NEWS & REPORTS

ATRI Report Shows Trucking Profitability Severely Squeezed by High Costs, Low Rates

Aug 12, 2025 | Reports

TRI has released the 2025 findings of its leading costs and performance benchmarking report, An Analysis of the Operational Costs of Trucking.

 

The industry’s average cost of operating a truck in 2024 was $2.260 per mile, a 0.4 percent decline compared with the previous year. However, when lower fuel costs are excluded, marginal costs rose 3.6 percent to $1.779 per mile – the highest costs ever recorded by ATRI for non-fuel operating costs.

 

Operating cost trends varied by line-item in 2024. Fuel as well as repair and maintenance expenses each declined from 2023 to 2024, and driver wages – the primary contributor to cost increases in the three years following the COVID-19 pandemic – rose by just 2.4 percent, half a percentage point less than inflation. Given the present trucking industry recession, carriers were particularly hard-hit by growing costs in several line-items, including truck and trailer payments (which rose by 8.3 percent to a record-high $0.390 per mile) and driver benefits costs (which rose 4.8 percent to $0.197 per mile).

 

Carrier profitability suffered across all industry sectors under these pressures, as the findings show in stark detail. Average operating margins were below 2 percent in every sector aside from LTL, and the truckload sector had an average operating margin of -2.3 percent. (Read More)

 

 

CLICK HERE TO DOWNLOAD THE FULL OPS COSTS REPORT

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