Double door shipping containers: cargo doors at both ends

What a double door container is

A standard container has two swing doors on one end, each about 4 ft wide, with lock bars and rubber seals. A double door container repeats that at the other end. The door openings are the same size as a standard box, about 7'8" wide by 7'5" tall on a standard height unit and 8'5" tall on a 40ft high cube. Inside width stays 7'8". Everything else, including the floor, the corner castings and the way it rides a truck, is the same as a normal container.

Some sellers call them tunnel containers, double-ended containers or dual-door containers. They are all the same thing.

Why people want one

No dead zone at the back. In a standard 40ft, the stuff at the far end is 39 ft from daylight and behind everything else. With doors at both ends, nothing is more than 20 ft from a door.

Drive-through. Park a riding mower, a UTV or a golf cart and drive it out the other end instead of reversing. The same goes for a container garage holding two vehicles nose to tail: each one has its own exit.

Two zones. Build a partition in the middle and you have two separate lockable rooms, say tools on one end and seed on the other, or a workshop in front and storage behind.

Airflow. Open both ends on a hot day and you get a breeze through the full length, which matters in a workshop or when you store anything that minds heat.

Loading from a dock and from the yard. Jobsites and small warehouses back a truck up to one end and walk crew in the other.

Sizes available

A 20ft double door is the usual pick for drive-through equipment storage. A 40ft high cube double door suits anyone splitting the box into two rooms or storing long material that gets loaded from one end and pulled from the other.

Availability and price

Shipping lines rarely order double door boxes for ocean freight, so almost none exist in the used market. The ones for sale were built new for the storage and modification trade and sold as one-trip containers. That means one-trip pricing plus something extra for the second set of doors. How much extra depends on local stock, so pick double doors in the quote request and we confirm in writing what it adds before you book.

Standard one-trip delivered estimates, before the double door premium:

• 20ft: $3,900 to $6,000
• 40ft standard: $5,200 to $7,500
• 40ft high cube: $5,500 to $8,000

Stock varies by region. Port cities and rail hubs usually have them; inland they can take longer to source. Pick double doors in the quote form and we tell you what is near you, what it costs delivered and how long it takes. The pricing page covers the other things that move the number.

If you want the function of double doors on a used box, a fabricator can cut a roll-up or a second set of swing doors into the far end of a cargo-worthy container. It is rarely cheaper than buying new with doors already on, but it can be the only route if nobody near you stocks them.

What to check and prep

• Clearance at both ends. Each door leaf swings about 4 ft. Leave at least that much clear at each end, more if you plan to drive through.
• Approach. The truck still needs a straight run of roughly 60 to 100 ft for a 20ft and 100 to 150 ft for a 40ft, about 12 ft wide, with nothing overhead. See how delivery works.
• Level pad. Two sets of doors means two sets of seals to keep true. A twisted container binds its doors, so get the pad level before the truck arrives. Our site prep guide covers gravel, timbers and blocks.
• Locks. Two sets of doors means two padlocks. Ask for a lock box on each end if the box sits somewhere remote.
• Orientation. Tell the driver which way you want each end facing; with two doors it matters twice.

A worked example

A landscaping company in Georgia keeps two zero-turn mowers and a stand-on spreader in a 20ft double door container at their yard. The crew drives in from the parking side in the evening and out the gate side in the morning, no reversing, no shuffling. They bought one-trip, estimate $3,900 to $6,000 plus the double door premium, and added a lock box at each end.

How it works in three steps

1. Pick double doors on the quote form. Add the size, your ZIP and what you will store.
2. We check who has one near you. Double door stock is thinner than standard, so we confirm availability and lead time before quoting.
3. One delivered price. Container, doors and tilt-bed delivery in a single number from a real person, usually within 1-2 business hours.

Other door layouts, including open side and roll-up, are compared in our door options guide.

One price, one contact

Everyone who handles your container, from the yard to the local tilt-bed driver, is vetted, insured and bonded, and we quote one all-in delivered price in writing that spells out what it includes. If supply is short near you, we say so instead of padding the number. You get one person to text from first question to drop-off, and no card is needed to get a price.