December 2025

North Dakota's oil month in December 2025, from the public record.

Written on November 8, 2026, looking back. This issue was not published in December 2025. It is assembled now from today's public records, with what was known later, so that every month since January 2003 has an issue.

The month in numbers

Oil output1,129,548barrels a day5.8% below the month before · 5.5% below a year earlier

Wells reporting oil18,661plus 174 confidential wells whose volumes are withheld

Wells spudded47oil and gas wells, by spud date

Orders signed71156 spacing and 49 pooling actions

Crude price$51.85a barrel, first purchase$63.89 a year earlier

Flared share of reported gas4.1%

Oil output, January 2003 to August 2026; the dot marks December 2025.

Drilling

47 oil and gas wells have a spud date in December 2025 in the state's wells layer of November 6, 2026. By county: Williams 22, Mountrail 9, Dunn 6, Burke 5, McKenzie 5.

Hearings and orders

71 Industrial Commission orders signed in December 2025 are in the project's order index, with 156 spacing and 49 pooling actions on spacing units. Most frequent applicants: Hunt Oil Co. (13), Oasis Petroleum North America LLC (13), Continental Resources, Inc. (12). The facts are machine-extracted from the signed orders and not individually reviewed.

Operators

108 operators filed rows in the December 2025 report. Most wells reported: Continental Resources, Inc. (2,749), Devon Energy Williston, L.L.C. (2,080), Hess Bakken Investments II, LLC (1,984), Whiting Oil and Gas Corporation (1,972), Oasis Petroleum North America LLC (1,770).

The operator of record changed on 53 wells since their previous report.

Stephens Williston, LLC Dba Seg Williston, LLC to Swanson Oil & Gas LLC: 32 wells
Cobra Oil & Gas Corporation to Palo Alto Energy, LLC: 17 wells

A change of operator of record is what the reports show; it does not say why. Sales, mergers, renamed legal entities and new contract operators all look the same. Names are as the reports spell them.

Sources

Oil output and price: U.S. Energy Information Administration, monthly state series (public domain), as published today.
Wells reporting, withheld wells, operators and flared gas: the free NDIC Monthly Production Reports for December 2025, as first reported (workbook).
Spud dates: the DMR GIS wells layer of November 6, 2026.
Orders: the project's index of signed NDIC orders (facts only; see the well index).

Not an official record of the State of North Dakota. Not engineering, investment or legal advice. Every figure is in the archive data file.