Load factor is the share of a vehicle’s capacity actually taken up by goods: weight, volume or packages carried divided by maximum capacity, as a percentage. A 12-cubic-metre van that leaves with 4 cubic metres on board is a third full. It costs almost as much to run as a full one, but spreads that cost over fewer deliveries.
How it’s measured
The formula is simple; deciding what to measure isn’t. First, pick the dimension: light, bulky goods run out of volume first, drinks or building materials run out of weight, and deliveries in crates or totes run out of package slots. Then pick the moment. Load at departure and the average over the whole round give very different numbers, because a delivery vehicle empties stop by stop and often comes back empty.
Whole-trip averages are low: for diesel vans the GLEC framework uses a combined load and empty-running factor of 36%, as we note among the 7 KPIs every fleet manager should track. There’s no threshold that fits everyone; the useful comparison is against your own history.
Why it matters
A higher load factor means fewer vehicles and fewer trips for the same goods, and a lower cost per delivery. It affects emissions too: under the ISO 14083 and GLEC methodology emissions are reported per tonne-kilometre, so over the same distance a fuller vehicle has a lower emissions intensity.
It isn’t the same as fleet utilization rate, which measures how much vehicles work over time. Load factor measures how full they are while they work.
FAQ
Does a higher load factor mean loading more?
Not necessarily, because how much there is to carry depends on demand. The lever is assigning orders to vehicles so each one leaves as full as possible, and sending one fewer vehicle out when volumes allow. That’s the job of planning that weighs volume, weight, time windows and delivery zones together.
Can a vehicle be full at half its volume?
Yes, if it has already hit its weight limit. That’s why capacity is declared across several dimensions at once (weight, volume and packages) and the vehicle counts as full when the first of the three runs out. It’s how the OptivoRoute constraint library handles it.