Heating Oil / ULSD (HO) delivery months at a glance — every contract's record over its tenure as the lead month.
Futures Seasonality · Contract-Month Study
Every contract 2010–2026, measured over its tenure as the lead contract · Updated for 2026
Here is the one that surprises people: the January heating oil contract, the peak-of-winter delivery everyone instinctively wants to own, has been the worst contract on the HO board. The contracts that actually pay lead through the dead of winter and early autumn. This study measures all 193 HO contracts since 2010, each over its own time in the lead.
Most seasonality tables slice the calendar. This one slices the contracts. Each delivery month below is measured over its time as the lead contract: from the open of the day it takes over the front of the board to the close of the day it hands off the lead. No roll gaps, no splicing, one contract per observation. An HO contract leads for roughly a month, ending a few sessions before its expiration when volume hands off to the next month, the same roll convention used across all Traders Brief research.
Heating Oil (HO) — Average Change by Contract Month
Average change while each contract leads the board. Hover any bar for the detail.
Each row is a delivery month: how many of its 16 contracts since 2010 rose while leading, the average change over the tenure, and the average high-to-low range. “Typically leads” is the median window that contract runs the board.
| Contract | Typically leads | Up / Down | Win rate | Avg change | Avg range |
|---|
Table view doubles as the accessible read of the chart above.
The deep-winter contracts are the payers. The February (G) contract is the most consistent on the board, up 12 of 16 tenures (75%), and the March (H) contract behind it is the biggest mover, averaging a 4.2% gain at a 69% clip while leading through late January and early February. When cold actually bites, it is these contracts on the screen, and their record shows it.
The January contract is the trap. Leading from mid-November to mid-December, the F contract has risen just 6 of 16 times with an average loss of 2.8%. By the time it takes the board, the winter story is fully owned and priced, and its tenure is where that premium has gone to die. The December (Z) contract just ahead of it leans the same way.
The autumn diesel trade shows up in the November contract. The X contract, leading through late September and early October, has gained in 11 of 16 tenures (69%), averaging 2.9%, the quiet second season on the HO calendar as harvest, freight, and pre-winter stocking demand all pull at the barrel. A 69% contract sitting in what most people consider the off-season is exactly the kind of count worth knowing.
A contract’s record tells you how its month has treated the lead position historically. It doesn’t tell you where the current lead contract sits today, whether this cycle is tracking the record or fighting it, or the levels that matter into the next session. That is what The Traders Brief does every morning, across energy, metals, and the indexes.
See today’s read →Which heating oil contract month is historically strongest?
The February (G) contract, up 12 of 16 tenures (75%). The March (H) contract is the biggest average gainer at +4.2% while leading.
Which heating oil contract month is weakest?
The January (F) contract, up just 6 of 16 (38%) with an average loss of 2.8% during its mid-November to mid-December tenure, despite being the peak-winter delivery month.
When does each HO contract become the front month?
Roughly a month before its named month: the January contract typically leads from about November 18 to December 16. The table above shows each contract’s typical window.
Contract tendencies are drawn from 16 years of individual Heating Oil futures contract history (2010–2026), each measured over its own tenure as the lead contract, and describe the past. They are not a forecast and not trading advice. Markets can and do trade against their record in any given year. © 2026 The Traders Brief.