Which narrow sea passages do the world's oil and trade squeeze through?
Besides Hormuz, a handful of narrow waterways, from a canal cut by hand to a strait called "the gate of grief", carry a startling share of what the world ships.
▶ Start the storyBesides the Strait of Hormuz, the world's oil and goods squeeze through a handful of other narrow passages: the Bab al-Mandab Strait at the southern end of the Red Sea, the Suez Canal, the Strait of Malacca in Southeast Asia, and the Panama Canal. Each is a place where a vast amount of shipping is funnelled through a gap that can be measured in kilometres or even metres.
Start with the route from the Gulf to Europe. Most Persian Gulf exports of petroleum and gas that go through the Suez Canal or the pass through both the Strait of Hormuz and the Bab al-Mandab. The Bab al-Mandab is just 26 kilometres wide at its narrowest, and its name is Arabic for "gate of grief", a nod to how dangerous the strait was to sail. The Suez Canal, which opened in 1869, took about 8,900 kilometres off the journey from the Arabian Sea to London; by 2021 about fifty ships a day used it, around 12 percent of global trade.
Step 1: Persian Gulf
Tankers load oil and gas
Step 2: Strait of Hormuz
The only sea exit from the Gulf
Step 3: Bab al-Mandab
26 km wide at its narrowest
Step 4: Suez Canal
Opened in 1869
Step 5: Mediterranean
On to Europe
In Asia, the Strait of Malacca between the Malay Peninsula and Sumatra links the Indian and Pacific oceans. It was the busiest strait in the world in 2008, with over 94,000 vessels a year, and as of 2024 more than 35 percent of oil flowed through it. At one point it is only 2.8 kilometres wide. The Panama Canal, meanwhile, is a man-made shortcut between the Atlantic and Pacific, and over 5 percent of world trade passes through it each year.
35%+
What makes them chokepoints is not just narrowness but a lack of easy detours. If the Bab al-Mandab were closed, tankers would have to go around the southern tip of Africa, adding and shipping costs. That is not hypothetical in 2026: according to Wikipedia, shipping through Hormuz has been largely blocked by Iran since 28 February 2026, when the United States and Israel launched an air war against Iran, and in September 2026 Yemen's Houthis launched an offensive to seize control of the Bab al-Mandab.
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Recap
A handful of narrow passages carry a huge share of world shipping, and ships can't easily go around them.
💡 A trick to remember it · Five doors on the sea: Hormuz out of the Gulf, Bab al-Mandab into the Red Sea, Suez to the Mediterranean, Malacca into Asia, Panama between oceans.
Surprising fact · As of 2024, more than 35 percent of seaborne oil flowed through the Strait of Malacca.
Sources (7)
No source, no claim. Every fact in this lesson (20 claims) cites at least one of these.