• Bunker consumption reported to the IMO fell 1.2% to 220.8 million mt in 2025
• Share of in-scope tonnage reporting fell to 89.7% from 91.0%
• Adjusted for coverage, implied demand of the in-scope fleet was flat at about 246.1 million mt, up 0.2% on 2024
• Implied oil demand slipped; biofuel use more than doubled

Implied bunker demand from the ships covered by the IMO's fuel reporting rules was flat at about 246 million mt in 2025, according to Ship & Bunker's analysis of the latest data from the IMO.

While the IMO requires every ship of 5,000 GT and above on international voyages to report its annual fuel consumption under MARPOL Annex VI, not all of them do.

The 30,526 ships that reported for 2025 made up 80.6% of the 37,854 the IMO estimated to be in scope, down from 82.1% a year earlier, according to the IMO Secretariat's latest annual report on its Data Collection System (DCS) to the Marine Environment Protection Committee (MEPC), document MEPC 85/6.

That was more than the 29,690 that reported for 2024, but the IMO's list of ships in scope grew faster, by 4.6% against 2.8%.

On a tonnage basis, typically a better measure for consumption indicators given that larger vessels burn more fuel, data was reported from 89.7% of in-scope gross tonnage, down from 91.0%.

In total 220,788,703 mt of bunker consumption was reported in 2025, down 1.2% from 223,370,487 mt in 2024.

Adjusted for reporting coverage on a tonnage basis, implied demand from the in-scope fleet, that being ships of 5,000 GT and above on international voyages, was all but flat at about 246.1 million mt, up from 245.5 million mt in 2024.

In 2019, the first reporting year, the same calculation gives 229.1 million mt, so implied demand is up 7.4% over six years, against 3.6% for the reported figures alone.

The IMO also notes that some of the ships missing from its data are in fact out of scope, such as those in domestic service only.

As for consumption levels overall, the IMO says rerouting away from the Red Sea and Suez Canal explains why consumption remains well above pre-2024 levels, while 2025 was still slightly below 2024.

Fuel Mix

What little growth there was in demand came from alternative fuels rather than oil.

Reported use of heavy fuel oil, light fuel oil, and diesel and gas oil fell 2.0% to 202.5 million mt, which on the same tonnage-based calculation puts implied oil demand at 225.8 million mt, down from 227.1 million mt.

Within that, reported diesel and gas oil use rose 13.3% and heavy fuel oil 1.8%, while light fuel oil fell 42.6%.

LNG use was flat at 15.0 million mt, or 6.8% of the total.

Biofuel use, reported under the IMO's "Others" category, more than doubled to 2.6 million mt, or 1.2% of reported fuel use.

Actual global bunker volumes will differ from the in-scope figure, as demand from ships below 5,000 GT, ships trading only domestically, and the fishing fleet falls outside the IMO's reporting rules and is not captured in the data.