Short answer: a free freight exchange or free load board in Europe usually means free registration, a limited free plan or a trial. Full access to shippers’ contact details is usually paid, and without registration you can at most post an ad.
This guide is for carriers anywhere in Europe who run tractor-trailers or rigid trucks on cross-border lanes, for example Brno to Lyon. Subscription prices, vetting and payment protection are covered separately in our freight exchange comparison.
How we checked: on 4 November 2026 we read the home pages, price lists and terms of Trans.eu, TIMOCOM, Cargopedia and transporty77, in English where one exists. We opened no accounts and bought no access, so all data is as of that date.
Free freight exchange: four meanings of “free”
“Free” on a freight exchange page can mean four different things. Each one has its own catch.
Free registration. You open the account at no cost, but access to offers comes with a subscription. What you get for free is the sign-up form, and you leave your company details in it.
Limited free plan. You use it with no time limit, but some features are off. Most often, other companies’ contact details are missing, so you see the offer but cannot call the shipper.
Trial. You get the full version for a few weeks, then you pay for access. Put the end date in your calendar and check whether access simply ends or turns into a paid plan.
Free ad board with a paid option. You post an ad without a fee or an account. You pay for faster access to contact details, and others see the details in your ad.
Freight exchange without registration: step by step
A search for a free freight exchange with no registration often leads to ad boards. One example is the Polish-language transporty77.pl, whose header calls it a “free freight exchange” (transporty77.pl, as of 4 November 2026).
You can post a load or a vehicle there “for free, without registration”. This is how it works in practice, according to the transporty77 terms (in Polish, as of 4 November 2026):
- You fill in a form and accept the terms. You open no account, but the site links the ad to the email address you used to post it.
- Your contact details become public. The terms say you give them voluntarily for public view, and search engines may index the ads.
- You wait for calls. Any registered and logged-in user sees the contact details of a free vehicle at no cost.
- You look for a load yourself. This no longer works without an account: a logged-in user sees a free load’s contact details at no cost 77 hours after the load is posted.
- You want the contact now. Paid access removes the delay, from PLN 30 gross per month, and starts only once the payment is booked.
- The ad expires. 7 days after its expiry date it moves to the archive and the contact details are no longer available. To renew it, you post a new ad.
Editing and deleting ads work from an account. Without registration you publish fast, but you have less control over the ad.
What does this mean for a carrier? Say your reefer unloads near Wrocław tomorrow morning and needs a load towards Milan.
The free contact for a load posted today appears only after more than three days. That is too late for tomorrow, so you pay or use another channel.
Free load board: what you get for nothing
Searching for a free load board? The table below covers the free start only: what each platform gives at no cost and what stays paid.
| Platform | Free | Stays paid | Source, as of 4 November 2026 |
|---|---|---|---|
| transporty77 | Posting without registration. Vehicle contacts after login, load contacts after 77 hours | Load contacts without delay | terms |
| Cargopedia | Free plan, “for occasional shippers and for carriers who want to test the site”: publish, search loads | Other users’ contact information | plans |
| TIMOCOM | Trial: “test it now for free” (UK page), up to 4 weeks of the full Marketplace (Polish page) | Access after the trial | timocom.pl |
| Trans.eu | “Free registration”. The page does not say what a free account includes | Subscription for the vehicle and load exchange | trans.eu |
The table is not a ranking. Subscription prices and what they depend on are in our freight exchange comparison: price list of 4 platforms.
Commission or subscription: an example in round numbers
A subscription is a flat fee for access to a platform, while a commission is a share of the freight rate that an intermediary keeps. All the freight exchange pages we read on 4 November 2026 describe a subscription or paid access, and none mentions a commission on the freight rate.
The platforms do not set rates either. TIMOCOM states on its Polish page that the parties agree the contract terms each time (timocom.pl, as of 4 November 2026), and the transporty77 terms say payments go directly between users.
An example shows the difference best. The numbers below are hypothetical and rounded. They describe no market rate and no platform’s price.
- Commission. A shipper pays a hypothetical EUR 1,000 for a trip from Poznań to Lyon. If the order goes through one intermediary who keeps EUR 100, you receive EUR 900.
- Two links. If that intermediary passes the order on and each keeps EUR 100, you are left with EUR 800. Every link takes from the same rate.
- Subscription. Assume a hypothetical EUR 100 per month. With 10 trips from that platform’s offers it comes to EUR 10 per trip, with 2 trips EUR 50.
The point is simple. You pay a commission on every trip, while a subscription spreads over more trips the more often you haul offers from that platform.
On a freight exchange you can also get both. You pay the subscription, and the offer was posted by a forwarder, so its margin is already in the rate.
When does the free option stop paying off? When the delay or the missing contacts regularly cost you loads on your regular lanes. Then compare the cost of paid access with the trips it would win you.
Risks and limits of a free account
A free option saves the subscription, but some of the work and risk moves to you. These limits follow from the pages we read.
- No contacts, or a delay. On Cargopedia’s Free plan you cannot see other users’ contact information, and on transporty77 a load contact waits 77 hours.
- Nobody vouches for the partner. The transporty77 administrator states that it cannot check how trustworthy users are and takes no part in their transactions or disputes.
- Payment is up to you. Money for carriage goes directly between the parties, so you set the payment term and any security yourself.
- Your details are visible. The phone number and email in an ad are public and may reach search engines, so expect calls from more than shippers.
- End of the trial. After the trial you lose the full version. Save the contacts you want to keep before it ends.
Vet a partner from a free ad in public registers before you accept the order. We go through it in how to vet a carrier before booking freight.
Free ways to find loads beyond freight exchanges
A freight exchange is one channel. Several others cost only time and contacts.
- Regular customers. Ask the shippers you already haul for about return trips and new lanes.
- Shippers along your lanes. Plants near your unloading point, for example around Lyon, are a natural source of a return load east.
- Shipper tenders. Some companies publish transport requests on their own websites.
- Other carriers. Companies with a similar fleet sometimes pass on trips they have no truck for.
Each of these channels is covered in more depth in how to find loads for a transport company. Return loads and empty kilometres are covered in backhaul loads and empty running.
No-commission orders that load in Poland
ONYX Transport Orders carry no ONYX commission on the freight rate. Every order loads in Poland. If your tractor-trailers often deliver into Poland or head west from it, that is one more source of loads next to the ones above.
See Transport Orders for carriers
What to check before you open a free account
Before you leave your company details in a free option, answer five questions:
- What you see without paying. Contact details straight away, with a delay or not at all.
- What happens after the trial. Whether access ends by itself or turns into a paid plan.
- Who sees your details. Whether the ad is public and whether search engines index it.
- How you leave. How you delete the ad and the account, and how long it takes. On transporty77 you ask for account deletion by email, and it happens within 30 days.
- Who posted the offer. A shipper or an intermediary, because that decides whether a margin is in the rate.
Vetting, contract periods and payment protection on each platform are covered in our freight exchange comparison.
This guide is for information only. The platform data comes from their official pages and terms, as of 4 November 2026.
