Chokepoints · overview

Chokepoints dashboard

How trade and energy chokepoints affect the global economy — source-linked indicators across the Strait of Hormuz, the Red Sea / Suez corridor, and other passages: crude benchmarks, oil-transit volumes, and transit-disruption snapshots. Partial coverage, not real-time, not a causal model.

Warconomy tracks the economic impact of trade and energy chokepoints through source-linked, manually maintained static indicators across several subjects: the Strait of Hormuz (a crude-oil benchmark), the Red Sea / Suez corridor (transit-disruption snapshots), and — added with EIA Short-Term Energy Outlook oil-transit volumes and Panama Canal Authority traffic — Bab el-Mandeb, the Strait of Malacca, the Panama Canal, and the Turkish and Danish Straits. This dashboard summarizes those indicators and their review status in one place. Coverage is partial and not real-time; the EIA oil-transit figures are dated quarterly snapshots (1H2025) and the Red Sea figures are dated historical snapshots; benchmarks are tracked alongside risk, not as a causal attribution; and remaining rows are clearly labeled sample placeholders.

  • 15 live/source-linked chokepoint indicators across 7 topics and 8 public sources.
  • 2 sample rows remain clearly labeled placeholders pending source-linked replacement.
  • Review status: 3 current · 0 due soon · 5 overdue · 7 stale (12 high-priority, mostly dated Red Sea snapshots).

How to read this dashboard

  • At a glance counts how many indicators are live/source-linked versus labeled sample, across how many topics and sources.
  • Key indicators are source-linked values; each carries an as-of date and the source it came from — some are dated snapshots, not current readings.
  • Sample rows are illustrative placeholders, not measured values — never cite them as data.
  • Review status flags values due for a manual re-check against their source cadence. Stale means re-check recommended, not wrong.
  • Benchmarks are tracked alongside chokepoint risk — an association, not a causal attribution to any single event.

Chokepoint coverage at a glance

Chokepoint topics7
Live indicators15
Sample rows2
Public sources8
High-priority reviews12
Newest live asOfMay 31, 2026

Counts are computed statically from the fixtures as of . Partial coverage, manually maintained, not real-time.

Chokepoint topics

Source-linked chokepoint subjects. Each links to its detailed economic-impact page.

TopicLiveSampleSourcesReviewTop indicators
Economic impact of the Strait of Hormuz112currentBrent crude price
Economic impact of Red Sea shipping disruption214stale — review overdueSuez Canal transit change, Suez Canal container-ship transit change
Economic impact of the Panama Canal402stale — review overduePanama Canal vessel transits, Panama Canal toll revenue, Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit
Economic impact of the Strait of Malacca201stale — review overdueChokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit, Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit
Economic impact of the Bab el-Mandeb Strait201stale — review overdueChokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit, Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit
Economic impact of the Turkish Straits201stale — review overdueChokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit, Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit
Economic impact of the Danish Straits201stale — review overdueChokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit, Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit

Key chokepoint indicators

Every value is source-linked and manually maintained from a cited public source. The EIA oil-transit figures are dated quarterly snapshots (1H2025) and the Red Sea transit figures are dated historical snapshots; the Brent benchmark is tracked alongside risk, not as a causal attribution.

IndicatorValueAs ofSourceConfidence
Brent crude price107.14 USD/bbllive · source-linkedMay 31, 2026U.S. Energy Information AdministrationMedium
Suez Canal transit change-42 % vs. peaklive · source-linkedFebruary 22, 2024UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD)Medium
Suez Canal container-ship transit change-67 % vs. baselinelive · source-linkedFebruary 22, 2024UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD)Medium
Panama Canal vessel transits9,944 transitslive · source-linkedSeptember 30, 2025Panama Canal Authority (Autoridad del Canal de Panamá)High
Panama Canal toll revenue4.99 USD billion (balboas, 1:1 USD)live · source-linkedSeptember 30, 2025Panama Canal Authority (Autoridad del Canal de Panamá)High
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit2.4 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedJune 30, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit2.8 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedMarch 31, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit22.8 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedJune 30, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit21.7 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedMarch 31, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit4.3 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedJune 30, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit3.7 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedMarch 31, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit3.7 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedJune 30, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit3.6 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedMarch 31, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit4.7 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedJune 30, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh
Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit4.8 million bbl/daylive · source-linkedMarch 31, 2025U.S. Energy Information AdministrationHigh

Sample rows (pending replacement)

Sample rows are illustrative placeholders, not measured or current values, and must not be cited as data. They are pending source-linked replacement.

