Why Is Diesel More Expensive Than Gas (and Why So High)?
Prices as of October 6, 2026 · Updated October 06, 2026
The short answer
Diesel generally costs more than gasoline because it costs more to make than gasoline and federal taxes on diesel are higher than on gasoline.
- In 2026, diesel is very expensive because diesel exports from Russia and the Middle East have fallen, leading to a global shortfall.
- The U.S. is helping make up the global diesel shortfall, but U.S. refineries are already running flat out and have little room to produce more.
- Diesel averages $6.32 a gallon as of October 6, 2026 against $4.37 for regular, a gap of $1.95 (AAA). In EIA's weekly survey diesel is 70.2% higher than the $3.75 of a year ago.
Video explainer
Why gas and diesel are still expensive, in 2 minutes
Oil is flowing through Hormuz again. Here's why prices haven't followed yet.
Read the transcript
In late September 2026, oil trackers said exports from the Persian Gulf were back to about 80% of prewar levels. So why are gasoline and diesel prices still so high?
One reason: the recovery is fragile. On September 29th, three tankers were struck in the strait.
Another reason: oil itself hasn't gotten much cheaper yet. Oil is still near $90 a barrel. That matters most for gasoline. From January to September, gasoline rose about $1.50 a gallon, and more than half of that was the cost of oil.
Diesel is different. It rose about $2.75 over the same months, and less than half of that was the oil. Most of it came from refining margins, because two of the world's biggest diesel suppliers have been shipping less. By August, diesel exports from Russia and the Gulf were down 1.6 million barrels a day from February, and American refineries were already running close to flat out.
Then, oil takes time to travel. From the Gulf, a tanker needs about three weeks to reach China, and about five and a half weeks to go around Africa to Europe. The last prewar Gulf diesel cargo reached Europe around April 10th, six weeks after the war began. That clock runs both ways. A cargo loaded this week arrives in early November.
Wholesale diesel peaked on September 16th, then fell 36 cents in a week. The price at the pump has dropped 15 cents so far. Wholesale gasoline has started falling too. The pump hasn't caught up yet. If the oil keeps moving, more will follow.
Sources for every number are at energyfactbook.com.
Diesel prices today (October 6, 2026)
The AAA national average for diesel is $6.32 per gallon, against $4.37 for regular, fetched this morning. A semi truck (tractor-trailer) taking on 100 gallons pays $632, about $263 more than the same fill a year ago. A 26-gallon pickup tank costs $164.32.
| Week of | Diesel ($/gal) | Change | Regular ($/gal) | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| September 28, 2026 | $6.38 | −14.7¢ | $4.46 | $1.92 |
| September 21, 2026 | $6.53 | +24.4¢ | $4.48 | $2.05 |
| September 14, 2026 | $6.29 | +31.8¢ | $4.32 | $1.97 |
| September 7, 2026 | $5.97 | +36.8¢ | $4.16 | $1.81 |
| August 31, 2026 | $5.60 | −5.3¢ | $4.07 | $1.53 |
Weekly rows: EIA weekly U.S. averages, No. 2 diesel and regular all formulations, surveyed each Monday. Today's figures: AAA national averages, fetched once each morning. The widest weekly gap in EIA's series, which begins in 1994, was $2.05 in the week of September 21, 2026.
Diesel and gasoline at the pump since 2020
The two fuels come from the same barrel and usually move together. In 2022 and again in 2026 diesel pulled away, which is the signature of a distillate problem rather than a crude oil problem.
Why diesel costs more than gasoline every year
EIA's own answer gives three structural reasons, and diesel has cost more than regular gasoline in every full year of its weekly survey since 2005:
- Taxes. The federal excise tax on highway diesel is 24.4¢ a gallon, against 18.4¢ on gasoline. That 6-cent gap is there in every gallon before anything else happens.
- The fuel itself. Highway diesel has been ultra-low-sulfur since 2006. Removing the sulfur takes hydrogen and processing capacity that gasoline does not need, so a gallon of diesel costs more to make and to distribute.
