The true cost of running a truck just hit a record — here's why that matters to shippers
There's a number that every shipper should know right now, even if they've never thought much about carrier economics before: $2.336 per mile. That's what it costs, on average, to operate a truck in the United States today. It's the highest figure ever recorded — and it's still climbing.
The American Transportation Research Institute released its 2026 Analysis of the Operational Costs of Trucking this month, and the findings explain something that has puzzled many shippers: why freight rates remain historically elevated even after the freight recession, even through the July lull, even as demand has been uneven. The answer isn't complicated. The cost floor underneath every load has been rising steadily for years — and it just set a new all-time record.
Understanding what's driving that cost record, and what it means for the freight you move, is one of the most useful things a shipper can know heading into the second half of 2026.
What the ATRI report actually found
ATRI's annual Operational Costs of Trucking report is the most comprehensive benchmarking study in the industry. The 2026 edition — covering 182,248 trucks and 14.67 billion miles traveled in 2025 — found that costs rose across every single major category last year. Not most categories. Every one.
$2.336
Average cost per mile to operate a truck in 2025 — the highest in ATRI report history, up 3.4% from $2.260 in 2024
$1.854
Cost per mile excluding fuel — up 4.2%, meaning non-fuel costs are rising even faster than total costs
The 3.4% overall increase looks modest in isolation. But at ATRI's average of 85,991 miles per truck annually, that 7.6 cent per-mile increase adds up to roughly $6,535 more per truck per year. Multiply that across a fleet of 50 trucks and you're looking at over $325,000 in additional annual operating costs — before a single additional mile is driven or a single new load is taken.
The cost increases that jumped most sharply tell an important story about where the structural pressure is coming from.
Tolls
+13.2%
The single largest percentage increase — driven by new toll infrastructure and rate increases on major freight corridors
Repair & Maintenance
+8.6%
Rising parts costs and aging fleets — average truck age increased as carriers delayed new equipment purchases
Driver Benefits
+6.6%
Health insurance and retirement costs rising faster than base pay, compressing carrier margins on labor
Tires
+6.4%
Supply chain inflation in rubber and manufacturing flowing through to one of trucking's largest consumable costs
The detail most coverage missed
Only two cost line items rose at sub-inflationary rates in 2025: fuel and, for the second consecutive year, driver pay. Carriers are holding the line on driver wages even as every other cost climbs — a dynamic that has long-term implications for driver supply, carrier stability, and ultimately the availability of trucks when shippers need them most.
What carriers did in response — and what it cost the market
Faced with record operating costs and freight rates that didn't keep pace during 2025's prolonged downturn, carriers didn't sit still. They made significant, deliberate cuts — and those cuts are now reshaping the capacity picture heading into peak season.
-2.4%
Truck count reduction in 2025 — the largest capacity cut since the freight recession began in 2022
10%
Average share of trucks sitting unseated — equipment that exists but has no driver to move it
-7.8%
Reduction in non-driver staffing — dispatchers, safety personnel, and back-office roles cut to reduce overhead
Carriers also ran older trucks longer, increased annual mileage on existing equipment, and elevated deadhead miles — all signals of an industry squeezing every efficiency it can find out of an asset base it stopped expanding. Large fleets with more than 1,000 trucks actually increased procurement spending by 16.1%, suggesting the biggest carriers are positioning for recovery. Smaller fleets spent less, delaying replacement purchases and extending the life of aging equipment.
Despite all of it — the capacity cuts, the staffing reductions, the deferred maintenance trade-offs — profitability remained poor across most of the industry. Truckload and refrigerated carriers saw operating margins improve slightly but stay below 1.0%. Flatbed carriers averaged an operating loss of -0.5%. Only LTL carriers and the very largest fleets maintained healthy margins, and even those were flat year over year.
"A stronger rate sheet does not automatically produce a stronger bottom line when operating costs are rising at the same time. Carriers aren't raising rates to get rich. They're raising rates to survive."
Why this is a shipper problem, not just a carrier problem
It's tempting to view carrier cost data as a trucking industry concern — interesting for carriers, irrelevant for the businesses that hire them. That misreads how freight markets actually work.
