A ferry timetable packs a lot into a small table. Once you know what each column means, planning a crossing takes seconds.
Departure vs arrival time
The departure time is when the ferry leaves the origin port — boarding closes before this. Arrival is when it docks at the destination; on routes with intermediate stops, the listed duration may include time alongside other ports.
Crossing duration
High-speed catamarans can be two or three times faster than conventional ferries on the same route, but they cost more and are more weather-sensitive. If a route shows very different durations, you're usually looking at both vessel types.
Operating days — the detail people miss
Not every sailing runs every day. A timetable will mark whether a departure is daily, weekdays only, weekends, or seasonal. Always check the operating days for your travel date — a "first ferry at 07:00" may not run on a Sunday.
Seasonal schedules
Most operators publish a summer and a winter timetable, with far more sailings in peak season. A route that runs hourly in August might drop to a handful of crossings in January. Confirm the schedule for your actual dates rather than assuming year-round frequency.
Not every listed sailing is a direct one
Some operators print connections as if they were single journeys. OceanJet publishes a Connecting Trip block: Cebu at 05:10 or 13:00 to Tagbilaran, then 07:30 or 15:20 onward to Siquijor. There is no direct Cebu–Siquijor ferry — the timetable shows two legs that happen to be designed to meet.
A useful check: does the through fare equal the sum of the legs? Cebu–Surigao costs PHP 1,900, exactly Cebu–Maasin (1,100) plus Maasin–Surigao (800). Equal means it is a connection, not a product.
A circle route is not a shuttle
BC Ferries describes one service explicitly as a circle route: Chemainus → Penelakut → Thetis → Penelakut → Chemainus. Penelakut is therefore called at twice per circuit, and a sailing listed "Chemainus to Thetis" may stop somewhere first. Read the arrival time, not the map.
Odd departure minutes usually mean something
Halifax runs two harbour ferries that both take 12 minutes and both go every 15 — but Alderney leaves at :00, :15, :30, :45 and Woodside at :07, :22, :37, :52. The offset is deliberate: the two lines share a terminal, so their arrivals interleave. Times that look arbitrary on one timetable make sense when you put two side by side.
Check which days, not just which times
Halifax again: the Alderney ferry runs every day of the year except four named holidays; the Woodside ferry runs Monday to Friday only and does not sail at weekends at all. Same city, same operator, same 12-minute crossing — entirely different availability.
Unequal counts in each direction are normal
A route showing 69 sailings one way and 68 the other is not an error. Vessels position overnight at one end, so the first or last departure of the day exists in only one direction. Where the gap is large — 32 against 22 on Bowen Island — it usually reflects a commuter flow rather than a scheduling quirk.
"Until further notice" is not a date
Operators leave cancellation notices online long after the disruption ends. OceanJet still hosts a 2023 advisory saying Batangas–Calapan is cancelled until further notice — while the current timetable lists the route with four daily departures. The live timetable wins.