IndicatorValueAs ofSourceConfidence
Hormuz oil & condensate transit20 million bbl/daysampleMay 1, 2026U.S. Energy Information AdministrationMedium
Asia–Europe container freight3,200 USD/FEUsampleMay 1, 2026UNCTADLow

Key economic channels

Energy benchmark channel

Perceived transit risk at oil chokepoints is tracked alongside crude benchmark prices (EIA Brent). An energy benchmark that may reflect many factors — not a causal attribution to any single event.

Shipping transit channel

Vessel and container-ship transits through the Suez Canal fall when carriers divert; UNCTAD reported sharp declines during the acute Red Sea phase (dated snapshots).

Route diversion channel

Reduced transits are associated with diversions around the Cape of Good Hope, lengthening voyages and tightening effective vessel capacity.

Freight & delivery-time channel

Longer routes are associated with higher freight rates, more fuel use, and longer lead times. The freight row here is a sample placeholder pending a clean source-linked value.

Canal revenue & trade-flow channel

Suez transit counts, tonnage, and canal revenue move with traffic; these measures are not interchangeable and are reported over different windows.

Review status & maintenance

Of 15 chokepoint live indicators: 3 current, 0 due for review soon, 5 overdue, and 7 stale. Stale means a manual re-check is recommended before citing as current context — not that the value is wrong. The Red Sea rows are dated acute-phase snapshots and read stale by design.

  • Suez Canal transit change stale — review recommended, review by August 20, 2024.
  • Suez Canal container-ship transit change stale — review recommended, review by August 20, 2024.
  • Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit stale — review recommended, review by September 27, 2025.
  • Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit stale — review recommended, review by September 27, 2025.
  • Chokepoint oil & petroleum liquids transit stale — review recommended, review by September 27, 2025.

For category-level maintenance, see the chokepoints review queue and data coverage.

What live monitoring would require (and why we don’t claim it)

This dashboard is not a live shipping tracker, not a live AIS feed, and not a live closure monitor— it shows no vessel positions and no live open/closed status. A delayed maritime layer (vessel density, tanker/LNG transit counts, or official transit/revenue indicators) could be added later only if a source’s terms permit publishing a dated, re-verifiable value — and live AIS can be spoofed or switched off, especially by shadow-fleet vessels, so any derived figure would carry heavy caveats. The criteria, a cautious roadmap, and the rules for safely linking to third-party live maps (without embedding, scraping, or republishing them) are written up in the maritime data evaluation and the general live-data architecture note. For now, the safe default is to link to authoritative external maps and official statistics rather than ingest anything.

Limitations

  • Partial coverage — not a complete map of global chokepoints.
  • Not real-time and not a live shipping tracker; values are manually maintained static fixtures.
  • The Red Sea / Suez figures are dated historical snapshots; they can remain valid yet stale for current-context questions.
  • Shipping metrics are not interchangeable — price benchmark, vessel transits, container-ship transits, trade volume, freight rate, and canal revenue measure different things.
  • Price and transit linkages are associative; this is not a causal attribution model.

Frequently asked questions

How do chokepoints affect the economy?
Through energy benchmarks (e.g. Brent), shipping-transit disruption (Suez/Red Sea), route diversion, and freight costs. Warconomy tracks these with source-linked indicators.
Is this a live shipping tracker?
No — it is not real-time and not a live vessel tracker. The Red Sea figures are dated historical snapshots that read stale by design.
Are price moves attributed to chokepoint events?
No. Benchmarks are tracked alongside risk; linkages are associative, not a causal attribution.

How to cite this dashboard

Cite the Warconomy chokepoints dashboard (https://warconomy.com/chokepoints/dashboard) as a cross-topic summary of source-linked chokepoint indicators, reviewed as of June 5, 2026. For an individual value, cite its source-linked topic page and the underlying source listed in the source registry.

Related

Data needs / next source gates

Source-gated data we would add to this category once a citable public source exists — not asserted values.

  • Suez Canal transit refreshSuez Canal Authority / official transit statistics (refresh, medium risk)
  • Openly-citable Red Sea freight-rate indexA free, attributable index (e.g. a public UNCTAD figure) (new observation, high risk)

Full backlog: /data-needs.