Natural Gas (NG) futures seasonality: sixteen years of month-by-month tendency, win rates and average change.
Futures Seasonality · 15-Year Study
Based on the last 15 completed calendar years · Updated for 2026
They call natural gas the widow-maker for a reason, and the 15-year calendar shows why: the biggest seasonal swings on the board, running almost exactly opposite to what intuition says. The winter months everyone fears being short have been the ones that fall the hardest. Here is the month-by-month record.
Natural Gas (NG) — Average Monthly Change
15-year average, by calendar month. Hover any bar for the detail.
Every calendar month, ranked as it falls on the calendar. “Win rate” is how often natural gas closed the month higher; “avg change” is the mean move; “range” is the average high-to-low travel within the month.
| Month | Up / Down | Win rate | Avg change | Avg range |
|---|
Table view doubles as the accessible read of the chart above.
The calendar runs backwards from intuition. The strongest stretch is not winter. It is April, higher 13 of the last 15 years (87%) with an average gain of 7.2%, followed by a firm August-through-November run as the market prices the coming winter in advance. By the time the cold actually arrives, the story is already owned.
December is the widow-maker’s month. Down 11 of the last 15 years with an average loss of 11.1%, it is the single worst month-and-magnitude combination we track in any contract. January follows at a 33% win rate, averaging another 5.7% decline. Winter is when the winter premium dies, and the record says it dies hard.
Size accordingly, always. Natural gas’s average monthly range runs 18 to 28%, double or triple most contracts on this site. Even its best seasonal, that 87% April, comes with 20% average travel inside the month. In this market the seasonal count tells you the lean; the range tells you why the lean alone has buried people.
A seasonal average tells you the backdrop. It doesn’t tell you where natural gas sits against that backdrop today, whether this year is tracking the norm 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 month is historically best for natural gas?
April, higher 13 of the last 15 years (87%) with an average gain of 7.2%. The late-summer stretch from August through November also leans firmly positive as winter gets priced in advance.
Which month is worst for natural gas?
December, down 11 of the last 15 years (a 27% win rate) with an average loss of 11.1%, the deepest seasonal hole of any contract we track. January leans the same way.
Is natural gas seasonality reliable enough to trade on?
The shape is strong but the swings are enormous, with average monthly ranges of 18 to 28%. Seasonality tells you the lean; position size and the current tape decide survival, and the daily brief tracks where this year actually sits against the record.
Seasonal tendencies are drawn from 15 years of historical Natural Gas futures data and describe the past. They are not a forecast and not trading advice. Markets can and do trade against their seasonal record in any given year. © 2026 The Traders Brief.