Louisiana gas tax
State fuel excise · tax year 2026 · federal tax excluded
On a 20-gallon fill
$4
Over 500 gallons
$100
Per gallon
20.0¢
state only
Rate rank
42
1 is the highest
What Louisiana charges at the pump
- Think of it as a charge per tank rather than a rate. In Louisiana that charge is $4 every twenty gallons, and $100 across a year of five hundred. The state ranks 42 in the country. Nobody ever quotes it this way, which is why almost nobody knows what they pay.
- Diesel is not punished in Louisiana. A twenty-gallon diesel fill carries $4 of state tax against $4 on ordinary fuel — the same or less. Most states go the other way and charge diesel more, so this is worth knowing if you drive one.
- The headline rate is not quite the whole story in Louisiana. There are separate charges on fuel too — inspection fees, environmental levies, that sort of thing — and they add $0.19 to a twenty-gallon fill on top of the main tax. Small on its own. Included in the price all the same.
- Expressed per transaction rather than per gallon, Louisiana's fuel excise is $4 on a twenty-gallon fill and $100 annually at five hundred gallons, ranking 42 nationally. ⚠️ Federal excise is excluded. Per-gallon quotation is conventional but obscures incidence: the same rate costs an efficient vehicle materially less per mile, so the tax is regressive with respect to vehicle age in a way the headline figure never shows.
- Louisiana taxes diesel at or below its gasoline rate: $4 per twenty gallons against $4. ⚠️ This is the minority arrangement nationally — most states levy a premium on diesel to recover the heavier road wear associated with the vehicles that burn it — so Louisiana's structure is a genuine cost difference for freight rather than a rounding artifact.
- Louisiana reports additional fuel levies apart from its principal excise — typically inspection, environmental or underground-storage charges — contributing $0.19 per twenty-gallon fill. ⚠️ These are reported separately by the state and are excluded from the headline rate on which the national rank is computed, so a like-for-like comparison against another state requires knowing whether that state folds equivalents into its main rate or reports them apart.
Your year of fuel tax
A $75,000 salary
| State fuel taxper gallon | 20¢ |
|---|---|
| Fuel tax, year | $125 |
| You must earn | $185 |
| Hours of work | 5.1 hr |
State excise only. Federal fuel tax and any local levy are not included.
Tax in a tank
A $75,000 salary
| State rate | 20¢ a gallon |
|---|---|
| Tank costs | $44.80 |
| Fifty tanks a year | $140.00 |
State excise only. The federal fuel tax and any local levy are on top of this.
Gasoline, diesel, and the charges reported separately
Per-gallon rates are shown as Louisiana publishes them, to a tenth of a cent. The money columns are what those rates come to on a 20-gallon fill and across 500 gallons. Federal tax is charged on top of all of it and is not included.
| Fuel | Per gallon | On a fill | Over a year |
|---|---|---|---|
| Gasoline | 20.0¢ | $4 | $100 |
| Diesel | 20.0¢ | $4 | $100 |
| Other state charges | 0.9¢ | $0.19 | — |
What this page cannot tell you
- ⚠️ Federal fuel tax is charged on top of all this and is not included above. It is the same everywhere in the country.
- The tank and the year here are round reference amounts, not a guess at your driving. Your own total scales directly with the gallons you actually buy in Louisiana.
- And some places add local fuel taxes of their own on top of the state's. Those are not counted here.
- ⚠️ Federal motor fuel excise applies in addition to every figure on this page and is deliberately excluded, being uniform nationally. Including it would raise each state's figure by the same amount and compress the differences this page exists to show.
- Quantities are reference points rather than estimates of consumption: liability is strictly proportional to gallons purchased, so any household's figure is this one scaled by its own volume. ⚠️ Fuel purchased outside Louisiana is taxed by the state where it is bought, which is why the figures describe purchases rather than mileage.
- Local option fuel taxes exist in a number of states and are excluded from these figures, which cover the state levy only. Where a county or city in Louisiana imposes its own charge, the true per-gallon burden at that address exceeds what this page reports.
Questions people ask
Why is there no tax line on my fuel receipt?
It is already in the price on the sign. The levy is charged per gallon further up the chain, so there is nothing to add at the pump and nothing to itemize.
Is this a cheap state for this?
Near the bottom: 42 of 51. Low tax and low price are not the same thing, and only the first is set by the state.
Is diesel taxed the same as gasoline?
It has a separate rate, below the gasoline one in this state. The two are set independently, generally on arguments about road damage from heavy freight.
Why does motor fuel excise not appear as a separate charge?
Motor fuel excise is levied per gallon at the distributor or terminal, not at retail, so it is embedded in the pump price and not separately stated. Because it is volumetric rather than ad valorem, liability per gallon is invariant to the retail price and its real value erodes with inflation absent legislative change.
Where does this state sit in the national distribution?
This state ranks 42 of 51, in the lower third. ⚠️ Excise rank is a poor proxy for retail price: production, distribution and retail margin dominate the final figure, and the tax component is the only part under state control.
How does the diesel rate relate to the gasoline rate here?
Diesel is taxed at a rate set independently of gasoline and is lower in this state. The differential is generally justified by road-wear attribution to heavy vehicles rather than by fuel characteristics, and several states index the two grades differently.