The largest junks ever built were possibly those of Admiral Zheng He, for his expeditions in the Indian Ocean (1405 to 1433), although this is disputed as no contemporary records of the sizes of Zheng He's ships are known.
The largest of the junks were said to be over 400 feet long and 150 feet wide. (The Santa Maria, Columbus's largest ship, was a mere 90 by 30 feet and his crew numbered only 90.) Loaded with Chinese silk, porcelain, and lacquerware, the junks visited ports around the Indian Ocean.
At its peak, Zheng He's armada had 30,000 sailors and over 300 ships, including the legendary nine-masted Treasure Ship. Measuring 400 ft. long and 150 ft. wide, it was the largest junk built in history.
These junks were usually three-masted, and averaging between 200 and 800 tons in size, the largest ones having around 130 sailors, 130 traders and sometimes hundreds of passengers.
The size of Chinese treasure ship has been a subject of debate with the History of Ming recording the size of 44 zhang or 44.4 zhang, which has been interpreted by some as over 100 m (330 ft) in length, while others have stated that Zheng He's largest ship was about 70 m (230 ft) or less in length.
Size record
Seawise Giant was the longest ship ever constructed, at 458.45 m (1,504.1 ft), longer than the height of many of the world's tallest buildings, including the 451.9 m (1,483 ft) Petronas Towers.
Oil tankers
Originally smaller, jumboisation made Seawise Giant the largest ship ever by length, displacement (657,019 tonnes), and deadweight tonnage.
Boats were an important way of getting around in Ancient China. Wooden sailing ships, called junks, were used by merchants to carry goods along rivers and canals or by sea. They were also used by pirates, who stole from the merchant ships.
Similar junk sails were also adopted by other East Asian countries, most notably Japan where junks were used as merchant ships to trade goods with China and Southeast Asia.
Zheng He's nine-masted flagship measured about 400 feet long; for comparison, Christopher Columbus's Santa Maria measured just 85 feet.
An intact 12th-century junk was found on the bottom of the South China Sea in 1987. It took 20 years just to develop an excavation plan that preserved this priceless time capsule. The wreck of the Nanhai No.
Wyoming was an American wooden six-masted schooner built and completed in 1909 by the firm of Percy & Small in Bath, Maine. With a length of 450 ft (140 m) from jib-boom tip to spanker boom tip, Wyoming was the largest known wooden ship ever built.
The Zumwalt is the largest destroyer in the world, with a displacement of 15,995 metric tons. The Type 055 is slightly lighter at 12,000 to 13,000 metric tons. Unlike the American-made USS Zumwalt, which is focused on land attacks, the Type 055 is an amphibious assault ship, according to the SCMP.
Whereas, carracks were usually very large ships (often over 1000 tons), galleons were mostly under 500 tons.
Nagato survived the battle, retreating to Japan to be refitted for coastal defense. She also escaped serious damage from an Allied air attack in July of 1945 and was the only Japanese battleship to survive the war.
Naval aircraft attacked the port of Osaka, airfields, and, notably, sank Japanese escort carrier Shimane Maru and disabled the Kaiyō. Two escort ships and several smaller vessels were also sunk.
Of 177 destroyers, only five remained. The Imperial Japanese Navy lost 334 warships (out of 611 total vessels) and just over 300,000 men during the course of the war.
The Dukling is believed to be the last authentic junk boat left in Hong Kong's waters. Other junks exist but they are replicas.
Among the junk's most important characteristics is the massive rudder functioning as a centreboard. The hull of the junk is partitioned into vertical and horizontal compartments. This counts as an important innovation in naval design that significantly added to the ship's strength.
If one or two cabins are accidentally damaged in the course of navigation, seawater will not flood the other cabins and the vessel will remain afloat. The junks are made mainly of camphor, pine and fir timber, and assembled through use of traditional carpenters' tools.
While Titanic holds her own when it comes to length, the ship's width is substantially smaller than modern cruise ships. Titanic's length from one side to the other measured 92.5 feet. Modern cruise ships are typically around 120 feet today, which is about 22% bigger than Titanic.
Peary was a Liberty ship which gained fame during World War II for being built in a shorter time than any other such vessel.
As of 2023, Royal Caribbean's Wonder of the Seas is the largest cruise ship in the world. Launched in 2022, the Oasis-class vessel can accommodate up to 7,084 guests in 2,867 staterooms and carries as many as 2,204 crew members. While you may get lost on this ship, you'll never be bored.
The largest vessel ever made was the Seawise Giant which was 1,504 feet in length and had a gross tonnage of 260,941. As it's no longer in use, the longest ship currently in use in the world is the Ever Ace container ship at 1,312 feet.
An oil tanker known as the Seawise Giant (formerly Oppama, Happy Giant, Jahre Viking, Knock Nevis, and Mont) was one of the longest and heaviest ships ever built. The Seawise Giant was a ULCC supertanker that was decommissioned in 2009. The Seawise Giant was the largest, moving man-made object on the planet.