Port of Çanakkale

A ship passing through the Dardanelles has not called at Çanakkale. According to the Turkish Straits transit statistics published by the Ministry of Transport and Infrastructure, 44,468 vessels passed through the Çanakkale Strait in 2025. The Ministry’s 2025 vessel statistics list 566 calling vessels for the Çanakkale harbour master’s area that year. For service firms, telling these two groups apart is where the work starts.

Port profile

Çanakkale lies on the Anatolian shore of the Dardanelles (Çanakkale Boğazı), the strait that links the Aegean Sea with the Sea of Marmara. Together with the Bosphorus, it forms the Turkish Straits.

The town’s commercial port is the Port of Çanakkale at Kepez. It is operated by Çanakkale Liman İşletmesi San. ve Tic. A.Ş. and handles dry bulk, general cargo and liquid cargo. South of the strait’s Aegean entrance, at Ezine, is the port of the Akçansa cement company. The Karabiga facilities in Biga district, such as the İçdaş ports, are reported separately in the Ministry’s statistics. Port formalities fall under the Çanakkale Regional Harbour Master.

Strait traffic, port calls and anchorages

Strait traffic and port traffic are different things:

• Transit: the ship enters the strait and leaves it without stopping. This is not a port call. The Ministry’s transit statistics have a separate class for these ships: “non call in” vessels.
• Anchoring and port calls: the ship berths at the port in Kepez or stops at a designated anchorage. Cargo, supply and service needs arise on these ships.

The Turkish Straits Maritime Traffic Regulation, in force since 2019, lists the reasons a ship in transit may stop at a designated anchorage with VTS permission: crew change, agent contact, fuel and provisions, and repairs. This regulation and the annex to the Ports Regulation define these main anchorages around Çanakkale:

• Karanlık Liman: inside the strait, the emergency anchorage for all transiting ships.
• Anchorage No. 2: south of the strait’s Aegean entrance, for short stays, bunkering and waste delivery.
• Anchorage No. 3: also south of the Aegean entrance, for ships calling at Çanakkale’s coastal facilities.

Which service companies find work at Çanakkale?

• Ship chandlers: ships that stop at an anchorage for supplies, and ships calling at Kepez for cargo. See ship chandlers.
• Technical service and spare parts firms: ships that anchor because of a breakdown need fast support. See marine technical services.
• Ship agents: crew changes, agent contact and the formalities of ships that berth.
• Bunker suppliers and surveyors: ships at the bunkering anchorage, and the cargo handled at Kepez.

How does VesselCall monitor Çanakkale?

Outreach detects commercial vessels that enter the range. Every ship passing through the strait sails past Kepez, so even a small range around Çanakkale includes transit traffic, and shrinking the range does not reduce it. That is why we suggest 20 nm: the circle covers the port at Kepez, Karanlık Liman, anchorages No. 2 and No. 3 at the Aegean entrance and the Akçansa port. The anchorages at the Marmara end of the strait and the Karabiga facilities stay outside.

If you do not want e-mails to go to transiting ships, choose approval mode: you see every e-mail before it is sent and approve only the ones you want. The same vessel also never gets a second e-mail within 7 days, even if it calls at another Turkish port after passing the strait.

The Data package does not count a strait passage as a port call. A record opens when a ship anchors or berths, and arrival, departure and length of stay are written to it. The report therefore shows only ships that actually stopped. Records build up from the day monitoring starts.