Is There A Boat Bigger Than The Titanic?

The Titanic is one of the most famous ships ever built, but many may wonder, are there any boats that are bigger than the Titanic?

The Titanic is well known for the tragic story of its sinking but at the time it was also an engineering marvel and the largest ship ever built, but have there ever been any ships large enough to take that record for itself?

In short, not only is there one ship bigger than the Titanic, there are many ships that are multiple times bigger than the Titanic was. In fact, even if the Titanic didn’t sink, it wouldn’t have been the largest ship in the world for long, as a larger ship was built just over a year later.

So if there really are ships bigger than the Titanic how big are they and how does the Titanic compare? In all reality, the Titanic has been absolutely obliterated by the passage of time when it comes to how it compares with modern ships. Modern container and tanker ships as well as warships and cruise ships are all much larger on average than even the largest ships back in the early 1900s so there is really no comparison between the two.

Still, knowing exactly how big the largest ships on the ocean are now, we can easily measure how the Titanic stacks up and see just how much bigger the current record holders are than the largest ships from just over 100 years ago.

‍How Big Was The Titanic?

Completed in 1912, the Titanic was the largest ship to ever be built. It was 882 feet and 9 inches long and measured 92 feet and 6 inches at its widest point. The Titanic is 175 feet tall from the bottom to the top of its smokestacks and it weighed an impressive 52,310 tons when fully loaded.

It was capable of carrying just under 2500 passengers along with almost 900 crew members, all of whom would be spread throughout the Titanic’s nine decks. It was an incredibly impressive ship that towered over all others of the time.

However, it's important to note that, though the Titanic was the largest ship ever built, at the time of its completion this record was being broken all the time. In fact, the Titanic was only a few inches longer and less than 250 tons heavier than the previous record holder, its sister ship, the RMS Olympic which was completed less than a year before. Not to mention that just over a year later the even bigger German SS Imperator would be built.

This was truly a time of rapid innovation in the shipbuilding industry and ships were constantly getting bigger and better. So now after 110 years of continued progress, how does the Titanic stand up against the largest ships in the world?

The World’s Largest Cruise Ship: Wonder Of The Seas

Since the Titanic was a passenger ship it feels only appropriate to start by comparing it to the largest modern passenger ship there is, Royal Caribbean's Wonder Of The Seas.

Finished in January 2022, Wonder of the Seas has an internal volume of a staggering 236,857 gross tons, passing up its sister ship, the Symphony of the Seas, by almost 9000 gross tons. For reference this is just over 5 times heavier than the Titanic. Wonder of the Seas is also about 305 feet longer than the Titanic was, at 1,188 feet long.

Wonder of the Seas can also carry almost three times the amount of people on board with a maximum capacity of 6,988 passengers and 2300 crew. Additionally, Wonder of the Seas is just over double the width of the Titanic at 210 feet at its widest point, and the ship features double the number of decks with 18, many more than the Titanic’s nine.

Overall, this cruise ship makes the Titanic look like a speed boat in comparison, and would be an absolute shock to see for anyone that was alive during the time of the Titanic. But Wonder of the Seas is just the world's largest passenger ship and there are plenty of other types of ships that are consistently bigger than the Titanic as well.

The World’s Largest Container Ship: Ever ACE

Container ships are consistently some of the largest ships out on the seas, and the Ever ACE is the biggest ever built. The Ever Ace is an absolute engineering marvel. It is 1,312 feet in length, making the Ever ACE 430 feet longer than the Titanic, and is 202 feet wide. Its internal volume is 235,579 gross tons and that's without any of the containers piled on it.

The capacity of container ships is measured in TEU, or Twenty foot equivalent units. This basically measures how many containers the ship can fit on it. The Ever Ace has an absolutely insane capacity of 23,992 TEUs which is the largest capacity of any container ship yet built. This container ship, along with most other modern container ships would absolutely tower over the Titanic is placed side to side.

The Longest Ship Ever Built: Seawise Giant

Though not nearly the biggest by gross tonnage, it's still worth mentioning the longest ship to ever be built. The Seawise was an oil tanker completed in 1979. It measured a mind boggling 1,504 feet long, a full 622 feet longer than the Titanic. It had a greater gross tonnage too at 260,941 gross tons, over 5 times more than the Titanic.

Though not nearly the largest ship ever built weighing in at 81,879 tons, just 30,000 tons more than the 110 year old Titanic, when the Seawise Giant was fully loaded with oil it weighed nearly 650,000 tons making it the heaviest self propelled ship ever.