- Demand. Diesel is the fuel of trucks, trains, ships, farms and mines, and the same distillate cut of the barrel is heating oil. EIA points to strong distillate demand in the United States, Europe, China and India, and a large share of what U.S. refineries make is exported (the weekly export figure is below).
| Year | Diesel | Regular | Gap |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | $2.71 | $2.43 | $0.28 |
| 2016 | $2.30 | $2.14 | $0.16 |
| 2017 | $2.65 | $2.41 | $0.24 |
| 2018 | $3.18 | $2.72 | $0.46 |
| 2019 | $3.06 | $2.60 | $0.45 |
| 2020 | $2.55 | $2.17 | $0.38 |
| 2021 | $3.29 | $3.01 | $0.28 |
| 2022 | $4.99 | $3.95 | $1.04 |
| 2023 | $4.21 | $3.52 | $0.70 |
| 2024 | $3.76 | $3.30 | $0.46 |
| 2025 | $3.66 | $3.10 | $0.56 |
| 2026 (through September 28, 2026) | $5.01 | $3.82 | $1.19 |
Annual averages of EIA's weekly U.S. survey. The 2026 average gap of $1.19 is already wider than any full year in the series; the previous record was $1.04 in 2022. Diesel averaged less than regular in 1999 and 2001 to 2004.
Why diesel is so high in 2026
The structural gap is a few tens of cents. The 2026 gap is $1.95. The difference is a world short of distillate, and three things explain most of it.
The scale comes first. Net diesel exports from Russia and the Gulf were 1.6 million barrels a day lower in August than in February, and before the two wars those regions supplied almost 45% of the diesel traded by sea (Reuters, September 15, 2026). The rest of the world has been bidding for replacement barrels ever since, and the United States is the biggest source it can turn to.
1. Russia, which shipped 2.5 million tons of diesel a month a year ago, all but stopped
Russia has published no production data since 2022, so this section quotes what has been reported, dated and sourced. The pattern is consistent: Ukrainian drone strikes on refineries cut Russian distillate output through the spring and summer, Moscow restricted and then banned diesel exports to protect its domestic market, and the barrels Russia's customers used to buy had to come from somewhere else. The IEA's reading, in its October 2025 report, was that the drop in Russian middle-distillate exports "reverberated globally" as regular buyers bid up diesel and jet cracks to secure alternative supply.
- September 15, 2026: Trader estimates cited by Reuters put Russian diesel exports below 1 million metric tons in June 2026, against roughly 2.5 million tons a month a year earlier (3.3 to 3.4 million tons including lower-quality gasoil). Russia has since restricted exports of gasoline, diesel and jet fuel to protect domestic supply. (Reuters, via OilPrice.com)
- September 15, 2026: Reuters reported that half of Russia's six largest diesel-producing refineries (Omsk, Kirishi, Taneco, Volgograd, NORSI and Perm, together about half of Russian diesel output) had cut or halted production this month after drone strikes: Kirishi fully shut, Volgograd and NORSI at about one quarter of nameplate capacity. (Reuters, via Kyiv Post)
- September 11, 2026: The International Energy Agency's September Oil Market Report estimated that a Russian refinery was successfully hit on average once every three days during the first eight months of 2026, and reported Atlantic Basin refining margins at record levels in August, led by sharply higher diesel cracks. (IEA Oil Market Report, September 2026)
- July 9, 2026: Deputy Prime Minister Alexander Novak announced a ban on Russian diesel exports, effective that day and initially set to run through July 31, to increase supplies to the domestic market; existing gasoline and jet fuel export restrictions stayed in place. (Euronews)
- June 24, 2026: Novak said Russian refiners had "maxed out capacity across all oil refineries, shortened repair timelines and postponed scheduled maintenance," and that a total diesel export ban was being weighed alongside the existing gasoline and jet fuel restrictions. (The Moscow Times)
2. The Gulf lost refineries, export routes and the diesel-rich crude
The war hit Gulf diesel twice: refineries were damaged or cut their runs, and the blockade of Hormuz constrained what the plants still running could ship. The refinery figures below are crude-processing capacity, a measure of how much oil the plants can run, not of diesel lost; plants restart and run at reduced rates, so the export figure is the closer measure of what buyers are missing.
