OPEC Puts 2026 Oil Demand Growth at 0.6 Million Barrels a Day, a 2.2 Million Gap With the IEA Forecast

By The Edge Research Team

OPEC expects world oil demand to grow by about six hundred thousand barrels a day this year, the organization said in its Monthly Oil Market Report published on Wednesday, cutting the forecast by two hundred thousand barrels a day from its July assessment. The figure stands two point two million barrels a day above the International Energy Agency’s forecast for the same year, published the same day, which has demand falling by one point six million barrels a day.

The two institutions are not far apart on where the market is heading. They are far apart on what has already happened to it. OPEC puts demand growth in 2027 at about two point two million barrels a day against the agency’s two point four million, a difference of about two hundred thousand. The bulk of the disagreement sits in the middle of this year.

Both bodies record a second quarter in which demand fell against the same period a year earlier. OPEC measures that fall at one point one million barrels a day. The agency measured it at four point nine million. In the third quarter OPEC already has demand growing again, by seven hundred thousand barrels a day, while the agency still has it falling by two point eight million. By the fourth quarter the two are within about five hundred thousand of each other, and for next year they are within about two hundred thousand. The gap is a gap about the depth of the disruption, not about the destination. The agency attributed its weaker view to the continuing closure of the Strait of Hormuz and the high fuel prices that have followed it.

OPEC’s own revision table is worth reading closely on this point. The organization’s highlights describe its 2027 number as following an upward revision. The revision table shows the 2027 demand level was not revised at all. The two hundred thousand barrels a day added to 2027 growth is the arithmetic consequence of removing two hundred thousand from the 2026 base, which is a base effect rather than an improved view of next year. Within 2026 the cut is concentrated in the second quarter, where the level was reduced by six hundred thousand barrels a day, with two hundred thousand taken off the third quarter and one hundred thousand off the fourth.

The composition is unusually lopsided. OECD demand is forecast to fall by about forty thousand barrels a day this year, so the whole of the growth OPEC expects comes from outside the developed economies, where demand rises by six hundred and ten thousand. Within the OECD, Europe falls by one hundred and twenty thousand barrels a day and Asia Pacific by one hundred and seventy thousand, while the Americas rise by two hundred and fifty thousand, of which the United States accounts for two hundred and thirty thousand. Middle East demand is forecast to ease by about fifty thousand barrels a day this year to eight point seven seven million, before recovering by about three hundred and forty thousand in 2027 to nine point one million.

On supply, production from countries outside the Declaration of Cooperation is forecast to grow by about six hundred and forty thousand barrels a day this year to fifty four point eight million, unchanged from last month, with Brazil, the United States, Canada and Argentina the main drivers and Qatar the largest single decline at five hundred and ninety thousand. A further six hundred and twenty thousand barrels a day of growth is forecast for 2027, led by Qatar, Canada, Brazil and Argentina.

The most striking numbers in the report are in the production tables for the Declaration of Cooperation itself. Crude output from the group averaged thirty seven point six six million barrels a day in July, one point four two million higher than in June, according to the secondary sources OPEC uses. That is a second consecutive monthly recovery for the group as a whole, from a second quarter in which it produced thirty four point three million barrels a day, and it followed disruptions the report attributes to geopolitical developments and to concerns over crude and product flows through the Strait of Hormuz.

Kuwait’s output rose by three hundred and ninety three thousand barrels a day in July to one point eight four five million, more than three times its May level of five hundred and seventy three thousand, and now stands at about seventy five percent of its 2025 average. Iraq added six hundred and sixty five thousand to two point six two one million, the largest increase of any member. Saudi Arabia rebounded by five hundred and ninety thousand to seven point three five two million, recovering from a decline in June and returning to about seventy eight percent of its 2025 average. The UAE, which recovered earlier, was broadly steady after a large June increase.

Those four producers together added about one point six two million barrels a day in July. The group’s net gain was smaller because output among the non-OPEC participants in the Declaration of Cooperation fell by two hundred and thirty five thousand barrels a day, almost all of it a two hundred and twenty three thousand decline in Kazakhstan.

