Tonnage

Aframax vs Suezmax

Published 12 October 2026

Aframax and Suezmax are the two mid-sized crude oil tanker classes. An Aframax is a tanker of roughly 80,000 to 120,000 deadweight tonnes. A Suezmax is the next size up, at roughly 120,000 to 160,000. On the main freight routes an Aframax lifts a cargo of 70,000 to 80,000 tonnes and a Suezmax lifts 130,000 to 145,000. Above them sits the VLCC (very large crude carrier).

The two classes side by side

	Aframax	Suezmax
Deadweight, Baltic Exchange guide	About 90,000 to 120,000	About 120,000 to 160,000
Deadweight, US EIA	80,000 to 120,000	Not on the AFRA scale
Baltic sale and purchase benchmark	115,000 dwt	158,000 dwt
Cargo size on Baltic routes	70,000 to 80,000 tonnes	130,000 to 145,000 tonnes
Named after	A freight rate scale, AFRA	The Suez Canal
Cargo	Crude oil and dirty products	Crude oil
Coated version	LR2, for clean products	None named in the Baltic guide

Deadweight (dwt) is the total weight a ship can carry, including cargo, fuel and stores. It is always more than the cargo. The Baltic Exchange figures were read from its site on 12 October 2026. Its guide warns that these terms "are not precisely defined" and that its ranges are "indicative only".

Where the names come from

Aframax is not a place. It comes from AFRA, the Average Freight Rate Assessment. The US Energy Information Administration (EIA) describes AFRA as a system set up by Royal Dutch Shell and overseen by the London Tanker Brokers' Panel, an independent group of shipbrokers. AFRA sorts tankers into size brackets by deadweight so that freight can be assessed for each bracket.

The odd part is that Aframax is not one of those brackets. The EIA's chart of the scale runs from General Purpose and Medium Range through LR1 (45,000 to 80,000 dwt) and LR2 (80,000 to 160,000) to VLCC and ULCC. It adds a note: Aframax "is not an official vessel classification on the AFRA scale". The EIA says the name is used for ships of 80,000 to 120,000 dwt, a size popular with oil companies, and that the panel publishes no freight assessment for it.

Suezmax is a place. It means the largest tanker that could pass through the Suez Canal fully loaded. The trouble is that the canal kept growing after the name was coined.

240,000 dwt

The largest loaded ship in the Suez Canal Authority's table of canal characteristics, on a draught of 66 feet (about 20.1 metres). The latest stage in that table is 2015. The ships the market calls Suezmax stop at about 160,000 dwt. The class is now well inside the limit it is named after.

So neither name does what it appears to. Aframax is a bracket that the scale it is named after does not contain. Suezmax is a size the canal outgrew. Both survive because the market needs a word for each group of ships, and the ships were built to those sizes.

Cargo sizes and routes

The clearest public measure of what each class does is the Baltic Exchange's list of dirty tanker routes. Each route is defined by a cargo size in thousands of tonnes. These are the routes the Baltic groups into its Aframax and Suezmax earnings averages, plus the other routes at Suezmax cargo sizes.

Class	Route	Cargo	From and to
Aframax	TD7	80,000 mt	North Sea to UK-Continent
	TD8	80,000 mt	Kuwait to Singapore
	TD14	80,000 mt	South East Asia to east coast Australia
	TD19	80,000 mt	Cross Mediterranean
	TD25	70,000 mt	US Gulf to UK-Continent
	TD26	70,000 mt	East coast Mexico to US Gulf
Suezmax	TD6	135,000 mt	Black Sea to Mediterranean
	TD20	130,000 mt	West Africa to UK-Continent
	TD23	140,000 mt	Middle East Gulf to Mediterranean
	TD27	130,000 mt	Guyana to Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp
	TD33	145,000 mt	US Gulf to Amsterdam-Rotterdam-Antwerp

The Baltic's Aframax average is built from the six Aframax routes above. Its Suezmax average is built from TD6 and TD20. For comparison, its VLCC routes are defined at 260,000 to 270,000 tonnes.