- September 21, 2026: Middle East diesel exports halved from March to August compared with a year earlier, averaging 800,000 barrels a day, according to Kpler shipping data cited by Reuters. The Middle East supplied nearly 41% of Europe's diesel imports in 2025. (Reuters, via Euronext)
- May 14, 2026: Industry monitor IIR estimated that the Iran war had shut as much as 3.52 million barrels a day of refining capacity as of May 7. (Reuters, via Baird Maritime)
- March 10, 2026: Consultancy IIR estimated that nearly 1.9 million barrels a day of Gulf crude refining capacity had been shut in by the war, including outages in Bahrain, Iraq, Kuwait, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates. (Reuters, via Pipeline & Gas Journal)
The crude oil shock that lifted gasoline lifted diesel too, and by more. Trade-press analysis (FreightWaves, August 20, 2026) adds that the Middle East and Russian grades taken off the market are heavier crudes that yield more distillate than the light shale crude the U.S. produces, so the barrels lost were the diesel-rich ones. The gasoline explainer covers the crude side and the Hormuz numbers cover what the chokepoint decline does and does not measure.
3. U.S. refineries are already running flat out
When the world wants more diesel, the first place it looks is the U.S. Gulf Coast. EIA's weekly survey put refinery utilization at 94.0% of operable capacity for the week ending September 18, 2026. Utilization that high is the signal of a tight market: refiners run every unit they can when product margins reward each extra barrel, and there is no idle capacity left to bring on when demand rises.
| Year | Weeks at 95% or above | Weeks at 96% or above |
|---|---|---|
| 1997 | 30 | 27 |
| 1998 | 28 | 24 |
| 2026 (through September 18, 2026) | 16 | 13 |
| 2018 | 21 | 12 |
| 1994 | 20 | 11 |
| 2004 | 15 | 9 |
| 2000 | 16 | 8 |
| 2005 | 8 | 6 |
The eight calendar years with the most weeks at 96% or above, EIA weekly series since 1990. Utilization is measured against operable capacity, which has shrunk as refineries closed; see the refining page for the count and capacity history.
With no spare capacity, a single outage matters more than it would in a normal year: there are fewer idle units, and less inventory, to cover for it.
- September 17, 2026: Exxon Mobil said floodwater overwhelmed a pump at its 275,000-barrel-a-day Joliet, Illinois refinery, which remained offline after losing power from ComEd's supply lines on September 13. The plant is a key Midwest supplier, making about 11 million gallons a day of gasoline and diesel. (Reuters, via KELO)
What the market signals say
The crack spread is a benchmark of what a barrel of product is worth over the crude that made it (not a profit figure). For the week of September 18, 2026 the New York Harbor diesel crack was $115.83 a barrel against $45.22 for gasoline, and $36.02 for diesel in the same week of 2025. The difference between the two cracks is worth about 168¢ a gallon at the pump, which is most of the gap between the two fuels. The diesel crack ranks 1st of 1,058 weeks since 2006; the record is $115.83 in the week of September 18, 2026.
U.S. distillate inventories stood at 107.4 million barrels in the week ending September 18, 2026, 12% below the 2021–2025 average for the same week and below the bottom of that five-year range (117.2 to 129.3 million). No year in EIA's weekly series, which begins in 1982, has had less distillate in storage at this point in the year. Exports of distillate averaged 1,559 thousand barrels a day over the past four weeks, against 1,265 in the same weeks a year earlier. Refineries running at capacity, inventories below the range, and exports up: that is a market drawing down what it has because it cannot make more.
Exports took the summer inventory build
Distillate stocks usually rise over the summer, when little heating oil is burned, and that cushion carries the market into winter. They rose over this stretch of the year in 41 of the 43 years from 1983 to 2025. From June 26, 2026 to September 18, 2026, U.S. distillate stocks fell 1.2 million barrels. Over the same weeks they rose an average of 5.2 million in 2021 to 2025, and 19.4 million in 2025. The last summer that ended with less added to stocks was 2021, when they fell 7.7 million.
What changed is exports. U.S. distillate exports averaged 1,672 thousand barrels a day over those 12 weeks, against 1,317 in the same weeks of 2021 to 2025, the most for this stretch of the year in EIA's weekly export series, which begins in 2010. The difference adds up to about 30 million barrels more sent abroad, more than the 6.4 million barrels by which this summer's stocks fell short of the average build.
| Year | Late June (mb) | Sep 18 (mb) | Change (mb) | Exports (kb/d) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 174.1 | 175.9 | +1.8 | 1,264 |
| 2021 | 137.1 | 129.3 | -7.7 | 1,050 |
| 2022 | 112.4 | 117.2 | +4.8 | 1,502 |
| 2023 | 113.4 | 119.7 | +6.3 | 1,264 |
| 2024 | 119.7 | 122.9 | +3.2 | 1,419 |
| 2025 | 103.6 | 123.0 | +19.4 | 1,350 |
| 2026 | 108.6 | 107.4 | -1.2 | 1,672 |
Exports are not the only thing that moves stocks: refinery output, imports, U.S. demand and outages all do. The comparison shows that the export surge was large enough to account for the missing build, not that every missing barrel went abroad. U.S. refiners were not idle; they ran near capacity all summer, and demand at home and abroad took everything they made.
