Comparison · South Atlantic · one side read, one side not · 07/26–07/29/2026
Savannah is one container terminal and Charleston is three, and only one side of this comparison has been read
- Savannah and Charleston are asked about here as cities far more often than as ports. Eight of the ten questions above these results compare them as places to live or visit — which is nicer, which is cheaper, which is wealthier — and the cheaper one there means rent, not the cost of landing a container.
- Port of Savannah is one container terminal and Port of Charleston is three. Garden City is the largest single-terminal container facility in North America at 1,345 acres with 9,693 feet of continuous berth; Charleston spreads the same work across Wando Welch, North Charleston and Hugh K. Leatherman.
- Container terminals decide this pair, and the two ports differ in how many answers that question has. At Savannah the terminal question has one answer; at Charleston it has three, so a quote naming only the port leaves out a field that matters three times over on one side and not at all on the other.
- Savannah has been read and Charleston has not, so this page compares disclosure rather than cost. Savannah carries a median of $260 across seven tariff lines and a port rule that starts its clock at 12:01 AM; for Charleston we hold no median, no volume, no dwell figure and no located port tariff at all.
Port of Savannah and Port of Charleston sit two hundred miles apart on the same coast and are read here to completely different depths. That has to be said before the first figure rather than after the last one.
How this comparison is built · what we are paid
- This is not a cost comparison, and it cannot be one. One side has been read and the other has not, so what follows compares shape and disclosure.
- Every figure on this page belongs to one named side and is labelled with it. Savannah supplies almost all of them.
- Charleston is never ranked below Savannah. The missing numbers are a property of our reading, not of the port, and ordering the two by completeness would publish our own gaps as a judgement.
- No channel depth appears anywhere here for either port. The market compares depth and we have read none, so publishing one from memory would be exactly the defect this site exists to catch.
- Neither port has paid to appear here, and no link on this site is a referral link.
| Port of Savannah | Port of Charleston | |
|---|---|---|
| Container terminals | one — Garden City | three — Wando Welch, North Charleston, Hugh K. Leatherman |
| Terminal size | 1,345 acres · 9,693 ft of continuous berth · the largest single-terminal container facility in North America | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Median first paid day | $265 over eight tariff lines · $165–$300 | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Port authority free-time rule | read — GPA Rule 34-025, the count starts at the first 12:01 AM after discharge | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| A separate rail rule | found — GPA Rule 34-035, Mason Mega Rail | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Storage rule | found — GPA Rule 34-255 | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Latest volume figure | about 5.7M TEU · calendar 2025 | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Dwell figures in circulation | three — about 3.9 days import, about 20 hours rail, about 9.1 days yard | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Terminal handling | market consensus of $290–$370 per TEU, no document behind it | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| FMC-licensed intermediaries in the metro | 11 organisations | not checked yetnothing located for this port |
| Primary sources we have read about the port itself | several | zero |
| One side has been read and the other has not. Everything below compares the shape of the two ports and how much each publishes — not what a box costs at each, because only one of those numbers exists. | ||
Georgia Ports Authority and nine carrier tariffs · read 07/26–07/29/2026; Charleston structure from the search results · read 07/26/2026
See alsowhat it costs to land a box at savannah →what it costs to land a box at charleston →
The terminal decides this pair, and one side has three of them
Port of Savannah and Port of Charleston are decided by the terminal, like every other pair on this site — but here the finding takes a new shape. The question is not which terminal is dearer. It is how many answers the terminal question has: one at Savannah, three at Charleston.
A quote that names the port without naming the terminal costs you almost nothing on the Savannah side, where there is one container terminal to mean. On the Charleston side the same omission leaves out the field that decides the road distance and the gate. The identical missing word is worth different amounts at the two ports.
How every figure here is sourced, and what each status permits: how every figure here is sourced.
The cost stack at Savannah and Charleston, with one column empty
Port of Savannah and Port of Charleston carry the same five-line stack, and the right-hand column is empty end to end.
| Line of the stack | Savannah | Charleston |
|---|---|---|
| Carrier demurrage, first paid day | $260 median · $165–$300nine US import demurrage tariffs · read 07/28–08/01/2026 | not publishedthe tariffs name this port — the source does not distinguish it |
| Terminal storage | found, not readGPA Rule 34-255 — gap A | not checked yetnothing located — gap A |
| Terminal handling | $290–$370 per TEUno document behind it; never enters a ranking columnmarket consensus · seen 07/26/2026 | not checked yet |
| Drayage | not publishedgap F | not publishedgap F — and here the terminal decides the distance |
| Local fees | not checked yetgap J | not checked yetgap J |
An invoice for these days answers to 46 CFR Part 541, in force since 05/28/2024 and litigated twice since — the decision of 09/29/2025 changed who may be billed. Test the document before paying it: the federal rules your invoice has to meet. Where the ports that do have numbers stand against each other: the cost stack ranked port by port.
