US petrol prices have fallen below $4 a gallon for the first time since August 10, with the national average at $4.0093 on Monday — the 16th straight daily fall, and the latest leg of a slide driven by collapsing oil prices. The AAA national average stood at $4.0093 on November 9, down from $4.0203 on Sunday, according to AAA’s daily fuel gauge. GasBuddy’s national average, which uses a different method, already slipped to $3.998 on Sunday — below $4 for the first time since August 10, according to GasBuddy analyst Patrick De Haan. The two measures differ slightly, so the headline depends on which gauge is used — but both agree the direction is firmly down. A week ago the average was $4.1732, and a month ago $4.3612 — so prices have fallen about 15 cents in a week and about 34 cents in a month. A year ago, the average was about $3.07, so drivers are still paying roughly a dollar more per gallon than last autumn, even after two weeks of falls.
The cheapest and dearest states
The gap between states remains wide. California is the most expensive at about $5.75 a gallon, according to AAA’s state averages for November 8, followed by Hawaii at about $5.66 and Nevada at about $5.08. North Carolina is the cheapest at about $3.27 — helped by a gas-tax holiday that suspended the state’s 41-cent-per-gallon tax from October 10 to November 30 under the Relief at the Pump Act. Diesel, meanwhile, is averaging about $6.17 to $6.19 a gallon. Analysts expect the national average to keep falling. GasBuddy’s De Haan said so in comments reported last week, and Gulf Oil’s Tom Kloza expects it within about 10 days — a forecast that now looks conservative, with the average already at the $4 line.
Why prices are falling
The driver is crude oil. Brent settled at $98.32 a barrel on Friday after losing about 16% in a week — its steepest weekly fall since the start of Covid — as hopes of a US–Iran deal removed the war premium that had pushed prices above $117. Brent is near $97 on Monday, down a further 1.5%. Cheaper crude takes time to reach the pump, but the direction is now firmly down. For households heading into Thanksgiving, the timing helps: the holiday is the busiest driving period of the year, and every 10 cents off a gallon saves the average driver real money over a long weekend trip. Petrol demand is also rising — the Energy Information Administration reported gasoline demand up last week from 8.35 million barrels a day to 8.80 million — but the crude price fall is doing the heavier work. Before 2026, the national average had never gone above $4 in November at all — and it remains the highest ever for this time of year.
