to Jul 26
Crude output1,546
tb/d, OPEC secondary sourcesVersus budget-294
tb/d against 1,840Share of OPEC6.54%
+1.38pp since Jun 2024Reporting gap41
tb/d, secondary over Nigeria's own figureBonny Light$86.45
+$3.06 vs Dated, monthly average01
Two official numbers for the same barrels
OPEC publishes two production figures every month: what each member submits itself, and an independent estimate compiled from secondary sources. Nigeria’s own submission of 1,505 sits just under its 1,500 quota. The independent estimate of 1,546 puts it over. Both are official, and neither is ever reconciled to the other.Nigeria reports 41 thousand barrels a day less than OPEC’s assessors measure.
Secondary sourcesDirect communication
02
Nigeria's share of OPEC crude
Share is Nigerian output divided by total OPEC crude. When Gulf volumes fell after the Strait of Hormuz closed, every other member’s share rose arithmetically even at flat production. This line is as much about what happened elsewhere as about Nigeria.Up to 6.5% from 5.2%. The Gulf fell; Nigeria held.
Nigeria share of OPEC crude
03
Output against the budget benchmark
Each barrel drawn is 25 thousand barrels a day. The benchmark is the production volume the federal budget was built on, not a target anyone committed to hitting, and the cash figure values the shortfall at realised Brent rather than the budget price. Worth holding alongside it: the OPEC quota is 1,500, well below the 1,840 budget figure. Nigeria is above the quota and below the budget at the same time, so the two targets pull in opposite directions and meeting one means missing the other.294 thousand barrels a day short of budget, worth about $0.8bn a month.
Produced1,546Short of benchmark294One barrel = 25 tb/d
04
Who kept their barrels
Each line runs from the first month in view to the last. The scale is logarithmic, so the same percentage change has the same steepness whatever the starting volume. Without that, Saudi Arabia's size flattens everyone else into a single band.The Gulf lost a fifth or more. Nigeria finished higher than it started.
GainedLost
05
The reporting gap, month by month
The independent estimate minus Nigeria's own submission. Positive means the assessors saw more oil than was declared. The consistency of the sign matters more than the size of any single month.Assessors see more oil than Nigeria reports, almost every month.
Secondary above directSecondary below direct
06
Reserves: oil slipped, gas grew
Bars show percentage change either side of zero, because 37bn barrels and 215 trillion cubic feet cannot share an axis. Reserves life divides reserves by current output, so 85 years of gas against 59 of oil is the clearest number behind the argument that Nigeria is a gas country that sells oil. Oil fell on 2025 production and field-performance revisions; gas rose on new discoveries and better reservoir studies. NUPRC publishes only the net change, not the volume produced or added, so no replacement ratio can be derived from the release. The gas opening is marked est. because no prior-year figure was given; it is recovered by inverting the published percentage, and doing the same to oil gives 37.286 against the reported 37.28, which is what makes the gas figure trustworthy.Oil and condensate reserves fell 0.74% over 2025 while gas rose 2.21%. Nigeria is replacing gas faster than oil.
Oil and condensate37.28 → 37.01 bn bbl
-3%0%+3%-0.74%
Crude oil 31.09Condensate 5.92Lasts 59 years at current output
Natural gas210.54 est. → 215.19 tcf
-3%0%+3%+2.21%
Non-associated 114.98Associated 100.21Lasts 85 years at current output
NUPRC National Annual Petroleum Reserves Position as at 1 January 2026.
07
Theft fell, and it barely moved the gap
The decline is real and one of the clearest policy wins in the sector. The point of the second bar is what it leaves. Ending theft completely tomorrow would close 2.9% of the distance to the budget benchmark; the other 97.1% is production that was never brought online. Recovered theft is deliberately not a slice of that bar. It was recovered, so it is not part of what is missing; its effect is the size of the bar itself, and without it the shortfall would be 428k rather than 335k bpd. A smooth exponential decay was fitted to the yearly series and rejected. It scores well on paper but its errors are patterned, over-predicting 2023 by around 12,000 bpd, because this is not a decay curve: losses collapsed 88.4% across 2021 to 2023 and have since flattened at roughly 10.2% a year against a floor near 10,000 bpd.Crude losses are down 88.4% from 2021, but what is still stolen is 2.9% of the shortfall.
