Shippers are facing a more expensive truckload market in 2026, but not because freight demand has rebounded. According to the latest quarterly U.S. Bank Freight Payment Index – Rates Edition, produced with DAT Freight & Analytics, pricing power is beginning to move back toward carriers largely because capacity is being managed more tightly.
Spot rates reached $2.01 per mile in February, up sharply from $1.65 in November 2025. Contract rates also rose, climbing to $2.12 per mile from $1.99 over the same period. The report said this marks a fourth straight month of increases in both spot and contract pricing.
Ken Adamo, chief of analytics at DAT Freight & Analytics, said the market in early 2026 is showing signs of rebalancing, with spot rates recovering modestly while contract rates have remained steadier. The sharper change, however, has taken place in the spot market.
After falling to $1.57 per mile in May 2025, spot linehaul rates rose by about 28% through February 2026, increasing by $0.44 from the low point. Contract pricing also moved higher, but much more gradually, rising roughly 6.5% over the same period from $1.99 to $2.12 per mile.
The turning point came in December 2025, when spot linehaul jumped from $1.65 to $1.91 per mile, a month-on-month increase of 15.76%. That rise coincided with a 14% increase in spot market activity. Contract linehaul also edged higher by just under 3%, suggesting that pricing momentum in transactional freight was beginning to influence negotiated contracts as well.
Darlene Laferriere, accounts payable analyst at Charles River Labs, said the report serves as a warning to both shippers and carriers because pricing power is shifting through capacity tightening, not stronger volumes. She said her company is working more closely with core carriers and stress-testing budgets as the contract premium continues to shrink.
The year-on-year figures underline how unusual the current setup is. Between March 2025 and February 2026, spot linehaul rose about 23.3% while contract linehaul increased around 5%. Yet volumes moved the other way, with spot volume down roughly 3.7% and contract volume down by about 22.1%.
That divergence points to the central theme of the report: rates are strengthening even though freight activity, particularly in contract freight, remains under pressure. The market appears to be tightening because carriers are protecting yield and becoming more selective, rather than because demand is surging.
One of the most important changes has been the rapid narrowing of the gap between contract and spot rates. A year ago, the premium for contract freight stood at around $0.39 per mile. By March 2026, that gap had shrunk to roughly $0.11, a compression of about $0.28. For shippers, that means less room to manoeuvre when balancing tender acceptance, routing guide compliance and fallback capacity.
Fuel costs were not the main driver of this shift. The report found that fuel increased only about 2.5% year on year, far below the increase in spot linehaul. That suggests the pressure is primarily related to linehaul pricing and constrained capacity, not fuel surcharges.
Industry commentary supports that view. Large truckload carriers have described demand as stable but unremarkable, while pointing to disciplined capacity management, selective freight acceptance and pricing focus as the main tightening mechanisms. In other words, the truckload market is repricing higher before any true demand-led recovery has taken shape.
