Petrol, unleaded · per litre · 1938 Estimated
This figure may be significantly off. It is projected back 52 years from the first recorded price, using general inflation. Items do not track inflation evenly — groceries in particular were far more expensive relative to other goods before modern agriculture, so a figure this old can understate the real price by two-fold or more. Use it for a sense of scale, not as a historical price.
1.4pin June 1938 — about £1.32 in today's money.
- Price in 19381.4p
- Same money today£1.32
- Estimated price today · projected from January 2025£1.49
- Change since 1938+10938%
Price history
Record & method
No price was recorded for 1938. This figure is estimated: we took the earliest observed price (February 1990) and moved it back along the category inflation curve — a back-cast of 52 years. The further back it reaches, the less it should be trusted. Treat it as an approximation, not a historical fact.
- Source
- Office for National Statistics (ONS), dataset MM23. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
- Series title
- RPI: Ave price - Ultra low sulphur/Unleaded petrol, per litre
- Series
- CZMK
- Estimated for
- June 1938
- Coverage
- February 1990 – January 2025
- Adjusted by
- CDKO · 16.8 → 1638.4 (May 2026)
- Back-cast
- 52 years before the first record · very low confidence
- License
- Open Government Licence v3.0