Does premium gas actually help your car perform better than regular gas?

Most cars on the road today don’t require premium gasoline, but recommend it. Does premium gas give drivers better fuel economy or better performance? Premium gasoline is required for some high performance cars, and should those cars should only use premium gasoline.

On the other hand, most newer cars’ owners manual recommend drivers to pump premium gasoline in their cars. Because of advances in automobiles and engine technology, even if owners manuals recommend usage of premium gasoline, the car will run on regular gasoline without any issues, and without harming the engine. Regular gasoline might reduce the performance just a little bit, but not enough for the everyday driver to notice.[1]

Years ago, premium gasoline contained more detergents and additives to stop carbon deposits, but now because of government regulations all grades of gas include these detergents and deposits.

The Science

Premium gas is more expensive because it has higher percentages of octane compared to regular gas. “When vaporized gas mixes with air and fills the combustion chamber, it is compressed by the rising pistons. This makes the gas-air mixture grow hot and it could ignite before the spark plug fires, pushing backward on the piston”[2]. With higher octane percentages, more gas could be compressed with out self igniting. Thus causing the car to perform better when the car is rapidly accelerating.

Todays technology can monitor the low levels of octane, and tune the engine for the appropriate levels of octane within mili seconds. This gives drivers more flexibility in the fuel grades that they select.

Lower grade fuels do not allow the engines to run as much ignition advance as the premium levels do in cases of immediate accelerations. The more ignition advance, the more power that the car can produce. However this power loss is only noticeable when you stomp on the throttle from a dead stop, or change lanes at very high speeds. When accelerating normally, power loss is not noticeable.[3]

There are however some cars that require premium gas. These cars need the extra octane percentage in order to produce the power that the engines are designed for. If the drivers do not use the required gasoline, the engine starts to break down over time, and can lead to major mechanical problems.[4]

In conclusion, excluding cars the REQUIRE premium gas, using regular 87 octane will not have noticeable decrease in power, nor will the gas harm the engine. Spending the extra 20-25 cents per gallon adds up to about 5$ of extra cost per fill up. Cars that are driven regularly with recommended premium fill ups are fine to use regular 87 octane gas with no harm to the engine.[5]