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The total tonnage of goods handled by the eight main Irish ports was 12.9 million tonnes in Q1 2025.
Quarter 1 (Q1) 2025 saw the inclusion of Greenore, Co Louth as a main statistical port for the first time (See Statistician’s Comment below).
Total tonnes of goods handled by Irish ports in Q1 2025 increased by 7% when compared with Q1 2024 (See Statistician’s Comment below).
Goods forrwarded from Irish ports amounted to 4.0 million tonnes in Q1 2025, up 5% when compared with Q1 2024 (3,977 vs 3,805).
Goods received by Irish ports amounted to 9.0 million tonnes in Q1 2025, 8% higher than Q1 2024 (8,951 vs 8,295).
During Q1 2025, 2,557 vessels arrived in the main Irish ports compared with 2,488 in Q1 2024.
Dublin Port accounted for 1,478 (58%) of all vessel arrivals in Irish ports in Q1 2025.
| Tonnage of goods handled by main Irish ports, Quarter 1 2023-2025 | ||||
| '000 tonnes | ||||
| Category of goods | Q1 2023 | Q1 2024 | Q1 20251 | % Change Q1 2024-2025 |
| Liquid bulk | 2,729 | 2,601 | 2,709 | 4 |
| Dry bulk | 3,066 | 3,321 | 3,892 | 17 |
| Lift-on/lift-off | 1,945 | 2,057 | 2,236 | 9 |
| Roll-on/roll-off | 3,899 | 3,862 | 3,787 | -2 |
| Break bulk & other goods | 272 | 259 | 304 | 17 |
| Total2 | 11,912 | 12,100 | 12,928 | 7 |
| 1Please note Greenore port is included from Q1 2025. See background notes for further details. | ||||
| 2Figures may not sum due to rounding. | ||||
Figure 1 shows the tonnage of goods handled by Irish ports in Q1 2025. Total goods handled increased in four categories of which Liquid Bulk (+4%), Dry Bulk (+17%), Lift-on/Lift-off (+9%), and Break Bulk & Other Goods (+17%) compared with Q1 2024, while Roll-on/Roll-off Traffic fell by 2%.
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Statistician's Comment
The Central Statistics Office (CSO) has today (20 June 2025) published Statistics of Port Traffic results for Quarter 1 (Q1) 2025.
Commenting on the release, Damien Lenihan, Statistician in the Transport Division, said:
“In Q1 2025, the port of Greenore, Co Louth, met the criteria to be included as a main statistical port for the first time. It joins Bantry Bay, Cork, Drogheda, Dublin, Rosslare, Shannon Foynes, and Waterford, and increases the total number of main statistical ports in Ireland from seven to eight. This is the first time the number of statistical ports in Ireland has increased since this series began in Q1 2017. Users should be advised that this will affect comparability as the data in the Q1 2025 release is now based on eight ports whereas previous releases were based on seven ports.
Under international guidelines, main statistical ports are categorised as those ports that have exceeded handling 1 million tonnes of goods or 200,000 passengers each year for a consecutive three-year period. Further information can be found in the Background Notes of this release.
Overall Results
Irish ports handled 12.9 million tonnes of goods in January, February, and March (Q1) 2025. This was an increase of 7% compared with Q1 2024.
Goods forwarded from from Irish ports amounted to 4.0 million tonnes in Q1 2025, while 9.0 million tonnes of goods were received (See Table 1).
Vessel Analysis
In Q1 2025 2,557 vessels arrived in Irish ports compared with 2,488 in Q1 2024 (See Table 2).
Dublin Port accounted for 1,478 (58%) vessel arrivals in Irish ports and for 6,046 (47%) of the total tonnage of goods handled in Q1 2025 (See Tables 2 and 5 respectively).
Great Britain & Northern Ireland accounted for 3,794 (29%) of the total tonnage of goods handled in the main ports by region of trade in Q1 2025. EU countries accounted for 6,208 (48%) of the total tonnage of goods handled in the main ports (See Table 5).”