Prices reflected the same easing. The OPEC Reference Basket averaged eighty two dollars and ninety nine cents a barrel in July, down six dollars and seventy six cents on the month. The declines were heavily concentrated in Gulf grades. OPEC records that the multiple-region destination grades, including Arab Light, Basrah Medium, Iran Heavy and Kuwait Export, fell by an average of eight dollars and sixty eight cents a barrel, while the West and North African components fell by an average of two dollars and eighty one cents. Kuwait Export fell furthest of any basket component, by ten dollars and twenty six cents to eighty two dollars and two cents. Both series remain far above last year: the basket has averaged ninety two dollars and four cents a barrel so far in 2026 against seventy one dollars and eighty eight cents in the same period of 2025, and Kuwait Export ninety three dollars and twelve cents against seventy two dollars and seventy one cents.

Front-month futures moved much less. ICE Brent slipped forty six cents on the month to eighty three dollars and ninety seven cents while NYMEX WTI fell two dollars and fifty seven cents to seventy nine dollars and twenty two cents, widening the Brent to WTI spread by two dollars and eleven cents to a premium of four dollars and seventy five cents.

Inventories continue to fall. OECD commercial stocks stood at two thousand seven hundred and twenty nine million barrels at the end of June, twenty six point four million lower on the month, fifty nine point six million lower than a year earlier and two hundred and eighteen point five million below the 2015 to 2019 average. Forward cover fell by a full day to fifty eight point seven days. OPEC’s own balance, which it labels stock change and miscellaneous rather than inventories alone, shows a deficit of two point nine million barrels a day in the first quarter and about five point nine million in the second.

OPEC left its global economic growth forecast for 2027 at three point two percent and trimmed 2026 slightly to three percent, with small reductions for the Eurozone, Japan and Russia and no change for the United States, China, India or Brazil.

Why it matters: Two institutions looking at the same market published forecasts on the same day that differ by two point two million barrels a day on this year and by about two hundred thousand on next year. The shape of that gap over time is the informative part. A disagreement about something structural, the pace of the energy transition being the obvious candidate, would produce a gap that persists into 2027, and on 2027 the two are within about two hundred thousand barrels a day. The divergence is concentrated instead in how each institution reads the depth and the persistence of this year’s disruption, and by extension how much of the lost consumption comes back. OPEC has already booked the recovery: it has demand growing again in the third quarter. The agency has not. Both, notably, describe the same physical picture — OPEC’s balance shows a deficit of about five point nine million barrels a day in the second quarter and OECD inventories two hundred and eighteen million barrels below their 2015 to 2019 average, which is the tightness the agency also described. Despite demand estimates that differ by two point two million barrels a day, both frameworks point to a tight physical market in the near term. What the two numbers disagree about is whether the buyers who left this spring are coming back, and that is a question the third and fourth quarter data will settle rather than either forecast.

Looking ahead: The measure to watch is the third quarter demand print, because it is where the two forecasts are furthest apart in direction as well as size, OPEC at growth of seven hundred thousand barrels a day and the agency at a fall of two point eight million. Whichever way it lands, one of the two will be revising substantially. The second is the pace of the production recovery. The Declaration of Cooperation produced thirty seven point six six million barrels a day in July, about four point seven million below OPEC’s estimate that the market will need forty two point four million from the group in the third quarter. That comparison is indicative rather than a realised shortfall, because July is a single month and output may keep recovering through August and September. The third is inventories: if production stays materially below the quarterly requirement, OPEC’s own balance implies continued stock draws or other balancing adjustments, and forward cover has already fallen to under fifty nine days. OPEC’s next report will carry August production, which will show whether the group’s recovery extends to a third consecutive month.

Sources: Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries, Monthly Oil Market Report, August 2026, published 12 August 2026, tables 1-1, 4-1, 4-2, 5-1, 5-2, 5-6, 5-7, 10-1, 10-2, 11-1 and 11-2. International Energy Agency, Oil Market Report, August 2026, published 12 August 2026, figures as carried in our own coverage of that report.

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