ContainerPulse Liner intelligence
Match the 4-letter prefix on any container to its operator in our liner registry of 200+ carriers.

OOCL

SCAC OOLU · Hong Kong · founded 1969 · Ocean Alliance

OOCL (legal entity Orient Overseas Container Line Limited) is a global mainline operator headquartered in Hong Kong. Founded in 1969, the line has spent 57 years building out its container service network and today operates a fleet of 105 vessels under the SCAC code OOLU. Total operated capacity stands near 855,000 TEU, placing the carrier among the recognised operators on its core trade lanes. The company holds intermodal equipment under 4 registered ISO 6346 owner prefixes, which appear on every box it owns or long-term leases.

OOCL is most active on the following corridors: Asia-Europe, Transpacific, Transatlantic. Through its membership of the Ocean Alliance, the carrier shares vessel capacity with CMA CGM, COSCO Shipping, Evergreen Marine on East-West services. Direct customer contact is available via +852 2833 3888 or the carrier's web portal at oocl.com.

OOCL container prefixes

Every intermodal container carries an ISO 6346 owner code — three letters identifying the owner, plus a single category letter (almost always U for freight containers). These four-letter prefixes are the fastest way to identify which carrier controls a given box. OOCL has the following registered prefixes recorded in the BIC database. If a container in your possession begins with any of these codes, the box is owned by or leased on long term to OOCL.

To track a container under one of these prefixes, contact the carrier directly using the bill-of-lading number or container number. Most ocean carriers expose a public tracking endpoint on their website that accepts either format. OOCL publishes its tracking page under the main oocl.com domain.

OOCL sample transit times

Indicative point-to-point transit times for services on which OOCL appears in rotation. Actual ETAs vary with vessel rotation, port congestion, weather and trans-shipment patterns. We update these figures every quarter against published carrier schedules.

OriginDestinationTransitFrequencyCorridor
Shanghai, China Piraeus, Greece 28 days Weekly Asia-Mediterranean
Jebel Ali, UAE Rotterdam, Netherlands 21 days Multiple weekly Middle-East-Europe
Melbourne, Australia Singapore 12 days Multiple weekly Oceania-Asia

How to track a OOCL container

Tracking a OOCL container starts with confirming the prefix. Look at the container's left-hand corner casting plate or the painted code on the door — the four-letter ISO 6346 owner code (e.g. OOLU) is followed by six numeric digits and a single check digit. If the prefix matches one in the list above, the box is on a OOCL bill of lading. Visit oocl.com, navigate to the carrier's tracking or "track and trace" portal, and paste the full container number. The portal will return current vessel position, the next scheduled port call, the estimated time of arrival (ETA) and the most recent equipment events such as gate-in, loaded, discharged and gate-out.

If the carrier portal does not return a result, the most likely causes are: the container has not yet been gate-in at the origin terminal, the bill of lading number is in a different format (check whether the system expects an MBL versus an HBL), or the box is moving on a partner alliance vessel rather than a OOCL hull. In the last case, the prefix still resolves to OOCL as equipment owner but the schedule data lives with the operating carrier. OOCL's customer service can normally cross-reference the booking and route you to the correct alliance partner. Reach the carrier on +852 2833 3888 during European business hours.

Related ocean carriers

Operators most often compared with OOCL on overlapping trade lanes: