[2][3] In 2017, it was ranked as 43rd busiest container port in the world and 8th in Europe, with a handled traffic of 3.85 million twenty-foot equivalent units (TEU).

In 1951, Gordon Parker, an agricultural merchant, bought the Felixstowe Dock & Railway Company, which at the time was handling only grain and coal.

[citation needed] On 21 August 2022, the first strike in thirty years occurred when about 1,900 Unite members walked out in a dispute over pay.

This allows Felixstowe to accommodate the world's latest generation of deep-draughted post-Panamax vessels and the much larger Maersk Triple E class, launched in 2013 and capable of carrying 18,000 TEUs.

In 2008, work began on the construction and reconfiguration of Felixstowe South terminal creating 1,300 m of quay served by 12 new ship-to-shore gantry cranes.

[15] As part of the Felixstowe South development, Hutchison Ports will provide financial support intended to increase capacity at the Copdock interchange (J55) between the A14 and the A12.

[19] Coverage of the industrial action revealed that some Felixstowe dockers relied on the support of food banks and were struggling to make mortgage payments.

[21] In a press statement, General Secretary of Unite, Sharon Graham said:[22] The bottom line is this is an extremely wealthy company that can fully afford to give its workers a pay rise.

Instead it chose to give bonanza pay outs to shareholders touching £100 million.On 24 August footage and photographs recorded a port worker carrying a Unite the Union flag surfed in front of an Evergreen Marine Corp container ship.