Guide · June 23, 2026
One fills a trailer; one shares it. Picking the wrong one means paying for space you don't use — or handling you didn't want.
FTL and LTL are the two basic ways to move palletized freight over the road, and the choice comes down to how much you're shipping and how much handling it can tolerate. Here's the difference and how to decide.
FTL — full truckload — means your freight takes a whole trailer, whether or not it physically fills it. The truck loads at your origin and drives to your destination without stopping to pick up or drop other shippers' freight. You're paying for the entire trailer, and in exchange your freight is touched once at load and once at unload.
LTL — less-than-truckload — means your freight shares the trailer with other shippers' loads. You pay for the space your pallets take, not the whole truck. Because the trailer is shared, your freight moves through carrier terminals and gets handled multiple times along the way as loads are sorted and combined.
| FTL | LTL | |
|---|---|---|
| You pay for | The whole trailer | Only your space |
| Handling | Loaded once, unloaded once | Re-handled at terminals |
| Speed | Direct — usually faster | Slower — multiple stops/sorts |
| Best for | Larger loads, fragile or time-critical freight | A few pallets, cost-sensitive freight |
For importers, the FTL/LTL decision usually comes after the container is unpacked. A box comes off the port (that's drayage), the freight is transloaded into domestic equipment, and from there it goes out — a full domestic trailer for a big consolidated load, or local box-truck and LTL runs for a few pallets to nearby stops. Matching the equipment to each leg is how you avoid paying full-trailer rates to move a half-empty one.
FTL (full truckload) dedicates an entire trailer to your freight and moves it directly; LTL (less-than-truckload) shares a trailer with other shippers, so you pay only for your space but the freight is handled more and routed through terminals.
For small shipments, LTL is usually cheaper because you only pay for the space you use. Once you're filling roughly half a trailer or more, FTL often costs less per unit and adds less handling.
Use FTL for larger loads, fragile or high-value freight that shouldn't be re-handled, and time-critical shipments that need a direct route.
Use LTL for a few pallets at a time when the freight travels well and isn't on a tight deadline, so you avoid paying for unused trailer space.