, and at what grain each port is written.
	New York and New Jersey	Norfolk
Rate lines in the nine tariffs	fourteen	nine
Of those, lines that name the port	thirteen	six, across five carriers
Lines that reach it through a group	one	three — ZIM, CMA CGM and Maersk
Named terminals carrying their own rate	Maher, APM, Port Liberty, PNCT, Newark	none — the port is priced whole
Widest gap one carrier writes inside the port	$160 — Hapag-Lloyd, $465 at Maher against $625 elsewhere	none — Hapag-Lloyd writes $310 twice
Rows billing line demurrage only	five — every one in the whole reading	none recorded
The top tier	$1,000 per day from day 30 — the highest figure in the nine tariffs	not published for this port

nine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026

Three of Norfolk’s nine lines still come from a group. ZIM, CMA CGM and Maersk reach Norfolk through a catch-all rather than by name. For those three the rate can move when the carrier revises which ports its enumeration covers, without Norfolk appearing in the amendment. The other six name it outright, and they behave like any named line.

How every figure here is sourced and what each status permits: how every figure here is sourced.

The cost stack at New York and Norfolk, and why the low figures are not low

The stack is thin on both sides and thinner on the right, and one line does more damage here than anywhere else on this site.

The cost stack at both ports.
Line of the stack	New York and New Jersey	Norfolk
Carrier demurrage, first paid day	$355 median · $80–$625 across fourteen linesnine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026	$270 median · $165–$310 across nine linesnine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026
Terminal storage	not checked yetgap A — and at four carriers here it is a separate invoice, so the missing document changes what four of the twelve rates mean	not checked yetgap A
Terminal handling	not checked yet	not checked yet
Drayage	not publishedgap F	not publishedgap F
Local fees	found, not readinside the authority tariff, which is located and unopened	not checked yetgap J

What an empty-looking cell means: not checked yet — we have not read the document yet not published — the source publishes no figure here found, not read — the document exists and is identified, but we have not opened it

On the New York side, $80 and $625 are not two points on one scale. Five rows there bill line demurrage only — the carrier’s half, with the terminal invoicing storage separately under a document nobody has read. Comparing $80 with $625 is comparing a fragment of an invoice with a whole one, and it is why the median excludes those rows while the table keeps them visible.

An invoice for these days answers to 46 CFR Part 541, in force since 05/28/2024 and before the D.C. Circuit twice since — and the decision of 09/29/2025 touched exactly the provision about who may be billed, which matters most at the port where two invoices are normal. Test the document before paying: the federal rules your invoice has to meet. Both ports inside the full ranking: the cost stack ranked port by port.

One carrier wrote New York a shorter clock, and nobody wrote Norfolk anything

Free time separates these two ports in one direction only, and it is the opposite of what a reader would guess: the port with more tariff lines gets fewer free days from one carrier.

What the tariffs say about the clock at each.
	New York and New Jersey	Norfolk
A carrier carve-out for free time	four days with COSCO, against five everywhere else it sails — the only port-specific free-time exception in all ten tariffsread 07/28/2026	not applicableno carrier names this port
The hour the count starts	not checked yetno tariff we read states one for this port	not checked yet
The port authority’s own rule	found, not readinside the authority tariff — gap B	not checked yetnever located — gap B

What an empty-looking cell means: not applicable — the measure does not apply to this row not checked yet — we have not read the document yet found, not read — the document exists and is identified, but we have not opened it

What every carrier gives before any of this starts, ordered by how much each document discloses: how many free days each port allows.

When New York is the port you can plan against, and why Norfolk is not simply cheaper

Two scenarios, and in the second one the comparison itself stops being the right question.

