Despite the ups and downs of 2025, with local and international drama unfolding in markets, local motorists have ended the year only slightly worse off when it comes to fuel prices.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The main culprit\u2014outside of a global diesel shortage, which hit local pricing\u2014was the government’s decision to hike the general fuel levy, which ensured motorists would be worse off.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Looking at the fuel price adjustments across the full year (December 2024 to December 2025), petrol users would have seen mixed results.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Those who fill up with cheaper 93 petrol will find prices 11 cents more expensive at the end of the year, with the petrol price jumping up from R21.15 to R21.26 per litre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
However, those filling up with 95 petrol will have seen a slight reduction in price, with the December 2025 price per litre declining by 6 cents, from R21.47 to R21.41.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The real pain is being felt in diesel pricing, which is typically more sensitive to geopolitical shocks and market swings\u2014and 2025 presented many of those.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
For drivers using Diesel with a 0.5% sulphur content, prices escalated by 57 cents per litre this year, taking costs from R19.21 in December 2024 to R19.78 in December 2025.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The biggest hike was seen in Diesel with a 0.05% sulphur content, where prices jumped by 69 cents per litre during the course of 12 months, going from R19.33 to R20.02 per litre.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
In practical terms, for a driver filling up a 50 litre tank from empty<\/strong>, Petrol 93 is up R5.50, Petrol 95 is down R3.00, and diesel is up between R28.50 and R34.50 at the pumps.<\/p>\n\n\n\n While the final result for the year was relatively flat, there were several wild fluctuations in the price changes.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The price changes for local fuel are driven by fluctuations in the global oil price as well as changes to the rand\/dollar exchange rate.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Global oil prices have dropped significantly since the start of the year, when they began around $80 a barrel, still reeling from geopolitical tensions, seasonal demand, and low inventories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n During the course of the year, however, global supply started outpacing demand, especially as the Trump administration took office in the White House and initiated a global tariff war.<\/p>\n\n\n\n The imposition of tariffs dampened demand in oil-consuming economies at a time when oil producers (OPEC+) started ramping up output.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This led to a major shift in market expectations, driving prices down to below $60 a barrel from their highs in January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Overall, oil prices averaged around $68 a barrel, with more recent pricing putting it at the lower end of the range.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Analysts anticipate that the general weakness will continue, with supply gluts expected for 2026 and beyond.<\/p>\n\n\n\n In addition to the significant decline in oil prices this year, the rand also ended the year much stronger against the US dollar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Reflecting the same tensions present in oil markets, the rand kicked off the year on the back foot, trading as high as R18.99 in January.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, following the depreciation of the dollar due to the aforementioned trade war by the United States, the rand actually gained against the greenback throughout the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Unfortunately, this was interrupted by periods of immense weakness as a perfect storm of international and local problems hit local markets.<\/p>\n\n\n\n This includes the Trump administration’s targeted attacks on South Africa, which coincided with the 2025 budget drama and a near-collapse of the Government of National Unity amid ructions between the ANC and DA.<\/p>\n\n\n\n At this time, the rand reached record lows against the dollar.<\/p>\n\n\n\n Ultimately, though, markets recovered, and the rand surprised many by proving far more resilient than anyone had expected in the latter half of the year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n With a lower oil price and a stronger rand, South African motorists should have seen a lower petrol price relative to December 2024.<\/p>\n\n\n\n However, the government’s decision to hike the general fuel levy by 15 cents per litre in the May 2025 budget ensured that motorists were generally worse off.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" The government’s decision to hike the fuel levy this year ensured fuel prices ended up worse off in 2025.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":10,"featured_media":796944,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9874],"tags":[8995,19909,2835,2171],"class_list":["post-845448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-energy","tag-cef","tag-diesel-price","tag-oil","tag-petrol-price"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845448","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/10"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=845448"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845448\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":846611,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/845448\/revisions\/846611"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/796944"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=845448"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=845448"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/businesstech.co.za\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=845448"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Petrol and diesel price changes in 2025<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
Month<\/th> Petrol 93<\/th> Petrol 95<\/th> Diesel 0.5%<\/th> Diesel 0.05%<\/th><\/tr><\/thead> Start<\/em><\/td> R21.15<\/em><\/td> R21.47<\/em><\/td> R19.21<\/em><\/td> R19.33<\/em><\/td><\/tr> January<\/td> +19<\/td> +12<\/td> +8<\/td> +11<\/td><\/tr> February<\/td> +82<\/td> +82<\/td> +105<\/td> +101<\/td><\/tr> March<\/td> -7<\/td> -7<\/td> -18<\/td> -24<\/td><\/tr> April<\/td> -58<\/td> -72<\/td> -84<\/td> -86<\/td><\/tr> May<\/td> -22<\/td> -22<\/td> -42<\/td> -41<\/td><\/tr> June<\/td> -5<\/td> -5<\/td> -37<\/td> -37<\/td><\/tr> July<\/td> +55<\/td> +52<\/td> +82<\/td> +84<\/td><\/tr> August<\/td> -28<\/td> -28<\/td> +65<\/td> +63<\/td><\/tr> September<\/td> -4<\/td> -4<\/td> -56<\/td> -57<\/td><\/tr> October<\/td> +1<\/td> +8<\/td> -10<\/td> -8<\/td><\/tr> November<\/td> -51<\/td> -51<\/td> -21<\/td> -19<\/td><\/tr> December<\/td> +29<\/td> +29<\/td> +65<\/td> +82<\/td><\/tr> Final<\/em><\/td> R21.26<\/em><\/td> R21.41<\/em><\/td> R19.78<\/em><\/td> R20.02<\/em><\/td><\/tr> Total Change<\/strong><\/td> +11 cents<\/strong><\/mark><\/td> -6 cents<\/strong><\/mark><\/td> +57 cents<\/strong><\/mark><\/td> +69 cents<\/strong><\/mark><\/td><\/tr><\/tbody><\/table><\/div><\/figure>\n\n\n\n Ups and downs<\/h2>\n\n\n\n