Why your state is different
Crude and distillate trade on world markets, so the spread between states comes from state taxes and fees, low-carbon and low-sulfur fuel rules, and distance from a refinery. This week California averages $8.37 for diesel against $5.76 in Texas, a gap of $2.61 a gallon.
See all 50 states ranked; every state page shows its diesel average next to regular. State averages are from AAA as of October 04, 2026.
Will diesel prices go down?
EIA projects they will. Its Short-Term Energy Outlook, as of October 4, 2026, has U.S. diesel averaging $5.07 a gallon in 2026 and $4.40 in 2027, with regular gasoline at $3.35, so EIA expects the gap to narrow but not to close. What would bring it down is the reverse of what pushed it up: Russian refineries back online, more crude through Hormuz, and refiners with room to spare after a full-throttle summer.
This is EIA's projection, not ours, and EIA reissues it every month; we pull the current edition from EIA's API on each weekly refresh.
Frequently asked questions
Why is diesel more expensive than gas?
Three structural reasons and one 2026 reason. Structurally, per EIA: distillate demand is strong at home and abroad, ultra-low-sulfur diesel costs more to make, and the federal excise tax on diesel is 24.4¢ a gallon against 18.4¢ on gasoline. In 2026 the gap widened far past those causes: the IEA reports that the drop in Russian middle-distillate exports sent regular buyers scrambling for alternative supply and bidding up diesel cracks, while U.S. refineries were already running near capacity. Diesel is $6.32 against $4.37 for regular as of October 6, 2026, a gap of $1.95.
Was diesel always more expensive than gasoline?
No. In EIA's weekly survey, diesel averaged less than regular gasoline in 5 of the years from 1994 to 2005; every full year from 2005 on has averaged higher. This year's average gap so far, $1.19, is wider than any full year in the series; the previous record was $1.04 in 2022.
Why is the U.S. exporting diesel during a shortage?
Because the shortage is global and buyers abroad are bidding for replacement barrels. The United States was the world's largest diesel exporter in 2025 (Kpler data via Reuters), and with Russian and Gulf supply cut, its exports rose further: EIA's weekly data show U.S. distillate exports averaging 1,672 thousand barrels a day from June 26, 2026 to September 18, 2026, against 1,317 in the same weeks of 2021 to 2025. Over those weeks U.S. distillate stocks fell 1.2 million barrels, when they rose an average of 5.2 million in the previous five summers.
How long will the diesel shortage last?
Probably into 2027. As reported by Reuters on September 21, 2026, EIA forecasts U.S. distillate inventories to stay below their five-year low through the end of 2026 and most of 2027. The supply that went missing is large: Reuters calculated that net diesel exports from Russia and the Gulf were 1.6 million barrels a day lower in August than in February, and damaged refineries take far longer to restore than they took to knock out.
Will diesel prices go down?
EIA projects they will. Its Short-Term Energy Outlook as of October 4, 2026 has U.S. diesel averaging $5.07 a gallon in 2026 and $4.40 in 2027. That is EIA's projection, reissued monthly, not ours.
Which state has the most expensive diesel?
California, at $8.37 a gallon in AAA's survey, against $5.76 in Texas, a spread of $2.61. Every state page on the gas prices hub shows its diesel average next to regular.
Related
Sources: EIA Gasoline and Diesel Fuel Update (weekly retail prices), EIA Weekly Petroleum Status Report (refinery utilization, distillate stocks and exports), EIA spot prices (crack spread legs), EIA Short-Term Energy Outlook (projections), EIA FAQ (federal excise taxes and structural reasons), AAA (daily national and state averages), and the reported items linked in the Russia, Gulf and refinery-outage sections. See methodology.