Global Crude Oil Benchmarks & Price Differentials

Both are light, sweet benchmark grades, but WTI is landlocked US crude priced at Cushing, Oklahoma while Brent is seaborne North Sea crude priced off the UK. Brent is the reference for roughly two-thirds of internationally traded crude; WTI is the North American reference. Right now WTI trades at $100.94 a barrel and Brent at $108.32, a spread of $7.38. The gap mostly reflects transport and export economics out of the US Gulf Coast, so it widens when US pipeline or export capacity is tight.

A benchmark is a widely traded reference grade that other crudes are priced against at a premium or discount, rather than negotiated from scratch. A cargo contract typically reads "Brent plus or minus X dollars". The big three references are WTI for the Americas, Brent for Europe and Africa, and Dubai/Oman for Middle Eastern crude sold into Asia.

Two physical properties and one geographic one. Density (API gravity) determines how much high-value gasoline and diesel a barrel yields, so lighter crude is worth more. Sulfur content determines how much processing a refinery must do, so sweet crude (under about 0.5% sulfur) trades above sour. Location then adds or subtracts the cost of getting the barrel to a refinery that wants it, which is why landlocked grades trade at a discount to seaborne ones of similar quality.

Murban is Abu Dhabi's flagship light, sour grade and since 2021 has traded as its own futures contract on ICE Futures Abu Dhabi, making it a third seaborne benchmark alongside Brent and Dubai. It is quoted here at $109.10 a barrel.

The "Futures & Indexes" figure is the NYMEX front-month futures contract, which is the number quoted as "the oil price" in headlines. The entry under United States Blends is a physical wellhead posting for the same grade. Physical postings settle against actual barrels at a specific location and are published on a delay, so the two legitimately differ. Neither is wrong; they measure different things.

The futures strip updates through the trading day. Most physical grades do not: 88 of the 122 quotes on this page carry an explicit delay from the source, ranging from ten hours to a week, and the OPEC official selling prices are monthly figures. Each row shows what it is. Treat the physical postings as recent reference levels, not live tradeable quotes.