The quote above is the live front-month Natural Gas futures price, the same feed used across Commodity Hub. The rest of this page explains what actually moves that number — the supply and demand drivers, how the forward curve behaves, the seasonal pattern, how to read positioning, and the recurring reports worth watching.
Henry Hub natural gas futures track the U.S. benchmark price for gas delivered at the Henry Hub interchange in Louisiana. It is one of the most seasonal and most volatile commodities on the board — demand swings hard between winter heating and summer power-generation loads, and weekly storage reports move the price sharply.
Weather is the dominant driver, because gas demand is heating in winter and power-generation cooling load in summer. Forecasts for heating and cooling degree days over the next two weeks move the front of the curve every day, and a single cold snap or heat dome can add or remove a large share of national demand within days.
Storage is the scoreboard. The EIA's Weekly Natural Gas Storage Report (Thursdays 10:30 a.m. ET) shows the injection or withdrawal versus the five-year average, and a surprise of even 10–20 Bcf routinely moves the front month several percent. The market spends the year watching whether inventories will end the withdrawal season comfortably full or dangerously low.
Structural supply and demand set the level around which weather swings it. Dry-gas production from the Appalachian, Permian, and Haynesville basins is the supply side; the demand side has been reshaped by LNG export terminals, which now tie U.S. prices to global gas markets, plus coal-to-gas switching in the power sector and industrial load. A new LNG train starting up is a step-change in demand.
Natural gas has the most distinctive forward curve of any major commodity: it is not a single contango or backwardation but a repeating sawtooth, with winter months priced well above the shoulder months around them because that is when the gas is needed and storage is scarce. The most watched spread is March–April, nicknamed the widow-maker, which prices the risk that a cold end to winter drains storage and leaves the market short. Curve analysis in gas is really about reading the seasonal spreads, not a single front-to-back slope.
For the mechanics of reading a curve month by month, see contango vs. backwardation and the roll yield calculator.
Gas seasonality is strong and physically grounded. The withdrawal season runs roughly November to March, the injection (refill) season April to October, with shoulder months in spring and autumn when demand is lowest. Prices and volatility typically peak in winter and again in mid-summer heat, and sag in the shoulders. Our month-by-month natural gas seasonality guide walks through the pattern and the traps in trading it.
Managed money in Henry Hub gas swings between net long and net short far more than in oil, tracking the weather narrative. Because the contract is volatile and positioning turns quickly, COT data is best used to spot crowding just before it unwinds: a large net short into a forecast change, or heavy net length into a warm winter outlook, are the setups where a positioning squeeze amplifies the fundamental move. Combine it with the storage surplus or deficit to the five-year average.
Background: how to read the COT report.
The market data calendar lists when these are released.
Relevant background: seasonality, contango and backwardation, and roll yield.
Why is natural gas so much more volatile than oil?
Gas is expensive to store and hard to move between regions, so supply and demand have to balance almost in real time. When a cold snap lifts demand there is little slack to absorb it, and price does the adjusting. Daily weather-forecast revisions feed straight into the front of the curve.
What is the 'widow-maker' spread?
The price difference between the March and April natural gas futures contracts. March is the last month of winter withdrawal season and April the first of injection season, so the spread prices the risk of a late cold spell draining storage. It has produced spectacular blow-ups for traders who were short it into a cold March, hence the name.
When is the EIA natural gas storage report released?
Thursdays at 10:30 a.m. Eastern, covering the week ending the previous Friday. It reports the change in working gas in underground storage and is compared against both the prior year and the five-year average for the same week.
What is natural gas's futures ticker and contract size?
Henry Hub natural gas trades on NYMEX as NG, shown as NG=F for the continuous front month. Each contract is 10,000 MMBtu, so a $0.001 move is worth $10. A smaller contract (QG) covers 2,500 MMBtu.
Commodity Hub tracks Natural Gas alongside 30 other commodities with historical charts, forward curves, COT positioning, seasonality, and price alerts. Open the app to see it live, or browse the full commodity list.