Why don't Australians have access to their own fuel price data?
Every Australian driver is affected by fuel prices. Yet there is no national, public, real-time fuel price database. The data exists - it's just not being shared with you.
The Current State of Fuel Price Data in Australia
Australia does not have a unified, national, publicly accessible fuel price database. Instead, we have a patchwork of state-based systems, most of which don't exist at all.
NSW
Has public dataFuelCheck API - mandatory reporting since 2016. Retailers must report price changes within 30 minutes.
WA
Has public dataFuelWatch - mandatory next-day price reporting since 2001. Prices must be locked for 24 hours.
QLD
Has public dataOpen Data portal - mandatory reporting since 2018. Real-time price data available.
VIC
No public dataNo mandatory reporting. No government API. Drivers rely on crowdsourced apps or commercial providers.
SA
No public dataNo mandatory reporting. No public database. Price transparency is essentially non-existent.
TAS
No public dataNo mandatory reporting. Tasmanians have no official way to compare fuel prices.
NT
No public dataNo mandatory reporting despite some of the highest fuel prices in the country.
ACT
No public dataNo mandatory reporting. The nation's capital has no fuel price transparency.
The ACCC Monitors Fuel Prices - But You Can't Access the Data
The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission (ACCC) has been directed by the government to monitor petrol prices. They collect extensive data from retailers and publish quarterly reports.
But here's the problem: the underlying data is not publicly available in real-time. Australians fund the ACCC through their taxes, yet the detailed price data that's collected is not made available as an open, queryable dataset.
The ACCC's quarterly reports tell you what happened months ago. They don't help you decide where to fill up today.
How Other Countries Handle This
United States
The U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) provides free, public, weekly fuel price data at national, state, and regional levels. GasBuddy and other services supplement with station-level data.
European Union
The EU mandates member states to provide fuel price data. The European Commission's Oil Bulletin publishes weekly consumer prices across all member states. Many countries have real-time station-level databases.
United Kingdom
The UK government publishes weekly average fuel prices. In 2024, the CMA (Competition and Markets Authority) launched an open fuel price database requiring major retailers to report prices in real-time.
South Korea
Opinet provides real-time fuel prices for every station nationwide through a free public API and website, operated by the Korea National Oil Corporation.
What We're Calling For
National Mandatory Price Reporting
Every fuel retailer in Australia should be required to report price changes in real-time, in every state and territory. Not just NSW, WA, and QLD.
A Free, Public, National API
The data should be available through a free, open API that anyone - developers, researchers, journalists, consumers - can access. Not locked behind commercial data providers.
Historical Data Access
Australians should be able to access historical fuel price data to identify trends, price gouging, and the true relationship between crude oil prices and what we pay at the pump.
ACCC Data Made Public
The data the ACCC already collects using taxpayer money should be made available to the taxpayers who fund it. Not just in quarterly PDF reports - in real-time, machine-readable formats.
The Cost of Opacity
Without transparent pricing data:
- Consumers overpay - without easy comparison, drivers can't make informed decisions and pay more than they need to
- Price cycles go unchecked - the petrol price cycle in major cities sees prices spike by 30-40 cents per litre, costing families hundreds of dollars per year
- Regional Australians suffer most - rural and regional areas often pay significantly more, with no visibility into why
- Competition suffers - price transparency drives competition. Without it, retailers have less incentive to offer competitive prices
- Research is hampered - academics, economists, and policy makers can't properly study fuel markets without comprehensive data
What Can You Do?
Share this page. Talk about it. Ask your local MP why fuel price data isn't public in your state.
Use our petrol price calculator to understand how price changes affect your budget. And demand better from the institutions that are supposed to represent your interests.
Fuel is not a luxury. It's a necessity for millions of Australians. The data about what we're paying and why should be public, free, and accessible to all.
