Dry van spot linehaul averaged $2.32 per mile this week, minus fuel, down 2.4%, or $0.06 per mile, from the prior week. Rates ran 42.1%, or $0.68 per mile, year over year and held 30.0%, or $0.53 per mile, above the nine-year seasonal average of $1.78 per mile, near the top of the historical range.
All rates cited are linehaul only. They exclude fuel costs and surcharges unless otherwise noted.
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Bellwether states
The 10 dry van bellwether states posted a moves-weighted outbound rate of $3.04 per mile this week, down 1.7%, or $0.05 per mile, week over week and up 46.5%, or $0.97 per mile, year over year. The roster carried 35.4% of all U.S. state-outbound dry van loads, in line with its recent baseline near 35%.
Regional rate trends
| Dry Van — Top 10 Origins by Rate Per Mile · Week Ending July 31, 2026 | ||||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rank | Origin Region | Avg RPM | WoW % | YoY % |
| 1 | California | $2.68 | -2.4% | +43.6% |
| 2 | Ohio River | $2.56 | -2.0% | +41.5% |
| 3 | Southeast | $2.53 | -4.8% | +50.2% |
| 4 | Carolinas | $2.47 | -3.8% | +48.1% |
| 5 | Great Lakes | $2.46 | -2.4% | +37.6% |
| 6 | Lower Midwest | $2.42 | -1.6% | +40.8% |
| 7 | South Central | $2.38 | -4.8% | +43.4% |
| 8 | Lower Atlantic | $2.26 | -2.0% | +40.3% |
| 9 | Upper Atlantic | $2.12 | -1.7% | +30.5% |
| 10 | Florida-So Georgia | $1.75 | -7.7% | +44.7% |
The top 10 origins carried 87.7% of all U.S. outbound loads moved in the week. Lower Midwest held up best week over week at -1.6%, while every leading origin eased from the prior week as summer volumes softened.
Market conditions
Dry van load posts were down 3.6% week over week and up 18.6% year over year. Truck posts were down 12.5% week over week and down 27.8% year over year, so capacity pulled back faster than freight. The load-to-truck ratio rose to 10.93, up from 9.92 a week earlier and 6.64 a year ago, a direct read on how much capacity has left the market.
Spot vs. contract
Contract linehaul averaged $2.25 per mile this week against a spot rate of $2.32 per mile, leaving spot $0.07 per mile above contract. That inverted spread reflects how far spot has climbed. Contract held the premium for roughly 45 months, from March 2022 through November 2025, averaging $0.24 per mile and peaking at $0.43 per mile in November 2022, before the spread flipped in December 2025. Across 2022 through 2025, contract ran $0.22 per mile above spot, so today’s spot premium is a clear break from the recent norm.
Short-term outlook
The 35-day DAT Rate Forecast puts dry van spot at $2.29 per mile in early September, roughly $0.03 below this week’s $2.32. The uncertainty band spans about plus or minus $0.07 per mile, or 3.0% of the point forecast, the widest of the three equipment types this week, so treat the projection as a range rather than a fixed number. The end-of-forecast rate would still stand about $0.63 per mile above the $1.66 actual recorded near the same date a year earlier.
