Wyoming Gas Creeps to $3 — But Drivers Still Ahead of Last Year

With input from K2 Radio, Wyoming Tribune Eagle, and Oil City News.

Wyoming’s weekly pump check shows a tiny nudge higher: the statewide average rose 1.4 cents to land right at $3.00 a gallon, per GasBuddy’s survey of 494 stations. That’s the headline. The context is kinder — prices are still 5.9 cents cheaper than a month ago and 17.9 cents below where we were this time last year.

Bargain hunters can still find deals if they’re willing to drive a bit. The cheapest price spotted Sunday was $2.55 a gallon, while the state’s high topped out at $3.99 — a $1.44 swing that makes shopping around worth it. Natrona County continues to punch below its weight with the state’s lowest average at $2.67 after a weekly jump of 18 cents; the rock-bottom local price was $2.55 at Smith’s on CY Ave., with several others clustered in the $2.58–$2.59 range. Campbell County isn’t far behind at about $2.80 on average, and Albany County has edged back into the top tier at roughly the same level.

Zooming out, the national picture moved the other way. The US average fell 6.4 cents to $3.02 a gallon, down 13.7 cents from a month ago and 14.4 cents versus a year back, according to more than 11 million weekly station reports. Diesel eased as well, slipping 3.5 cents to $3.628. AAA’s read is a shade higher than GasBuddy’s — about $3.08 nationally and $3.03 for Wyoming — but the direction of travel is the same: broadly lower than late summer.

Why the split between Wyoming’s slight rise and the national slide? Part of it is simple timing and local supply. The latest federal data show gasoline inventories down modestly from the five-year norm while refineries nudged utilization to the low 90s, and implied gasoline demand popped to just under 8.9 million barrels per day. Layer in a fresh dip in crude — West Texas Intermediate briefly slid under $60 after tariff saber-rattling with China — and you get a tug-of-war: cheaper oil pulling prices down nationally while local retail markets work through their own supply quirks and competitive pressures.

Market psychology matters too. GasBuddy’s Patrick De Haan says drivers are on the cusp of seeing a “2-handle” nationally for the first time in years if crude stays soft and state taxes don’t get in the way. He even floated the possibility that a few stations in places like Oklahoma, Texas, or Wisconsin could flirt with prices below $2 — levels not seen since the pandemic. Whether Wyoming shares that moment depends on how quickly the crude drop filters into rack prices here and how aggressively stations compete in the shoulder season.

For road-trippers, neighboring markets are a mixed bag. Fort Collins slid to roughly $2.79 on average, Ogden hovered near $3.29, and Billings held around $3.05. Translation: cross-border fills can make sense, but the savings aren’t uniform.

If you like a little history with your fill-up, Wyoming’s current $3 average looks tame compared with recent Octobers: statewide averages were around $3.67 in 2023 and $3.85 in 2022. You have to go back to 2020 to see widespread prices beginning with a “2,” and that was during a very different economy.

Bottom line for Wyoming drivers: we inched up a hair this week while the country kept easing lower, but the bigger trend still favors consumers. With crude softer, inventories adequate, and demand past its summer peak, the odds lean toward steadier — or even slightly cheaper — fall driving. Keep an eye on local competition and those wide intra-state spreads; a little price scouting can still save more than a buck a gallon depending on where you pull in.