Deadhead miles are the miles a truck travels without a paying load. Every carrier runs some deadhead. Repositioning after a delivery, moving toward the next pickup, or backhauling from a region with thin freight all happen from time to time, and a small amount is a normal part of trucking. The problem is not that deadhead exists. The problem is when it goes unmanaged and quietly becomes a bigger share of the week than it needs to be.

Deadhead is never actually free

An empty mile does not show up on a settlement as a loss. There is no line item that says "lost money here." That is exactly why it is so easy to underestimate: the truck simply looks like it is between loads, not like it is losing money. But every mile a truck runs, loaded or not, comes with real costs attached.

  • Fuel. An empty truck still burns fuel, and depending on equipment and route, it is not dramatically less than a loaded one.
  • Maintenance and wear. Tires, brakes and engine wear accumulate per mile, not per paying mile. A truck does not get a discount on wear and tear for running empty.
  • Driver time and hours of service. Deadhead miles consume drive time under HOS rules exactly the same way loaded miles do. Time spent driving empty is time that is not available to run a paying load later in the week.
  • Insurance and depreciation. Both are calculated, in part, on total mileage and time in operation, regardless of whether the trailer was loaded.

None of these costs pause because the trailer is empty. They accumulate exactly the same, while the revenue side of the equation stays at zero for that stretch of road.

How fast this adds up over a week

Take a truck averaging 15% deadhead over a 2,000-mile week. That is 300 empty miles, roughly the distance of an entire extra trip with no revenue attached. At a typical all-in cost per mile (fuel, maintenance, insurance and depreciation combined), those 300 miles are a real, calculable drain on the week's numbers, even before accounting for the paying freight that could have been run in that same time.

Now compare a truck running the same schedule at 8% deadhead instead of 15%. The difference is not cosmetic. It is capacity: miles that were previously wasted are now available for freight that pays. Over a month, that gap compounds into a meaningfully different bottom line, without the truck driving a single extra hour.

Why this hits car haulers and Amazon Relay carriers differently

Car hauling and power only freight, including Amazon Relay, are both more exposed to deadhead than general dry van freight, for different reasons.

Car haulers depend on return loads and regional freight density. A multi-car trailer that delivers into a market with weak outbound car hauling freight either runs empty back toward better freight, or waits, and both options cost money. The fix is not reactive: it is planning the return lane before the truck ever arrives at delivery, based on which markets consistently produce outbound car hauling freight and which do not.

Amazon Relay and other power only freight depend heavily on board availability at any given moment. When the Relay board is thin in a region, a truck that only works that one board sits empty or runs light. Carriers who blend the Relay board with other power only sources, so a slow stretch on one board does not translate into an empty truck, avoid a large share of the deadhead that hits single-source carriers.

In both cases, the deadhead risk is structural to the freight type, which means it needs to be planned around, not reacted to after the fact.

What actually reduces deadhead in practice

Reducing empty miles is not about accepting worse-paying freight just to avoid running empty. Cheap freight to fill a gap often costs more in fuel and time than it earns. Effective dispatch reduces deadhead by combining several factors at once, not by chasing any single one:

  • Load availability, checked across multiple boards and direct freight sources, not just one.
  • Market rate awareness, so a load is accepted because it is worth taking, not simply because it exists.
  • Driver hours, planned so the next load fits the remaining drive time without forcing a rushed, poorly matched booking.
  • Preferred lanes, built around regions and freight patterns that consistently produce backhauls, rather than one-off routing decided load by load.

The practical difference is planning the next load before the current one is delivered, not after. A truck that already has its next pickup confirmed before it drops the current load spends far less time sitting empty between the two.

Turning saved miles into growth

Every deadhead mile eliminated is not just a cost avoided, it is capacity returned to the operation. A truck running fewer empty miles per week can run more loaded miles in the same amount of drive time, which means more weekly gross without adding hours or equipment.

With the right dispatch support behind a truck, deadhead stops being an unavoidable cost of doing business and becomes a number that can be actively managed down, week over week. HRS builds car hauling and Amazon Relay dispatch specifically around this: matching load availability, rates, driver hours and lane patterns so trucks spend more miles hauling freight and fewer miles looking for it.

Related reading: Operate Under HRS's MC or Keep Your Own Authority | Professional Car Hauling Dispatch: $9,600 to $17,500+ a Week | Amazon Relay Power Only: Protect Your Rating | More on the HRS blog