Oil chokepoints: the world's critical shipping routes compared

Oil chokepoints are the narrow sea passages that a large share of the world's oil has to cross, and a handful of them carry most of it. Of the 79.8 million barrels a day traded by sea in the first half of 2025, 23.2 mb/d crossed the Strait of Malacca and 20.9 mb/d the Strait of Hormuz, according to the EIA. The Suez Canal and SUMED pipeline, Bab el-Mandeb, the Danish Straits, the Turkish Straits and the Panama Canal carried between 2 and 5 mb/d each. A disruption at any of them adds cost, time or both; a disruption at Hormuz removes supply that nothing else can replace.

2026 was the first year in which the system was tested at several points at once. Hormuz was effectively closed from 28 February; oil through it fell to 14.6 mb/d in the first quarter and much lower afterwards. Malacca's flows dropped by about 30% in the second quarter without any event inside the strait, because the Gulf barrels that feed it could not get out. And the Red Sea corridor, which had partly recovered, came under renewed Houthi pressure from July. This page compares the chokepoints side by side; each has its own entry.

Key numbers

EIA estimates of crude oil and petroleum liquids through each chokepoint, in million barrels per day.

Source: EIA, World Oil Transit Chokepoints, based on Vortexa tanker tracking and Panama Canal Authority data; Panama figures are fiscal years. Estimates differ by source: the IEA, using Kpler data, puts Hormuz at 19.9 mb/d for full-year 2025.

What flows through the oil chokepoints

The two giants are linked. Most of the crude that leaves the Gulf through Hormuz is bound for Asia and then passes Malacca, so the two figures overlap rather than add up. Hormuz is also the only chokepoint that carries a fifth of the world's LNG, almost all from Qatar. The Red Sea pair, Bab el-Mandeb in the south and Suez with SUMED in the north, link the Gulf and Asia to Europe; their volumes halved between 2023 and 2024 as ships diverted around the Cape of Good Hope. The Danish Straits carry Russian Baltic exports and North Sea trade; the Turkish Straits carry Russian and Kazakh crude from the Black Sea; Panama links the US Gulf Coast to Asia and the west coast of the Americas.

Who depends on them

Asia depends most, because it imports most. China, India, Japan and South Korea take the bulk of the crude that crosses Hormuz and Malacca. Europe depends on the Red Sea corridor for speed and on Norway and the Atlantic for volume. The United States is the least exposed of the large consumers: it imports only about 0.5 mb/d through Hormuz. See China's crude oil imports and India's crude oil imports.

Exporters depend on them just as much. Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar and the UAE ship most of their output through Hormuz, and only Saudi Arabia and the UAE have pipelines that bypass it. See Saudi Arabia's crude oil exports.

Alternatives and bypass routes

The chokepoints differ in one decisive way: whether a detour exists. Bab el-Mandeb and Suez have one, the Cape, at a cost of 10 to 14 days. Malacca has the Lombok and Sunda straits, at a cost of one to three days. Hormuz has only pipelines, with 3.5 to 5.5 mb/d of usable spare capacity for crude and none for LNG. That is why the same event, a closure, means higher freight at the first group and lost supply at Hormuz.

A further layer sits above all of them: war risk insurance. When the Joint War Committee lists an area, the cost of each transit rises before any ship is stopped.

Historical incidents

Assets and companies exposed

Tanker and LNG owners, container lines, refiners in Asia and Europe, Gulf national oil companies, the Suez Canal Authority and the marine insurance market in London are exposed across all of them, each through a different mix of volume, price and time. Each chokepoint entry lists its own exposed assets. This entry is descriptive: the encyclopedia does not publish recommendations.

What to watch

• EIA quarterly chokepoint data (Global Energy Security Data), now published for Hormuz, Malacca and Bab el-Mandeb.
• IMF PortWatch daily transit counts for each chokepoint.
• Joint War Committee listed areas and indicative war risk premiums.
• Freight rates on long routes (VLCC Gulf to China, Asia to Europe containers), the market's real-time price of disruption.

FAQ

What are the world's main oil chokepoints? By volume, the Strait of Malacca (23.2 mb/d in the first half of 2025) and the Strait of Hormuz (20.9 mb/d), followed by the Suez Canal and SUMED pipeline, Bab el-Mandeb, the Danish Straits, the Turkish Straits and the Panama Canal, according to the EIA. The Cape of Good Hope is a major route but not a chokepoint.

Which oil chokepoint is the most important? Hormuz, because of what has no alternative: about a fifth of world oil consumption and a fifth of LNG trade pass it, and bypass pipelines cover at most a quarter of the oil and none of the gas. Malacca carries slightly more oil but has alternative routes through Indonesia.

How much of the world's oil passes through chokepoints? Most seaborne oil crosses at least one. World maritime oil trade was 79.8 mb/d in the first half of 2025, and Malacca and Hormuz alone handled 44.1 mb/d, though much of that is the same oil crossing both.

What happened to the oil chokepoints in 2026? Hormuz was effectively closed from 28 February 2026, cutting Gulf exports and, indirectly, Malacca's flows. The Red Sea corridor came under renewed pressure in July and September with a Houthi embargo on Saudi shipping and the seizure of Perim island. With both routes out of Saudi Arabia impaired at once, the system had fewer workarounds than in any recent crisis.