20 Lists of World War II ships

This list of ships of the Second World War contains major military vessels of the war, arranged alphabetically and by type. The list includes armed vessels that served during the war and in the immediate aftermath, inclusive of localized ongoing combat operations, garrison surrenders, post-surrender occupation, colony re-occupation, troop and prisoner repatriation, to the end of 1945. For smaller vessels, see also list of World War II ships of less than 1000 tons. Some uncompleted Axis ships are included, out of historic interest. Ships are designated to the country under which they operated for the longest period of the Second World War, regardless of where they were built or previous service history.

This is a list of aircraft carriers of the Second World War.

This list of auxiliary vessels of Second World War contains major military vessels of the war, arranged alphabetically and by type. The list includes armed vessels that served during the war and in the immediate aftermath, inclusive of localized ongoing combat operations, garrison surrenders, post-surrender occupation, colony re-occupation, troop and prisoner repatriation, to the end of 1945. For smaller vessels see also list of World War II ships of less than 1000 tons. Some uncompleted Axis ships are included, out of historic interest. Ships are designated to the country under which they operated for the longest period of the Second World War, regardless of where they were built or previous service history.

This is a list of battlecruisers of World War II. A battlecruiser, or battle cruiser, was a capital ship built in the first half of the 20th century. They were similar in size, cost, and carried similar armament to battleships, but they generally carried less armour to obtain faster speeds. The first battlecruisers were designed in the United Kingdom, in the first decade of the century, as a development of the armoured cruiser, at the same time as the dreadnought succeeded the pre-dreadnought battleship. The original aim of the battlecruiser was to hunt down slower, older armoured cruisers and destroy them with heavy gunfire. However, as more and more battlecruisers were built, they increasingly became used alongside the better-protected battleships.

This is a list of battleships of the Second World War. All displacements are at standard load, in metric tonnes, so as to avoid confusion over their relative displacements. [Note: Not all displacements have been adjusted to match this yet]. Ideally displacements will be as they were at either the end of the war, or when the ship was sunk.

The Royal Canadian Navy expanded rapidly and substantially during the Second World War, with vessels transferred or purchased from the Royal Navy and US Navy, and the construction of many vessels in Canada, such as corvettes and frigates. The RCN ended the war with the third-largest naval fleet in the world, and an operational reach extending into the Atlantic, Pacific, Caribbean and Mediterranean. The List of Royal Canadian Navy ships of the Second World War lists over 1,140 surface warships, submarines and auxiliary vessels in service during the war. It includes all commissioned, non-commissioned, loaned or hired ships, and all ships crewed by RCN personnel, including 30 depot ships, under the command of the RCN.

The List of ship classes of World War II is an alphabetical list of all ship classes that served in World War II. Only actual classes are included as opposed to unique ships

Coastal defence ship is a catchall category for warships with overlapping characteristics and duties, grouped here for purposes of concision and comparison. They included ships variously called coastal defence ships, coastal battleships, German Küstenpanzerschiff, Kystforsvarsskib, Panserskip; the Dutch Kruiser, Pantserschip and Slagschip; and the Swedish 1:a klass Pansarbåt and Pansarskepp.

This is a list of corvettes of World War II.

The heavy cruiser was designed for long range, high speed, and heavy calibre naval guns. The first heavy cruisers were built in 1915, although it only became a widespread classification following the London Naval Treaty in 1930. The heavy cruiser's immediate precursors were the light cruiser designs of the 1910s and 1920s; the US 8-inch 'treaty cruisers' of the 1920s were originally classed as light cruisers until the London Treaty forced their redesignation. Heavy cruisers continued in use until after World War II.

This is a list of destroyers of the Second World War.

This is a list of frigates of World War II. The list includes frigate-class ships, such as US Navy "destroyer escorts", and British "escort destroyers" and sloops. Note that US Navy "escort destroyers", are destroyer-class vessels and found in that list.

This is a list of mine warfare vessels of World War II.

This is a list of minor warships of World War II. It contains minor combat vessels that are generally under 1,000 t standard displacement, and includes fast attack craft, submarine chasers, gunboats, missile boats, torpedo boats and patrol boats. It also contains similar vessels, over 1,000 t, such as patrol vessels or patrol ships.

A monitor is a class of relatively small warship that is lightly armoured, often provided with disproportionately large guns, and originally designed for coastal warfare. The term "monitor" grew to include breastwork monitors, the largest class of riverine warcraft known as river monitors, and was sometimes used as a generic term for any turreted ship. In the early 20th century, the term "monitor" included shallow-draft armoured shore bombardment vessels, particularly those of the Royal Navy: the Lord Clive-class monitors carried guns that fired the heaviest shells ever used at sea and saw action against German targets during World War I. Two small Royal Navy monitors from the First World War, Erebus and Terror survived to fight in the Second World War. When the requirement for shore support and strong shallow-water coastal defence returned, new monitors and variants such as coastal defence ships were built. Allied monitors saw service in the Mediterranean in support of the British Eighth Army's desert and Italian campaigns. They were part of the offshore bombardment for the Invasion of Normandy in 1944. They were also used to clear the German-mined River Scheldt by the British to utilize the port of Antwerp. The German, Yugoslav, Croatian, Romanian, Hungarian and Czech armed forces operated river monitors that saw combat during World War II.

This is a list of Royal Navy ships and personnel lost during World War II, from 3 September 1939 to 1 October 1945.

This is a list of some of the submarines of the Second World War. Germany used submarines to devastating effect in the Battle of the Atlantic, where it attempted to cut Britain's supply routes by sinking more merchant ships than Britain could replace. While U-boats destroyed a significant number of ships, the strategy ultimately failed. Although U-boats had been updated in the interwar years, the major innovation was improved communications and encryption; allowing for mass-attack naval tactics. By the end of the war, almost 3,000 Allied ships had been sunk by U-boats.

This is a list of Allied ships sunk by Axis warships operating in Australian waters during the Second World War.

List of United States Navy and Coast Guard ships lost during World War II, from 31 October 1941 to 31 December 1946, sorted by type and name. This listing also includes constructive losses, which are ships that were damaged beyond economical repair and disposed of.

This is a list of Victory ships. Victory ships were a type of cargo ship which were mass-produced in the United States during World War II.