Freight Desk

Dock Door Throughput Calculator

See how many trucks your dock can turn in a shift — from door count, shift length, and how long a truck holds a door. Add a realistic efficiency factor, and pallets per truck to size the volume that moves.

How many trucks a door turns

Each door can turn a truck every dwell time — the span from spotting to release, unloading or loading, paperwork and all. Over a shift, that’s the shift length divided by dwell time. Multiply by your door count for the dock’s theoretical capacity.

Trucks per shift = doors × (shift hours × efficiency) ÷ dwell time

Why efficiency matters

No door runs flat out all shift. Trucks arrive in waves, drivers wait on paperwork, crews take breaks. A door efficiency of around 80–90% pulls the theoretical number back to something you’d actually see on the floor. Add pallets per truck and the tool scales trucks into the pallet volume moving across the dock.

Throughput bound by dwell time? Faster turns come from staging, better scheduling, and drop trailers — not always more doors.