Purpose. The tasks of optimizing the placement of tared and piece cargoes (or the task of loading) in a limited volume (capacity) are typical for cases of loading with tared and piece cargoes (mainly large-sized) of transport containers, car bodies, ship holds in the merchant fleet, transport aircraft, railway wagons, areas of the warehouse complex. At the same time, the safe and efficient performance of loading and unloading operations with tared and piece cargoes, including large-sized ones, in a limited space is directly related to taking into account the requirements and using ergonomic methods. The purpose of this paper is to develop a mathematical model for the optimization of the placement of tared and piece cargoes (or about loading) in a limited volume (capacity), which is used to select a subset of cargo units with the maximum relative utility, while observing the limit on the total volume (or mass) of cargo. Methods. The analysis of literary sources made it possible to establish that for modeling and solving the problem of optimizing the placement of cargo (or loading) in a limited volume (capacity), it is rational to use one of the exact solution methods (dynamic programming method), the number of stages of which is the number of types of cargo. The work uses the method of dynamic programming, methods of theory of systems, and linear optimization. Results. The article presents a mathematical model of the problem of optimal placement of tared and piece cargoes (or about loading) in a limited volume, and for the case of placing weapons, ammunition, weapons, it is proposed to maximize not the function of the total cost (value) of the cargo, but the function that would take into account the relative usefulness of each cargo. The relative usefulness of each cargo is proposed to be determined by expert methods of systems theory, for example, the Delphi method, which is well formalized and suitable for computer processing of results. Scientific novelty. The scientific novelty consists in the development of a mathematical model that allows solving the problem of optimal placement of container loads (or loading) in a limited volume, and the target function of the optimization model is proposed to be the total relative usefulness of the cargo. Practical significance. Defined ergonomic requirements for cargo operations with tared and piece cargoes in a limited space (vehicles, warehouses). A method of numerical calculation based on the model is proposed (the case of loading a car body with tared and piece cargoes). In further research, the obtained results will be used for computer simulation according to the developed model using the Solver tool of Microsoft Excel.