What is Container Sizes

 Intermodal containers exist in many types and a number of standardized sizes, but ninety percent of the global container fleet are so-called "dry freight" or "general purpose" containers – durable closed rectangular boxes, made of rust-retardant Corten steel; almost all 8 feet wide, and of either 20 or 40 feet standard length, as defined by International Organization for Standardization (ISO) standard 668:2020. The worldwide standard heights are 8 feet 6 in and 9 feet 6 in – the latter are known as High Cube or Hi-Cube (HC / HQ) containers.

Forty-eight-foot and fifty-three-foot containers have not yet been incorporated in the latest, 2020 edition of ISO 668.

𝐈𝐒𝐎 (𝐠𝐥𝐨𝐛𝐚𝐥) 𝐬𝐭𝐚𝐧𝐝𝐚𝐫𝐝 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐬
✱  20 foot Standard Container
✱  40 foot Standard Container
✱  40 foot High Cube
✱  45 foot High Cube

𝐂𝐨𝐦𝐦𝐨𝐧 𝐍𝐨𝐫𝐭𝐡 𝐀𝐦𝐞𝐫𝐢𝐜𝐚𝐧 𝐜𝐨𝐧𝐭𝐚𝐢𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐬
✱  48 foot High Cube
✱  53 foot High Cube

𝐄𝐱𝐭𝐞𝐫𝐧𝐚𝐥 𝐃𝐢𝐦𝐞𝐧𝐬𝐢𝐨𝐧𝐬
Length: 20 ft (19 ft 10.5 in), 40 ft (40 ft), 45 ft (45 ft), 48 ft (48 ft), 53 ft (53 ft)
Width: 20/40/45 ft (8 ft), 48/53 ft (8 ft 6 in)
Height: Standard (8 ft 6 in), High Cube (9 ft 6 in)

𝐔𝐍𝐂𝐎𝐌𝐌𝐎𝐍 𝐒𝐈𝐙𝐄𝐒
✱  European pallet wide (or 'PW') containers are minimally wider, and have shallow side corrugation, to offer just enough internal width, to allow common European Euro-pallets. The 45 ft pallet-wide high-cube container has gained particularly wide acceptance, as these containers can replace the 13.6 m (44 ft 7+3⁄8 in) swap bodies that are common for truck transport in Europe.
✱  Australian RACE containers are also slightly wider to optimize them for the use of Australia Standard Pallets, or are 41 ft long and 8 ft 2 in wide to be able to fit up to 40 pallets.
✱  In Japan's domestic freight rail transport, most of the containers are 12 ft long in order to fit Japan's unique standard pallet sizes.
✱  60 foot Container - In May 2017, Canadian Tire and Canadian Pacific Railway announced the deployment of the first 60-foot intermodal containers in North America. The containers allow Canadian Tire to increase the volume of goods shipped per container by 13%.

The ISO 668 standard has so far never standardized 10 ft (3 m) containers to be the same height as so-called "Standard-height", 8 ft 6 in (2.59 m), 20- and 40-foot containers. By the ISO standard, 10-foot (and previously included 5-ft and 61⁄2-ft boxes) are only of unnamed, 8-foot (2.44 m) height. But the industry makes 10-foot units more frequently of 8 ft 6 in (2.59 m) height,[88] to mix, match (and stack) better in a fleet of longer, 8'6" tall containers.