The purpose of this work is to collect, analyze and generalize information on the operation of river dock-caissons. Currently, dock-caissons are rarely built despite their advantages. However, ship-lifting structures do not lose their relevance. The paper analyzes the constructed dock-boxes intended for caissoning the ends of passenger and cargo ships and docking of small vessels, namely, their fundamental design, analysis of hulls, systems and devices, as well as supporting structures on the slipway-deck, identified the main problems and search their decisions. A patent search was carried out on this topic and the most successful solutions were identified. The results of the work are generalized information about the operation of dock-boxes and allow to optimize further design, construction and operation of dock-boxes, taking into account the accumulated experience, and also allows to avoid mistakes that were made earlier. As a result of this work, some aspects of the operation of the ship-lifting structures were identified that were not taken into account in the design