Day 30 comes and goes. Your supplier shrugs, your container is still at sea, and your Lagos customers want answers. I’ve handled more than 200 shipments from China to Nigeria. Calls like this land on my desk weekly. The panic is rarely about patience. It’s about cash flow, because stock stuck in transit is money you can’t touch. And don’t take a supplier’s first quote at face value. Here are the real numbers, pulled from my own shipment records.

Shipping Methods and Real Transit Times

The method you pick sets the clock. Here’s the 2025 reality:

  • Sea freight (FCL/LCL): 25 to 40 days on the water, plus 7 to 14 more for port handling and customs. Total: 32 to 54 days.
  • Air freight: 5 to 10 days door to door, customs included.
  • Express courier (DHL/FedEx/UPS): 3 to 7 days from a Shenzhen warehouse to a Lagos doorstep.

Those are base numbers. Now the part most suppliers skip: sea freight from Shanghai to Apapa Port in Lagos averages 30 to 35 days on a direct route. If your container transfers through Singapore or Colombo, add another 7 to 12 days. We tracked 142 shipments from Shenzhen to Lagos last year. Port to door, the average came out to 42 days for sea freight. That’s 12 days longer than the first quote most buyers hear. Build that buffer into your planning.

Sea Freight: Costs and Real-World Delays

About 85% of imports from China to Nigeria move by sea. For bulk goods, nothing else comes close on price. A full container load (FCL) follows these routes:

  • Shenzhen to Lagos (Apapa): 28 to 35 days sailing + 7 to 14 days at port.
  • Shanghai to Lagos (Tin Can Island): 30 to 38 days sailing + 7 to 14 days at port.
  • Guangzhou to Onne Port (Rivers State): 32 to 42 days sailing + 5 to 10 days at port.

A 20-foot container from Shenzhen to Lagos normally runs $2,200 to $3,800. Between August and November, peak season kicks in and rates jump to $4,500 to $5,500 as everyone stocks up for the holidays. Book early or pay the difference.

LCL (shared container) rates sit at $80 to $150 per cubic meter. Careful, though. Shared cargo often gets stuck at transshipment ports while forwarders consolidate it with other goods. One client of mine, an electronics retailer in Lagos, moved to FCL after three straight LCL shipments arrived an average of 18 days late. His cost per unit barely changed, but delivery predictability shot up 40%. To be frank, I now tell smaller buyers to treat LCL as a test-order tool only.

Air Freight: When Paying More Makes Sense

Air freight lands your goods in 5 to 10 days total. I recommend it for high-value or urgent items: electronics, fashion samples, medical gear, or the part that fixes a stalled production line. What you’ll pay:

  • Standard air freight (cargo hold): $5.50 to $9.00 per kg for shipments over 100 kg.
  • Express air freight: $8.00 to $14.00 per kg for priority handling.
  • Most forwarders enforce a 45 kg minimum.

The main airports are Murtala Muhammed (LOS) in Lagos and Nnamdi Azikiwe (ABV) in Abuja.

Let me run the numbers for you. Say you need 500 kg of phone accessories from Shenzhen to Lagos. Air freight at $7/kg costs $3,500. By sea, the same load would run roughly $400 to $600. A painful premium on paper. But if each accessory earns you a $15 profit and you’re holding 2,000 units, selling three weeks earlier makes the math work easily. Speed isn’t vanity here. It’s margin.