Every dollar of structural cost increase that carriers can't absorb eventually reaches shippers. The mechanism is straightforward: when carriers can't cover their costs at prevailing rates, they stop accepting loads at those rates. They reject tenders. They exit unprofitable lanes. They shrink their fleets. And as capacity exits the market, the remaining carriers have more pricing power — which is precisely the dynamic driving the 50%-above-year-ago truckload rates shippers are paying right now.
The ATRI data makes the math visible. A carrier with $2.336 in average cost per mile — across all miles, including empty repositioning moves — needs approximately $2.80 per loaded mile just to break even once deadhead is factored in. A load offering $2.50 per mile may look acceptable on a load board. Run the full trip math and it loses money. That's why tender rejection rates, while easing from their July peak of 17.65%, remain at 14.1% — more than three times the 4.75% baseline from one year ago.
And July's diesel surge — from $4.67 per gallon on June 29 to $5.31 on July 27 — added a new compounding variable on top of the structural cost baseline. Linehaul costs and fuel surcharges are both moving upward simultaneously, hitting shippers' per-shipment costs from two directions at once.
What this means for 2026 and beyond
ATRI's first-quarter 2026 data shows most 2025 cost trends continuing. There is no sign that the structural cost pressures on carriers are reversing — which means the elevated rate environment shippers are navigating today is not a temporary anomaly. It reflects a genuine reset in what it costs to move freight across the United States.
The supply side of that equation is also worth watching closely. Carriers that cut capacity in 2025 — reducing truck counts, leaving equipment unseated, deferring new purchases — don't rebuild overnight. Even as freight rates recover and margin pressure eases, the trucks that left the market take time to return. New equipment orders take months to fulfill. Drivers who left the industry don't come back immediately. The capacity that was removed during the freight recession won't snap back at the same pace demand is now recovering.
That structural lag between demand recovery and capacity recovery is one of the most important dynamics shaping the freight market heading into Q4 2026 — and it's rooted directly in the cost pressures the ATRI report documents.
What shippers should do with this information
Many shippers are still measuring current freight spend against last year's contract rates — a baseline that no longer reflects market reality. With operating costs at record highs and structural capacity removed from the market, 2024 rates are not coming back. Budgeting and planning that assumes a return to those levels will produce consistent surprises throughout the back half of 2026.
A rate that looks competitive on a load board may not cover a carrier's fully-loaded cost once deadhead, fuel surcharges, and tolls are factored in. On lanes where you're seeing unusual rejection rates or service inconsistency, the problem is often a rate that doesn't pencil out for the carrier. Understanding cost economics on your specific lanes helps diagnose service problems before they escalate.
In a market where carriers are operating on thin margins and capacity has been deliberately reduced, committed contract relationships get serviced first. Shippers who rely heavily on spot market sourcing are most exposed when capacity tightens — and with tender rejections at 14.1%, that tightness is already here. Shifting freight toward carriers you have ongoing relationships with, even at a modest rate premium, reduces service risk significantly.
Diesel's jump from $4.67 to $5.31 in a single month is a direct input into both fuel surcharges and carrier operating costs. Fuel is the one major cost category that can move quickly in either direction, and it's currently moving the wrong way. Shippers with large fuel surcharge exposure should model Q3 transportation costs at multiple diesel price scenarios rather than assuming current levels hold.
With operating margins below 1.0% for most truckload carriers and flatbed carriers running at an average loss, carrier financial stability is a real operational risk. A carrier that can't cover its costs today may not be available to service your freight next quarter. Understanding the financial health of your key carriers — not just their safety scores and service records — is part of building a resilient logistics network.
The bottom line
The ATRI report isn't just a data release for trucking executives. It's a window into the structural economics that determine what it costs to move freight in America — and right now, those economics are telling a clear story. Costs are at record highs. Capacity has been cut. Margins are thin. And the rate environment shippers are navigating reflects those realities, not a temporary market spike.
The shippers who understand carrier economics are the ones who build better logistics strategies — because they're not surprised when rates hold elevated, and they know how to structure carrier relationships that deliver service when the market gets tight. At Joyner, we work with carriers and shippers every day, and we understand both sides of this equation. That's the kind of perspective we're here to bring.