The Strait of Hormuz and Oil Prices: What Passes Through It and What Changed in 2026

Update, 14 October 2026. A container ship sank in the Strait of Hormuz on 14 October. Iran’s Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) says it hit a naval mine while using an unauthorized route. The Washington Post, citing Singapore’s maritime authority, reports that the Singapore-registered GFS Pride was attacked, and a US official has said Iran attacked it, likely with a missile. The cause has not been independently confirmed. UKMTO separately reported container ships and a tanker struck by unidentified projectiles on 13 and 14 October. This article has not been rewritten around one event: the sections below still describe the longer picture, and figures for current flows remain uncertain. VERIFY CURRENT DATA on the sources listed at the end.

What is the Strait of Hormuz?

The Strait of Hormuz is the narrow sea passage that links the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the open ocean. Oil from Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait, the UAE, Qatar and Iran mostly leaves the Gulf this way, loaded on tankers. It is the world’s most important oil chokepoint by volume, together with the Strait of Malacca.

How much oil passes through it?

The shares differ because each source divides by a different total: all petroleum liquids consumed, only crude traded, or only oil moved by sea. They describe the same flow.

Why can’t oil just go around?

Two pipelines can move oil out of the Gulf without passing the strait: Saudi Arabia’s East-West pipeline to the Red Sea and the UAE’s Habshan-Fujairah pipeline to the Gulf of Oman. The IEA estimates their combined spare capacity at roughly 3.5 to 5.5 million barrels a day, against about 20 million that normally pass through the strait. A disruption can therefore be offset only in part, and only by shifting how oil is routed, which takes time.

What changed in 2026?

Dated, from official sources:

• Late February 2026: military action in the region began. According to the EIA, most shipping then stopped using the strait because of the risk of attacks on vessels, prices rose sharply in the first quarter, and Iraq, Saudi Arabia and the UAE shut in oil production.
• 11 March 2026: the IEA’s 32 member countries agreed to make 400 million barrels of emergency stocks available, the largest release in the agency’s history.
• 13 May 2026: the EIA’s first estimate put flows through the strait in the first quarter at 14.6 million barrels a day, almost 30% below a year earlier. The EIA later revised the figure and warns that the tracking data behind it have been especially unreliable since late February 2026.
• 6 October 2026: the EIA’s latest outlook says Middle East disruptions are drawing down global inventories. It reports that Brent averaged $114 a barrel in September.
• 13 to 14 October 2026: UKMTO reported container ships and a tanker struck by unidentified projectiles in the strait, and a container ship sank on 14 October. The IRGC attributes the sinking to a mine; the Washington Post and a US official say it was an attack. The cause is disputed and not independently confirmed.

Reports differ on how freely ships are passing now. Parties to the conflict give different accounts, and tanker counts depend on which ships broadcast their position. For ship transit counts, check the IMF’s PortWatch. For anything current, VERIFY CURRENT DATA with the EIA and the IEA.

How do Hormuz headlines move oil prices?

The market prices what it expects to reach buyers, not only what has already been lost. Three channels matter:

• Risk premium: a threat to shipping can lift prices before any barrel is delayed, and an easing of tension can remove the premium just as fast.
• Real supply: shut-in production and rerouted cargoes remove barrels, and inventories are drawn to cover the gap. The IEA’s emergency stock release is a response to exactly this.
• Products, not only crude: the EIA’s latest outlook notes that tight diesel markets are keeping prices high, so the effect reaches fuel prices through refining margins as well as through crude.

Brent, priced on seaborne crude, is usually the more direct gauge of this risk. WTI moves with it. See Brent vs WTI and why they move together and what Brent is.

What do the official forecasts say?

These are the EIA’s numbers, not ours:

The EIA expects prices to ease in 2027 as supply recovers, and it has warned that continued volatility in flows through Hormuz and through alternative routes will likely make short-term moves larger than its forecast shows. The EIA has revised its assumptions about Hormuz flows several times this year, a reminder that forecasts for events like this change often. For the full set of institutional forecasts and how they changed, see what the EIA and the World Bank expect for 2026 and 2027.

What should you watch instead of guessing?

Scheduled and published data, not headlines alone:

1. Ship transit counts: the IMF’s PortWatch publishes them daily.
2. Emergency stocks: the pace of the IEA release and any new announcement.
3. The weekly EIA report: US crude and product inventories on Wednesdays. See the EIA report explained.
4. The economic calendar and OPEC+ decisions: what moves oil volatility lists the recurring catalysts, and the calendar has the dates.
5. Your own thresholds: the oil hub lets you turn on push alerts for WTI or Brent moves of 1%, 2% or 3% in a session, described as bullish or bearish moves, which only describe the move that already happened.

Prices, units and hours: WTI, Brent, the barrel converter, oil trading hours and the oil to gas price calculator.

Trading oil CFDs carries a high risk of loss, and geopolitical gaps can skip your stop. This article is educational and is not a trading signal or advice.