The list of maritime disasters is a link page for maritime disasters by century.
For a unified list of peacetime disasters by death toll, see .
All ships are vulnerable to problems from weather conditions, faulty design or human error. Some of the disasters below occurred during periods of conflict, although their losses were unrelated to any military action. The table listings are in decreasing order of the magnitude of casualties.
Disasters with great loss of life can occur in times of armed conflict. Shown below are some of the known events with major losses.