Transport prices in Europe kept rising through 2026 even as the volume of goods being moved fell. The rise came from diesel, which jumped 26% in a single quarter and has been working its way into freight rates ever since, to the point that Spain rewrote the rules on passing fuel costs into transport prices and Portugal approved emergency fuel support for carriers.
This article goes through what happened to rates and costs this year, and what the new Spanish and Portuguese rules mean for carriers.
What happened to freight rates in 2026
The quarterly benchmark published by IRU, Upply and Transport Intelligence tracks what road transport costs across Europe, separating the prices agreed in regular contracts from the prices of one-off loads negotiated on the day.
In the first quarter of 2026, contract prices stood clearly above the previous year while one-off prices were still falling, the usual sign of a market with too many trucks for too little cargo. By the second quarter both were climbing, and compared with the first quarter one-off prices were rising almost twice as fast as contract prices, which means even loads with no contract behind them were being repriced upward within weeks.
Volumes moved in the opposite direction, with road freight across Europe's main markets falling 1.6% year on year in the second quarter. Corridors like Germany and France saw both falling volumes and sharply rising prices at the same time.
What happened to diesel
Prices usually rise when demand rises, so a market where rates climb against falling volumes needs a different explanation, and in 2026 it came from operating costs. Between the end of 2025 and the end of the first quarter of 2026, the average diesel price in the EU rose from €1.56 to €1.96 per litre, an increase of 26% in three months, according to the same benchmark data. France and Germany saw increases of 27% and 35% respectively between December and March. Behind the spike is the war in the Middle East and the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which made crude oil more expensive and dragged diesel prices up with it across Europe.
Fuel is one of the largest single costs of running a truck, so a jump of that size cannot be absorbed. Carriers raised their prices to clients where they could, and the increase drained cash reserves fastest at operators whose contracts had no way of adjusting the price when fuel moves, or one too slow to keep up with weekly changes. The driver shortage, with 13% of EU driver positions unfilled in 2025 according to IRU's annual survey, and rising tolls kept pushing operating costs in the same direction.
Diesel has come down from its spring peak, but the pressure has not gone. In the Q2 edition of the benchmark survey, nearly a third of respondents expected another substantial rate rise.
Spain and Portugal changed the rules
The fuel spike produced a legislative response on both sides of the border.
In Spain, the government changed the rules on transport contracts in April. When diesel moves 5% or more between the day a transport is agreed and the day it runs, the price now has to be adjusted to match, upward or downward, and that applies even if the contract says otherwise. Not applying the adjustment is now an offence under Spanish transport law.
In Portugal, the response came as direct support. A decree approved at the end of March gave licensed carriers back 10 cents per litre of gasóleo profissional on fuel bought between April and June, and a second one in June added a one-off payment per vehicle for goods transport operators, both managed by the IMT. Portuguese law already allowed transport prices to be revised when fuel costs change, which is part of why the new measures came as compensation instead of new contract rules.
On both sides of the border, the measures took part of the fuel shock off carriers, through contract rules in Spain and direct compensation in Portugal.
What this means if you run a small fleet
Diesel prices change weekly, and this year they moved 26% within a single quarter. Most transport prices are agreed for months or a year at a time. Until a price is renegotiated, the carrier pays the extra fuel out of its own margin, and whether a price still covers a trip depends on what that trip costs in fuel today, kilometre by kilometre, rather than on what it cost when the price was agreed.
Both Spain and Portugal give carriers legal ways to adjust prices when diesel moves. However, a carrier does not have to wait for any of that, or depend on external decisions. Getting its own side in order, with costs tracked and every route's numbers known, protects margin regardless of what the law or the client does.
A TMS keeps the kilometres, fuel and tolls of every trip in one place. When diesel jumps, that makes it possible to see within days which routes stopped covering their cost, instead of finding out at the end of the month, and it gives the carrier real numbers to take into the conversation with the client.
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