Accredited official statistics

Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin commentary (July to December 2025)

Updated 30 January 2026

1. Hydrocarbon Oils statistics notes

This Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin has been updated with provisional data from July to December 2025. From 23 March 2022, a 5p reduction was introduced to fuel duties. The Budget 2025 extended this 5p fuel duty cut until the end of August 2026. The 5p cut impacts receipts and clearances from April 2022 onwards. It is not possible to disaggregate impacts from this policy and other factors potentially impacting hydrocarbon oils.

This Bulletin is now published every 6 months, in line with changes to HMRC statistics publications.

2. Headlines

The latest hydrocarbon oils headline statistics are:

• provisional hydrocarbon oils receipts for April to December 2025 are £18,510 million, £125 million (0.7%) higher than the same period in 2024

• provisional petrol receipts for April to December 2025 are £7,302 million, £231 million (3.3%) higher than the same period in 2024

• provisional diesel receipts for April to December 2025 are £11,011 million, £94 million (0.8%) lower than the same period in 2024

• diesel receipts have trended downwards in recent years, as consumers shift from diesel cars to alternative fuel vehicles, although the last few months of diesel receipts have gone against this trend

3. About this release

National Statistics are accredited official statistics. This HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) publication provides biannual provisional National Statistics of receipts and quantities released for consumption for excise duty charged on fuels and oils.

Duty is charged when motor and heating fuels and oils are produced, imported or used in the UK. These statistics include data for hydrocarbon (mineral) oils, biofuels, fuel substitutes and fuel additives.

These statistics report trends for tax liabilities and payments (receipts) by hydrocarbon oil traders. This is done by reporting levels of goods made available for consumption after passing through a duty point, as this is the point at which duty is payable to HMRC.

The statistics in this release are based on data from recent and historic trader returns up to and including December 2025. Detailed statistics on clearances and receipts are provided in the accompanying tables.

4. Monthly hydrocarbon oils receipts

Total excise duty receipts are calculated by summing together excise duty receipts from all types of diesel, petrol, and other oils duties.

Figure 1: Total hydrocarbon oils receipts by month during the current and previous 2 financial years, in £ million.

Figure 1 demonstrates several trends for total hydrocarbon oils receipts:

• provisional hydrocarbon oils receipts for 2025 are £24,486 million, £137 million (0.6%) higher than the receipts from 2024. This is primarily due to a £298 million (3.2%) increase in petrol receipts, which is partially offset by a £150 million (1.0%) decrease in diesel receipts

• the hydrocarbon oils receipts for July 2023 (£1,674 million) and August 2023 (£2,546 million) show notable volatility. This anomaly is the result of a timing effect that temporarily affected reported receipts

For the full dataset underlying Figure 1 and these statistical headlines go to Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin tables (October 2025 to December 2025).

5. Petrol and diesel excise duty receipts

5.1 Petrol excise duty

Total petrol excise duty receipts are calculated by summing together excise duty receipts from several different motor spirits, over 90% of which is unleaded petrol.

Figure 2: Petrol excise duty receipts by month during the current and previous 2 financial years, in £ million.

Figure 2 demonstrates several trends for petrol receipts:

• total petrol receipts from October 2025 to December 2025 are £2,474 million, which is £86 million (4%) higher than the same period during the previous financial year

• provisional receipts for April to September 2025 are higher than the same period in the previous two years, primarily due to peaks in May and September

For the full dataset underlying Figure 2 and these statistical headlines go to Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin tables (October 2025 to December 2025).

5.2 Diesel excise duty

Total diesel excise duty receipts are calculated by summing together excise duty receipts from several different types of diesel.

Figure 3: Diesel excise duty receipts by month during the current and previous 2 financial years, in £ million.

Figure 3 demonstrates several trends for diesel receipts:

• total diesel receipts from October 2025 to December 2025 are £3,762 million, which is £72 million (2%) higher than the same period during the previous financial year

For the full dataset underlying Figure 3 and these statistical headlines go to Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin tables (October 2025 to December 2025).

5.3 Petrol and diesel excise duty comparison

Figure 4: Petrol and diesel excise duty receipts by month during the current and previous eight financial years, in £ million.

For the full dataset that accompanies Figure 4 go to Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin tables (October 2025 to December 2025).

Figure 4 demonstrates the following trends for quarterly diesel and petrol receipts during the current and previous 8 financial years:

• the general decrease in diesel oil receipts from previous years can be in part explained by a growing number of consumers moving away from diesel cars and towards alternative fuelled vehicles (AFV) including electric and hybrid vehicles, despite some recent increases that go against this longer-term trend

• following volatility in the 2020 to 2021 financial year likely caused by economic impacts related to the coronavirus, receipts increased at the start of the 2021 to 2022 financial year and have remained at relatively stable levels since

• since the financial year ending 2017, petrol and diesel excise had plateaued until the first quarter of the 2020 to 2021 financial year which saw a large unseasonal decrease for both petrol and excise duty receipts, likely due to impacts from the coronavirus pandemic

5.4 Contacts

The Hydrocarbon Oils Bulletin is produced by the Indirect Tax Receipts Monitoring team as part of the Excise duties, VAT, and other indirect tax statistics collection.

Contact revenuemonitoring@hmrc.gov.uk for statistical enquiries.

Contact HMRC press office for media enquiries.