Guide to Trucking
Special Report
On top of that, renewed expansion in US manufacturing activity is generating industrial freight. The Purchasing Managers’ Indexes( PMIs) from S & P Global and the Institute for Supply Chain Management( ISM) have both been in positive territory for months.
That is raising expectations among the largest US LTL trucking companies.
In 2025, the combined revenue of the 25 largest US LTL providers dropped 1.7 % to $ 47.3 billion after a revised 3.6 % post-Yellow increase in 2024, according to SJ Consulting Group. Their combined revenue was $ 10.6 billion lower than in 2022, the peak year for LTL. Only eight of the Top 25 carriers raised revenue in 2025, led by Knight-Swift Transportation Holdings, which saw revenue jump 19.7 % after acquiring Dependable Highway Express( DHE) in 2024 and merging it last year with AAA Cooper Transportation( ACT).
Total US LTL revenue, including hundreds of much smaller operators, dropped 1.8 % to $ 51.8 billion, down from an all-time high of $ 58.7 billion in 2022.
Although total US LTL revenue is down from that 2022 peak, it is 23 % higher than the $ 42.1 billion in
LTL revenues settle above pre-pandemic levels
Annual US less-than-truckload( LTL) revenue, top 25 carriers vs. total market, in billions of USD
Billions of US dollars
60
50
40 L
30
20
10 L 2010 2015 2020 2025
Top 25 LTL Total LTL
Source: SJ Consulting Group © 2026 S & P Global
Knowing the score
New data tool could give LTL shippers pricing leverage
By William B. Cassidy
A system that grades less-than-truckload( LTL) carriers according to the efficiency of dock operations could help shippers negotiate better LTL rates with carriers. All it needs is shippers willing to share data, said Lance Healy, co-founder and CEO of FreightFacts.
“ We’ ve got the LTL carriers; we’ ve got 3PLs [ third-party logistics providers ],” Healy told the Journal of Commerce.“ We need to get more shippers to bring us to a mature value proposition.”
FreightFacts will offer incentives to lure more shippers to its platform, he said. Those incentives, including no-cost reports, were part of the June 9“ soft launch” of the platform, called Shipper Score.
“ We have users signing up now, and when we have enough companies, we’ ll do the full launch, hopefully by this fall,” Healy said.
Shipper Score is part of a larger trend toward more use of data in LTL that is spreading from 3PLs and carriers to shippers. Carriers, for example, increasingly use dimensioning equipment and are pushing for more use of electronic documents.
“ Carriers come to the negotiating table with data, and shippers generally don’ t have it.”
As the co-founder and former president of Banyan Technology, Healy has been involved for three decades with efforts to digitize and automate more LTL functions.
“ Carriers come to the negotiating table with data, and shippers generally don’ t have it,” he said.“ This could give shippers data and ammunition they need [ in contract negotiations ].”
Shippers have long used technology and periodic score cards to grade and rank LTL carriers. Shipper Score applies data-driven scoring to not only shippers, but the docks of their vendors and customers, probing inefficiencies that increase costs.
Shippers may not be keen to have their data dissected, but rising LTL costs could force their hand. Average all-inclusive pricing, as measured by the US long-distance LTL producer price index
32 Journal of Commerce | July 6, 2026 www. joc. com