2021
102.9k
2022
57.2k-44%
2023
11.9k-79%
2024
11.3k-5%
2025
9.6k-15%
The 335k bpd still missing from the budget benchmark, by cause
2.9%
97.1% · 325k bpd of production never brought online
Still being stolen · 9,600 bpd
Recovered theft is not a slice of this bar, because it is no longer missing. Its effect is the size of the bar itself: without the 93k bpd already recovered, the shortfall would be 428k rather than 335k.
NUPRC annual crude loss figures. 2025 covers January to July, the period reported as a 16-year low.
T1
Monthly production
26 of 26 rowsCrude oil only. Condensate is excluded, which is what makes the comparison against the OPEC quota valid.
| Month | Secondarytb/d | Directtb/d | Gaptb/d | OPEC share% | Sauditb/d | Iraqtb/d |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jun 24 | 1,369 | 1,276 | 93 | 5.16 | 8,897 | 4,186 |
| Jul 24 | 1,401 | 1,307 | 94 | 5.22 | 8,987 | 4,324 |
| Aug 24 | 1,438 | 1,352 | 86 | 5.40 | 8,991 | 4,268 |
| Sep 24 | 1,399 | 1,324 | 75 | 5.37 | 8,964 | 4,133 |
| Oct 24 | 1,403 | 1,333 | 70 | 5.29 | 8,973 | 4,085 |
| Nov 24 | 1,497 | 1,486 | 11 | 5.59 | 8,962 | 4,029 |
| Dec 24 | 1,525 | 1,485 | 40 | 5.71 | 8,944 | 3,983 |
| Jan 25 | 1,526 | 1,539 | -13 | 5.71 | 8,941 | 3,991 |
| Feb 25 | 1,540 | 1,465 | 75 | 5.73 | 8,953 | 4,014 |
| Mar 25 | 1,483 | 1,401 | 82 | 5.54 | 8,962 | 3,988 |
| Apr 25 | 1,522 | 1,486 | 36 | 5.67 | 9,003 | 3,979 |
| May 25 | 1,513 | 1,453 | 60 | 5.59 | 9,175 | 3,939 |
| Jun 25 | 1,543 | 1,505 | 38 | 5.65 | 9,356 | 3,953 |
| Jul 25 | 1,557 | 1,507 | 50 | 5.67 | 9,450 | 3,893 |
| Aug 25 | 1,529 | 1,434 | 95 | 5.48 | 9,713 | 4,002 |
| Sep 25 | 1,491 | 1,390 | 101 | 5.25 | 9,960 | 4,064 |
| Oct 25 | 1,496 | 1,401 | 95 | 5.26 | 10,000 | 4,098 |
| Nov 25 | 1,491 | 1,436 | 55 | 5.24 | 10,051 | 4,064 |
| Dec 25 | 1,477 | 1,422 | 55 | 5.17 | 10,073 | 4,119 |
| Jan 26 | 1,488 | 1,459 | 29 | 5.23 | 10,086 | 4,157 |
| Feb 26 | 1,420 | 1,314 | 106 | 4.96 | 10,112 | 4,188 |
| Mar 26 | 1,449 | 1,383 | 66 | 7.03 | 7,626 | 1,679 |
| Apr 26 | 1,520 | 1,489 | 31 | 7.99 | 6,755 | 1,406 |
| May 26 | 1,554 | 1,530 | 24 | 8.19 | 6,946 | 1,525 |
| Jun 26 | 1,583 | 1,555 | 28 | 7.20 | 6,762 | 1,957 |
| Jul 26 | 1,546 | 1,505 | 41 | 6.54 | 7,352 | 2,621 |
OPEC Monthly Oil Market Report, 22 editions Sep 2024 to Aug 2026. Tables 5-7 and 5-8. Where a month was later revised, the most recent figure is used.