Savannah publishes the clearest free-time rule on this site and Charleston publishes none we found
Port of Savannah publishes the clearest free-time rule on this site and Port of Charleston publishes none that we found. This is the one comparison on the page a reader can act on today.
| Port of Savannah | Port of Charleston | |
|---|---|---|
| The port authority’s own rule | Rule 34-025, read in full — the count starts at the first 12:01 AM after dischargeGPA · read 07/26/2026 | not checked yetnever located — gap B |
| Singled out by any of the nine carriers | yes — Yang Ming gives five working days here against four at Los AngelesYang Ming tariff · read 07/29/2026 | not applicablenot named in any of the nine tariffs |
Savannah is one of only two US ports any of the nine carriers singles out for free time; the other is New York. How many free days each carrier gives, and which of them names an hour: how many free days each port allows.
When Savannah is the safer choice, and why Charleston cannot be ranked against it yet
One scenario has a number behind it and the other is a refusal, which is the honest split for this pair.
Savannah, when billing predictability is what you are buying
It is the only wave-0 port where the median, the range, the start hour, the rule number and three dwell figures are all known. You can plan the clock before the box lands and cite the rule number when the invoice arrives. That is not a claim that it is cheap — it is a claim that it is checkable.
GPA Rule 34-025 and nine carrier tariffs · read 07/26–07/29/2026
Charleston, which this page refuses to rank lower
The empty column above describes our reading, not the port. South Carolina Ports may publish every one of those rows; we have not read them. What is visible today is structural: three container terminals mean three different road distances to the same warehouse, so the terminal name in your quote matters more here than almost anywhere.
three terminals established from the search results · read 07/26/2026
How long boxes sit at the port that publishes three different dwell figures for itself: how long a box sits, and which dwell is meant.
What the Savannah and Charleston difference is not
- Not the cities. Eight of the ten questions people ask alongside this comparison are about tourism, migration and which city is nicer. None of that is answered here.
- Not the cost of living. “Which is cheaper, Savannah or Charleston?” uses the same words as our subject and means rent and groceries. It is the most dangerous homonym on this site, and this page answers the freight question only.
- Not cruise. Neither cruise operation appears in a container tariff, and every figure here comes from import demurrage documents.
- Not channel depth. The market compares the two on depth constantly. We have read no depth figure for either port, so none appears here.
- Not the port-war story. The trade press has framed these two as rivals for over a decade — some of the material still ranking is dated 2012. That framing is an observation about the genre rather than a source of figures.
- Not a live comparison. Seven of the related searches on this query are the search engine’s own recency controls, which is what happens when a subject has no stable published answer.
The coast as a whole, compared on what can actually be compared: the East Coast ports compared. Every US container port we cover, with what has been read about each: every US container port we cover.
Questions about Savannah against Charleston for imports
Is Savannah port bigger than Charleston port?
Not comparable on volume: no figure for Charleston has been read. On terminals, Garden City is the largest single-terminal container facility in North America and Charleston operates three separate terminals instead of one.
Savannah or Charleston for imports?
The terminal decides it. Savannah has one and Charleston has three, which means a quote for Charleston is not usable until it names which terminal the service calls at.
Which is cheaper for freight, Savannah or Charleston?
Not answerable here: only Savannah has a median, $260 for the first paid day across seven tariff lines. The missing second figure describes our reading rather than the port, and we do not rank a port down for being unread.
Which is cheaper, Savannah or Charleston?
In these results that question is about the cost of living rather than freight, and it is not answered on this page. The two subjects share the words and nothing else.
How many free days at each?
Whatever your tariff's group line says. Savannah is singled out by Yang Ming at five working days against four at Los Angeles; Charleston is singled out by none of the nine carriers.
When does the clock start at Savannah and at Charleston?
At Savannah, 12:01 AM after discharge under GPA Rule 34-025, which we have read. At Charleston no port rule has been located, so the start hour is unknown to us.
Does channel depth decide this?
No depth figure is published here for either port, because we have read none. The variable this page can show moving money is the terminal, and on that the two ports differ in structure rather than in depth.
Why do the search results talk about tourism?
Because the same words are used to compare the two cities. Eight of the ten questions above these results are about living or visiting rather than about freight.