Alaska Oil Production: Barrels per Day, Month by Month
Alaska produced about 0.42 million barrels of crude oil a day in July 2026, 3.0% of US output and #5 among the states, +17.6% from a year earlier. Almost all of it comes from the North Slope, on the Arctic Ocean, and travels 800 miles south through the Trans-Alaska Pipeline System to the ice-free port of Valdez — a logistics chain with no equivalent among the shale states.
Key Figures
EIA monthly · July 2026| Measure | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|
| Crude production, July 2026 | 421 kb/d (0.42 Mb/d) | EIA, preliminary |
| Rank among the states | #5 | EIA |
| Share of US crude output | 3.0% | EIA |
| Change from prior month | +8 kb/d | EIA |
| Change from a year earlier | +63 kb/d (+17.6%) | EIA |
| 12-month average | 419 kb/d | EIA, computed |
| Main field complex | Prudhoe Bay and the surrounding North Slope fields, discovered in 1968 | Alaska Department of Natural Resources |
| Transport | Trans-Alaska Pipeline System (TAPS), 800 miles from Prudhoe Bay to the port of Valdez | Alyeska Pipeline Service Company |
| Historical peak | Output peaked around 2.0 million b/d in the late 1980s, roughly five times current levels | EIA |
| Well type | Conventional, not shale — Alaska is not one of the six basins in the EIA's shale/tight-oil productivity report | EIA |
Ranked against every other state on oil production by state; national context on US oil production.
Monthly Production, Last 26 Months
Thousand barrels per day| Month | kb/d | Change vs prior month | Change vs year earlier |
|---|---|---|---|
| July 2026 | 421 | +8 | +17.6% |
| June 2026 | 413 | −3 | −2.4% |
| May 2026 | 416 | −6 | −4.4% |
| April 2026 | 422 | +4 | −3.2% |
| March 2026 | 418 | +2 | −4.3% |
| February 2026 | 416 | −12 | −5.0% |
| January 2026 | 428 | −6 | −2.9% |
| December 2025 | 434 | +4 | +0.0% |
| November 2025 | 430 | +1 | −2.1% |
| October 2025 | 429 | +10 | +0.2% |
| September 2025 | 419 | +32 | +2.4% |
| August 2025 | 387 | +29 | −2.3% |
| July 2025 | 358 | −65 | −12.3% |
| June 2025 | 423 | −12 | +5.5% |
| May 2025 | 435 | −1 | — |
| April 2025 | 436 | −1 | — |
| March 2025 | 437 | −1 | — |
| February 2025 | 438 | −3 | — |
| January 2025 | 441 | +7 | — |
| December 2024 | 434 | −5 | — |
| November 2024 | 439 | +11 | — |
| October 2024 | 428 | +19 | — |
| September 2024 | 409 | +13 | — |
| August 2024 | 396 | −12 | — |
| July 2024 | 408 | +7 | — |
| June 2024 | 401 | — | — |
EIA petroleum/crd/crpdn, crude oil field production by state. The newest month is preliminary and is revised as operators report; the data is published with a lag of roughly two and a half months.
A Different Kind of Oil State
The pipeline is the constraint
- TAPS was built for output several times today's level, and the pipeline needs a minimum throughput and temperature to keep crude from waxing in the Arctic cold — a physical floor that does not apply to pipelines in the Lower 48.
- New North Slope production (including fields further west and offshore projects) matters partly because it helps keep TAPS flowing efficiently, not only for the barrels themselves.
Conventional, not shale
- Unlike Texas, North Dakota or New Mexico, Alaska's output comes overwhelmingly from large conventional reservoirs rather than horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing — see what is fracking for how the shale states differ.
- That makes Alaska's decline profile far gentler than a shale well's, but also means new large discoveries are rare.
Alaska Oil Production FAQ
How much oil does Alaska produce?
Alaska produced about 0.42 million barrels of crude oil a day in July 2026 (421 thousand barrels a day), 3.0% of US output and #5 among the states. That is +17.6% from a year earlier. Source: EIA monthly state estimates; the latest month is preliminary.
Why has Alaska oil production declined so much since the 1980s?
Prudhoe Bay and the other original North Slope fields are large, mature conventional reservoirs that have been producing since the late 1970s and naturally deplete over decades. Output peaked around 2.0 million barrels a day in the late 1980s and has fallen to a fraction of that as those fields age, even with newer North Slope projects adding some production.
Is Alaska oil shale oil?
No. Alaska's crude comes from large conventional reservoirs on the North Slope, not from shale formations developed with horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing the way Texas, North Dakota or New Mexico output is.