The most striking thing about China's container trade in 2026 is how quiet it looks. After a year of tariff shocks, booking collapses, and pull-forward rushes, the weekly China to US line has settled into a calm rhythm. That calm is the story. The volatility ended, and the volume that left the lane during 2025 has stayed gone.

Vizion booking data across seven major China export lanes, covering week 1 through week 28 of both 2025 and 2026, shows where it went.

The US lane found a lower floor

The grey 2025 line tells the story of last year's whiplash. Bookings collapsed through April as tariff escalation hit, bottoming at 53,122 in week 18. Two weeks later, the tariff pause triggered a rush that sent weekly bookings to 227,510, the highest reading in the entire dataset.

The yellow 2026 line shows what came after. No collapse, no rush, just a steady band running between roughly 100,000 and 160,000 bookings a week. Through week 28, China to US bookings are down 7.8% year over year. Strip out the weeks distorted by the shifting Lunar New Year calendar and the decline still sits above 4%. The trade has stopped whipsawing and settled into a structurally smaller lane.

Southeast Asia is the destination

Four Southeast Asian lanes combined, Vietnam, Malaysia, Thailand, and Indonesia, are up 28.3% year to date at 1.68 million bookings, and the pace is accelerating: over the most recent nine weeks the composite runs 34% above the comparable 2025 period. This matches what Vizion sees on the import side, where Southeast Asia's share of US inbound bookings has climbed from 20% to 29% over two years. Two independent views of the same shift.

The lane by lane detail sharpens the picture. Malaysia leads at 39.3% growth year to date. Indonesia is up 27.4% and accelerating hardest, running 49% above last year over the most recent nine weeks. Thailand has grown a steady 25.1% in every window measured.

Vietnam, the lane that draws the most transshipment attention, tells a different story. It is up 22.7% year to date, which makes it the slowest growing of the four. Volume built rapidly through the first quarter, peaked at 23,140 bookings in week 13, and has faded 48% since. A first quarter peak is unusual when transpacific and Asia to Europe lanes typically build toward summer, and a March rush of Chinese inputs is consistent with shippers front loading routes while rules of origin enforcement tightens. Meanwhile the three lanes facing less scrutiny are still climbing. The rerouting appears to flow around the pressure.

Europe is absorbing more, and faster

China to Europe is the largest lane in the dataset at 4.19 million bookings year to date, and it is accelerating. Year to date growth stands at 8.3%, but over the most recent nine weeks the lane is running 12.4% above the comparable 2025 period, with 2026 volumes topping 200,000 bookings in week 22. Goods that once crossed the Pacific are increasingly landing in European ports, which aligns with the import pressure European trade officials have been flagging all year.

Mexico is the quiet underperformer

For all the attention nearshoring receives, China to Mexico is the slowest growing destination outside the US lane itself. Year to date growth of 8.2% trails every Southeast Asian lane by 14 points or more, and the most recent nine weeks have softened to 6.3% above last year. If Chinese inputs were flooding toward North American assembly at the pace the nearshoring narrative suggests, this lane would show it. It does not.

Seven lanes, one map

Put the seven lanes side by side and the map redraws itself. The US lane shrank 7.8%. Southeast Asia absorbed the fastest growth across four separate lanes. Europe absorbed the most volume. Mexico grew, but modestly.

Carrier level detail sharpens the picture further: one major carrier, now at the center of the year's biggest liner acquisition, grew its transpacific bookings nearly 30% into a declining trade. TradeView subscribers can see which one, and where the volume went.

Booking data leads vessel movements by weeks, which is why these shifts appear here before they show up in port throughput statistics. To see lane, carrier, and commodity level booking trends as they develop, request a TradeView demo below.