Long Beach port and ships, live

The Index rates Los Angeles a large coastal harbour behind breakwaters. It lists container berths, ramps for roll-on, roll-off ships, dry bulk berths, liquid bulk berths, an oil terminal, general cargo berths and yards for major repairs there. It takes ships up to 400 m long, through a channel at least 16.1 m deep. A vessel traffic service watches the approaches.

• Long Beach1 km from the centreMedium-sized harbour
• Los Angeles6 km from the centreLarge harbour

In 24 hours of AIS recorded Oct 12 – 19, the map heard 262 different ships within 10 km of Long Beach, one of the best-covered harbours on the map.

• NGA’s World Port Index rates a harbour by its area, facilities and wharf space when it was last surveyed, not by its traffic, so a busy terminal can be rated small. Where it doesn’t know about a facility it says so, and only what it marks as there is listed here.
• AIS is heard by receivers on shore, so coverage follows where they are: ships far out at sea, or off coasts without one, don’t show. Warships and some others switch it off, and a ship’s type and destination are typed in by its crew.
• Harbours from NGA’s World Port Index (Pub. 150), downloaded on Oct 19, 2026. The major ports and chokepoints are the map’s own reference list.

How the layers work, where their data comes from and what they can’t tell you: Live ship tracker, Shipping chokepoints