What does deadhead mean in trucking?

Deadhead, defined

In trucking, deadhead is any driving without a paying load. The most common kind is the run from where your last load delivered to where the next one picks up. Driving home empty at the end of a trip is deadhead. So is driving to a shop, a truck wash or a yard with an empty trailer, or bobtailing with no trailer at all.

The word comes from old transportation slang for a vehicle running without paying passengers or cargo. In trucking it shows up everywhere: deadhead miles, deadheading, deadhead to origin on a load board, and deadhead pay in some driver contracts. On load boards, the column often marked DH-O is the deadhead to origin, the empty miles from your search point to the pickup. Some boards also show DH-D, the deadhead from the delivery back to a point you choose.

A little deadhead is unavoidable. Almost every load needs some empty miles to reach it. The problem is when deadhead quietly grows, because each empty mile costs money and earns none.

What deadhead does to a load's real rate

Here's an EXAMPLE load: $1,300 for 500 loaded miles. Slide the empty miles to the pickup and watch the all-in rate drop. The broker pays the same; the truck just drives further to earn it.

This is why the rate on a posting, almost always per loaded mile, flatters the load. A $2.60-per-mile posting with 150 empty miles to reach it is really $2.00 a mile across everything the truck drives. If your cost per mile is $1.90, the load still pays, barely. If it's $2.10, the load loses money, even though the posted rate looked strong.

What deadhead miles actually cost

The out-of-pocket cost of a deadhead mile is at least fuel plus wear: the diesel price divided by your miles per gallon, plus your maintenance and tire cost per mile. At an EXAMPLE $4.00 a gallon and 6.5 mpg, fuel alone is about 62 cents a mile. Add 25 cents for maintenance and tires and each empty mile costs about 87 cents before anything else.

Then there's time. Empty miles use driving hours under the hours-of-service rules, and hours are limited. An hour spent deadheading is an hour not spent hauling a paying load. Fixed costs like the truck payment and insurance run either way, so they don't change because a mile is empty, but they do need loaded miles to pay for them. The deadhead miles cost calculator puts a dollar figure on both sides.

Is deadhead paid?

Usually not, at least not as a separate line. Brokers and shippers pay for moving the load from pickup to delivery. The miles you drive to get there are your cost, and they have to be covered inside the rate you agree to. That's why empty miles are a fair and common reason to counter: "I'm 120 miles out empty, so I need $1,650 to make this work."

There are exceptions. Some dedicated and contract arrangements pay for empty miles, or pay a weekly rate that covers them. Some company drivers are paid for empty miles as part of their per-mile wage, while others are paid less for them or not at all. For owner-operators running spot freight, assume the empty miles are on you and price accordingly.

Deadhead by equipment and freight type

How much deadhead a truck runs depends a lot on what it pulls. Dry vans have the largest pool of freight in most regions, so the next load is usually closer. Reefers do well in produce regions in season and can face long runs out of them later. Flatbeds follow construction and manufacturing, so some regions are busy and others quiet. Hotshots often run long empty miles between scattered loads in oilfield and rural areas. Specialized equipment like car haulers and tankers can have the longest empty runs of all.

That's why a deadhead figure that's fine for one carrier can be a warning sign for another. Compare your empty-mile share with your own past months, not with someone else's truck.

Why deadhead happens

• +Searching after delivery. By the time the trailer is empty, the best nearby loads are often gone.
• +Delivering into weak markets. Some areas receive far more freight than they ship. A strong load in can mean a long run out. See our guide to trucking zones.
• +Equipment mismatch. Specialized trailers have fewer loads in some regions, so the run to the next one is longer.
• +Home time. Getting home often means empty miles at the end of a trip.
• +Chasing rate alone. Taking the highest posted rate without checking what it costs to reach it.

How carriers keep deadhead down

• +Plan the reload before delivery. Search for the next load while the current one is still on the trailer.
• +Check outbound freight before booking in. Before you accept a load into an area, look at what moves out of it for your equipment.
• +Compare all-in rates. Judge every option on pay divided by loaded plus empty miles, not the posted rate.
• +Consider a short repositioning load. A cheap load toward a strong market can beat driving the same miles empty. See cheap loads to reposition.
• +Build repeat lanes. A dedicated lane or regular freight on a round trip cuts empty miles more than anything else.
• +Know when a hot load is worth the drive. A well-paid urgent load can justify extra empty miles. Our guide to hot loads covers when.

Track your empty-mile share each month: empty miles divided by total miles. It's one of the most useful numbers in a small trucking business, because it shows how well the loads fit together, not just how well each one paid.