The pattern in the table is the practical difference between the classes:

Aframax routes include several short regional ones: across the North Sea, across the Mediterranean, and from Mexico to the US Gulf. The EIA notes that ships in this size range can access most large ports that ship crude oil and petroleum products.
Suezmax routes are longer and link an export region to a refining region: West Africa, the Black Sea, Guyana and the US Gulf to Europe. The cargo is nearly twice the size.

Aframax or LR2: the same hull, a different ship

The Baltic guide adds one line to its Aframax entry: "also called an LR2 if coated tanks for refined products". An Aframax and an LR2 (Long Range 2) are the same size of ship. The difference is the cargo tanks. An LR2 has coated tanks and carries clean products such as naphtha and jet fuel. An Aframax carries crude oil and dirty products such as fuel oil.

A deadweight search cannot tell them apart. Ask for the tank coating and the last three cargoes. Tanker sizes explains why the coating, not the tonnage, decides which cargoes a tanker may load.

How they are fixed

Both classes are fixed in the same way, and it differs from dry cargo.

Rates are quoted in Worldscale. The Baltic Exchange guide to tanker chartering says most oil fixtures are concluded on the Worldscale system, where the market rate is a percentage of a published flat rate for the voyage. Worldscale explained shows how to turn that into dollars.
Laytime is one block of hours. The same guide gives the usual allowance as 72 hours SHINC (Sundays and holidays included) for loading and discharging together.
There is no despatch. The guide states that "despatch money is not paid in the tanker industry". A tanker that finishes early earns the charterer nothing back. See despatch vs demurrage.
Forms. The guide names the oil companies' own forms, such as Shellvoy and BPvoy, and ASBATANKVOY as the most common form that is not an oil company's.

To compare the two sizes on one cargo, earnings per day are the fair measure, not the Worldscale number. The free TCE calculator turns a freight figure, fuel and port costs into a daily rate for each ship.

Where the sources disagree

Question	One answer	Another answer
Where does Aframax start?	80,000 dwt (US EIA)	About 90,000 dwt (Baltic Exchange guide)
What is the 80,000 to 160,000 bracket called?	LR2, on the AFRA scale	Aframax up to 120,000 and Suezmax above it, in the market
How big is a Suezmax?	About 120,000 to 160,000 dwt (Baltic Exchange guide)	Up to about 200,000 dwt in wider market usage, which this site's tanker table follows
How big a ship fits the Suez Canal?	240,000 dwt loaded (Suez Canal Authority)	The class name implies about 160,000

None of these is an error. Each source draws the line for its own purpose: a rate scale, a freight index or a canal's rule book. Our own tanker sizes table uses the wider market range for Suezmax, up to about 200,000. When an enquiry says Aframax or Suezmax, read it as a cargo size and a set of port limits, and check the ship's real deadweight, length, beam and draught against them.

The canal limit is also not one number. The Suez Canal Authority's rules tie the permitted draught to the ship's beam, and the authority has deepened the canal more than once. Check the current rules before a transit, not the class name.

References

Baltic Exchange, Guide to Modern Shipping: Main Types of Vessels, read 12 October 2026. balticexchange.com
Baltic Exchange, Tanker market information: dirty routes and sale and purchase benchmarks, read 12 October 2026. balticexchange.com
Baltic Exchange, Guide to Modern Shipping: Tanker Chartering, read 12 October 2026. balticexchange.com
US Energy Information Administration, Oil tanker sizes range from general purpose to ultra-large crude carriers on AFRA scale, 16 September 2014. eia.gov
Suez Canal Authority, Canal Characteristics, read 12 October 2026. suezcanal.gov.eg
Suez Canal Authority, Rules of Navigation. suezcanal.gov.eg

Tanker sizesHandy to ULCC: where the tanker size bands sit, and why the coating and the last three cargoes decide suitability, not the deadweight. Worldscale explainedWS 92.5 is a percentage of a published rate for one specific voyage. What the flat rate is, and why the same number means different money on different routes. Tanker cargo operationsThe cargo is pumped, the ship must be approved before it is fixed, and two parties who disagree measure the quantity twice. Dry bulk vessel sizesHandysize to Capesize: where the deadweight bands sit, why their edges are trade habits, and how many ships fall in each.

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