Norfolk is $85 lower on the median, and that gap is the smallest number here

$270 against $360, both all-in and both over lines that name the port. It is a real price difference. It is also less than the $160 Hapag-Lloyd writes between Maher and the rest of New York, and less than a third of the $545 between New York’s cheapest and dearest rows. Choose the port on this number and you are choosing on the smallest variable in the comparison.

nine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026

New York is dearer on the median and holds the cheapest-looking figures in the country

Both facts have one cause. Five rows there bill line demurrage only — $80, $82, $125, $165 and $250 — and the terminal invoices its own storage separately. The port is simultaneously the dearest we measured on all-in rows and the source of every half-invoice in the reading.

nine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026

And what a complete answer looks like is a third port

Savannah publishes its own rule, read end to end, with the hour the count starts. Neither port in this comparison publishes anything we could read on that question — one has a tariff located and unopened, the other has nothing located at all.

GPA Rule 34-025 · read 07/26/2026

The whole coast, ordered by disclosure rather than by price, is linked at the top of this page. How long boxes sit at either, and which dwell that means: how long a box sits, and which dwell is meant.

What the New York and Norfolk difference is not

Every question above these results is a superlative about size, and two of them are not even about these ports.

Not a size comparison. Two volume figures circulate for New York — one table gives 6,251,953 and one answer gives 9.4 million TEU, about half again — and neither names its measure or its period. A table ranking New York first cannot be measuring national container volume while Los Angeles publishes 10,239,318 for calendar 2025. We adopt neither figure.
Not a share of anything. The results carry a claim that one of these ports moved 37% of a total, and the noun completing that denominator does not survive in our capture. A share whose denominator cannot be read is not a figure.
Not New York against New Jersey, and not against Newark. One port authority across two states, and the terminals people name are all inside the same twelve tariff lines.
Not a question about the Gulf. One of the questions above these results asks which is the largest port on the Gulf Coast, on a query about two Atlantic ports.
Not geography. One of them asks what the sea in New York is called.

Every US container port we cover, with what has been read about each: every US container port we cover.

Questions about New York against Norfolk for imports

New York vs Norfolk for imports?

The medians are $355 and $270, and the $85 between them is the smallest number on this page. Thirteen of New York’s fourteen rate lines name it and six of Norfolk’s nine do, across five carriers, so both ports are written down. What differs is grain: New York is priced terminal by terminal and Norfolk once per carrier.

Is Norfolk cheaper than New York?

Its all-in median is $85 lower and both figures are the same kind of number, so on this one line yes. But the same reading puts $545 between New York’s cheapest and dearest rows and $160 between two of its terminals under one carrier, so the port is the smallest of the choices in front of you. Norfolk buys predictability rather than a low number: nine lines inside 1.9 times.

Why is New York such a good port?

What we can check is that the tariffs name it more than any other, and that every port-specific exception they write for it runs against the shipper: four free days from COSCO against five elsewhere, up to $900 for a 45-foot box from CMA CGM, and $1,000 from day 30 from HMM, the highest figure in the nine tariffs.

Is New York a big shipping port?

Two figures for it circulate in these very results and they differ by about half — a table row reading 6,251,953 and a snippet giving 9.4M TEU — and neither names its measure or its period. We publish the disagreement and adopt neither.

Is New York or Norfolk the busier of these two?

Not answerable from anything we have read. No comparable volume series exists across these ports, the two New York figures in this result set contradict each other, and this site publishes no position column until a series exists.

Norfolk port vs Baltimore port?

Both are priced since 08/01/2026. Norfolk carries nine lines and a median of $270; Baltimore carries nine and $265, six of them naming the port outright. The question of whether the groups reached Baltimore was answered by reading the six tariffs that had never been transcribed.

New York port vs New Jersey port or Newark port?

One port authority across two states, not a choice between ports. One row in the whole reading is written under the Newark name — Maersk at $455 — and it is neither the cheapest nor the dearest at the port. The dearest is Hapag-Lloyd at $625 for New York terminals other than Maher.

Is Norfolk the same as the Port of Virginia?

Yes. Every carrier tariff we read calls it Norfolk and this catalogue profiles it as Virginia. A reader holding a tariff needs both names, which is why both appear together everywhere on this page.

What is the deepest port on the East Coast?

No depth figure is published here for either port, because we have read none for either. Depth is what the market compares; the variable this page can show moving money is whether a tariff names your port.