Americans face high prices at the pumps as gas prices have skyrocketed to an average of $3.88 a gallon – but some states are seeing more than $6.
Thankfully there is an app that can guide you to cheaper stations.
The navigation tool Waze uses crowdsourcing, allowing the public to share gas prices along routes.
Users select the ‘Where to’ option and a gas icon will appear, showing nearby stations and how much each one charges per gallon.
Waze can guide you to cheaper gas stations nearby. Users select the ‘Where to’ option and a gas icon will appear, showing nearby stations and how much each one charges per gallon
The Gas Station feature in Waze must first be activated in Settings, letting users select the preferred gas type, brand and distance from their current location.
And then, users can see nearby gas stations, distance, address, price, and the last time the price per gallon was updated.
The hike in gas prices has been caused in part by cuts to oil supply by Russia and Saudi Arabia and hot weather in the US, which has harmed the output of many refineries.
As usual, California had the highest prices in the nation, with an average of $5.17, and pump prices more than $6 in its remote Mono County bordering Yosemite National Park.
By contrast, in Texas, the average price for a gallon of unleaded was $3.46, up from around $3 just a month ago. They were the cheapest in Mississippi and Louisiana, at $3.32 and $3.42, respectively.
In the last month, national average gas prices have climbed 28 cents, and since the Fourth of July, around 32 cents.
But prices are still well down from the peak average of $5 in June 2022 – around four months after the Russian invasion of Ukraine. At this time last summer, the national average was $4.28 per gallon.
The Gas Station feature in Waze must first be activated in Settings, letting users select the preferred gas type, brand and distance from their current location. Users can see nearby gas stations, distance, address, price, and the last time the price per gallon was updated
‘We appear to be at a fork in the road when it comes to which direction gas prices will take – up or down,’ said AAA spokesperson Andrew Gross.
‘The summer heat that kept people home and suppressed refinery production has eased for now, so we have to look at the cost of oil to determine if the recent price climb is ending.’
Ongoing hikes to fuel prices are likely to cause inflation to rise through August, an expert told Business Insider.
An AAA spokesperson noted last month that ‘the primary culprit is a higher oil price.’
The gas price high comes with oil prices approaching $90 a barrel, and some analysts predict it could surpass that level.
In February, Goldman Sachs predicted oil could reach $100 a barrel this year thanks to the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) production cuts.
