Why are rural fuel prices higher?

Rural fuel is dearer where forecourts are few and far between: unleaded averages 176.6p a litre at forecourts in the most sparsely served parts of the UK, 1.9p more than the 174.7p where forecourts are most crowded. Diesel is 3.0p dearer there (202.7p against 199.7p). Where it is dearer, the reasons are the ones HMRC and the Competition and Markets Authority give: fuel has further to travel, low sales spread a forecourt’s fixed costs over fewer litres, and there are fewer rival forecourts, especially supermarkets, to compete with.

How much more does fuel cost in rural areas?

“Rural” here means few forecourts. We split the country into the same grid our price heat map is drawn on — squares 0.4° of latitude by 0.4° of longitude, about 44 km from north to south and roughly half that from east to west (the grid treats the strip either side of the Greenwich meridian as one column, so squares there are twice as wide) — and count the forecourts selling each fuel in every square. A square with 5 or fewer counts as sparsely served, one with more than 40 as crowded. Each figure is the average over every forecourt in those squares, taken from the same prices as the national figures, so out-of-date and implausible ones are left out.

In squares with 5 or fewer forecourts, unleaded averages 176.6p a litre across 229 forecourts, 1.9p more than the 174.7p in squares with more than 40 (5,156 forecourts). In squares with 5 or fewer forecourts, diesel averages 202.7p a litre across 249 forecourts, 3.0p more than the 199.7p in squares with more than 40 (5,062 forecourts).

The sparsely served squares hold 229 of the 7,876 forecourts selling unleaded (3%). The sparsely served squares hold 249 of the 7,988 forecourts selling diesel (3%). The heat map shows where they are.

Are remote towns dearer than cities?

We also compared towns directly. A town counts as remote when no other town on our list is within 15 miles of it, and as a city when it has 200,000 people or more; each figure is the median over every forecourt that town’s page covers.

Across the 23 remote towns, the median unleaded price is 174.9p a litre, the same as the 174.9p across the 35 cities. Across the 23 remote towns, the median diesel price is 199.9p a litre, the same as the 199.9p across the 35 cities.

Of the 23 remote towns with unleaded prices today, 8 have a median above the national median of 174.9p, 6 match it and 9 are below it. The dearest for unleaded is Turriff at 178.9p, and the cheapest Cardigan at 167.9p: a spread of 11.0p, while remote towns and cities as a whole have the same median.

Of the 23 remote towns with diesel prices today, 7 have a median above the national median of 199.9p, 13 match it and 3 are below it. The dearest for diesel is Bude at 202.9p, and the cheapest Cardigan at 193.9p: a spread of 9.0p, while remote towns and cities as a whole have the same median.

The remote towns include Stornoway, Kirkwall and Lerwick, whose prices already carry the 5p Rural Fuel Duty Relief described below.

Is the gap smaller than people think?

On the evidence of the CMA’s market study, yes. Its 2023 final report found that “rural PFS fuel prices are on average 1.2ppl higher than urban prices, for both diesel and petrol” (a PFS is a petrol filling station), and that “there was much wider variation within the rural and urban categories than between them”. The RAC makes the same point: local prices are “very often driven by the presence of supermarkets keen to compete on price or an independent forecourt retailer that is determined to offer the cheapest fuel”, and “sometimes fuel can even be cheaper in a more rural location than in an urban one”. The CMA also found regional differences relatively small, with the exception of Northern Ireland, which it describes as in a geographically unique position because of the Irish border; the regional league table ranks every nation and English region by today’s median.

Why does fuel cost more in remote places?

Delivery. Fuel has to be carried from the refinery to every forecourt, and the further it goes the more that costs. HMRC’s evaluation of Rural Fuel Duty Relief explains that for the islands “delivery to the islands takes longer and covers a greater distance so costs are higher”, and the government’s guidance on the scheme says the remoteness of the areas it covers “leads to high fuel transport costs from refinery to filling station”.

Lower volumes. The same evaluation says “low populations mean that fixed costs are spread across a smaller volume of fuel sales”, and the guidance adds that “relatively low sales means that these fuel retailers cannot benefit from bulk discounts on their fuel purchases”.

Less competition. The CMA found that “the highest-priced PFSs faced fewer competitors nearby, were less likely to have a supermarket competitor and were significantly less likely to have an Asda competitor”, and that “where there are no supermarkets, and retailers are likely to have higher costs (eg more remote areas) prices are likely to be higher”. Our own figures fit that picture, since the extra cost is concentrated where forecourts are fewest, but they can’t tell competition apart from delivery and volume as the cause.

What is Rural Fuel Duty Relief?

Rural Fuel Duty Relief takes 5 pence per litre off the duty on unleaded petrol and diesel sold by registered retailers in specified remote areas. It is claimed by the retailer, not the driver: each forecourt registers with HM Revenue and Customs, claims monthly, and after an introductory 60 days must pass the full relief on to customers in its pump prices.

It began in the islands, where retailers had to cut their prices from 1 March 2012, and now covers the Inner and Outer Hebrides, the Northern Isles, the islands in the Clyde and the Isles of Scilly, plus remote mainland areas added since: the post town of Hawes in North Yorkshire, the postcode districts EX35, LA17 and NE48 in England, and IV14, IV21, IV22, IV26, IV27, IV54, KW12, PA38, PA80, PH19, PH23, PH36 and PH41 in Scotland. The gov.uk guidance has the full rules.

It works, but it doesn’t close the gap. Before it, HMRC says, fuel on the Scottish islands had been around 10p a litre dearer than elsewhere in the UK and on the Isles of Scilly around 25p, mainly because of transport and distribution costs. Its 2013 evaluation found island prices had fallen by around 4p a litre relative to the mainland on average since the relief began, and by 5p in the latest quarter it studied. With the relief, the median unleaded price is 175.9p in Stornoway, 175.9p in Kirkwall and 172.9p in Lerwick, against 174.9p nationally: 2 of the 3 are still above it. With the relief, the median diesel price is 202.3p in Stornoway, 202.8p in Kirkwall and 199.9p in Lerwick, against 199.9p nationally: 2 of the 3 are still above it.

The island towns on our list are Stornoway in the Outer Hebrides, Kirkwall in Orkney and Lerwick in Shetland.

How to pay less in a rural area

The CMA found prices vary more within rural areas than between rural and urban ones, so the forecourt you choose matters more than where you live. Each town page lists its forecourts cheapest first, and the price history shows how the national figures have moved. Where there is a supermarket forecourt within reach, the CMA’s findings suggest it is likely to be among the cheapest.

Sources

• Rural Fuel Duty Relief Scheme (Excise Notice 2001), HMRC, GOV.UK
• Remote islands to get cheaper fuel from March 2012, HM Treasury, GOV.UK
• Evaluating the impact of the Rural Fuel Duty Relief (2013), HMRC
• Road fuel market study and its final report’s executive summary (2023), Competition and Markets Authority
• What affects the price of UK fuel?, RAC

The density figures, town medians and comparisons are our own, from today’s Fuel Finder prices: the density figures cover every forecourt on the heat map, and the town figures the remote towns and cities counted above, plus the island towns in the relief area. They are refreshed hourly.

Prices on this page were read 11 October 2026 at 09:21. They refresh on their own; the analysis around them is dated at the top.