I used a discount petrol app for a month – here’s how much I saved

Let’s face it, fuel prices are getting ridiculous. Since 2020, the average unleaded petrol price has risen by 67.7 cents.

As a result, it’s all anyone is talking about; fuel price cycles and how to save.

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I drive roughly 200km per week, regularly travelling from South Sydney out to the West on motorways, making trips to and from the station and a few local errands each week for necessities.

Over the month of January 2024, I spent a total of $171 on petrol, paying between 206 cents to 222 cents per litre once a fortnight for a full tank of fuel. 

So, I decided to find out if using a discount fuel app can actually save enough money to make a difference.

Fuel price app MotorMouth allows motorists to find the best value fuel from the closest petrol station. At first, MotorMouth was a website, until 2013, when they launched a smartphone app, currently still available to download for free on both the App Store and Google Play.

I picked MotorMouth for a variety of reasons. It has fuel data from all around Australia, and it doesn’t make you pay for extra features. Several people who reviewed it on the App Store said they were glad they downloaded it and found it saved them a lot of running around to find cheap fuel, so I hoped it would do the same for me.

MotorMouth relies on roaming drivers, major fuel retailers, service station operators and government sources to provide timely and accurate details of the price of fuel at an outlet to help fellow motorists get the best possible deal.

MotorMouth reports prices for around 4500 Australian service stations each day, continuously adding more locations as new users who discover the app contribute by posting the prices they encounter. Using a colour-coded system, servos with prices in the cheapest range are indicated by a green dot, mid-range prices are coloured yellow, and the most expensive prices are shown with red dots. Selecting a coloured dot displays information about the station and the price of fuel.

The MotorMouth app includes useful features such as locating the cheapest price nearby on a colour-coded map, determining the best time to buy through market trends and forecasts in fuel prices, saving your favourite servo locations and the option to contribute fuel prices to help your fellow motorists.

For a month, I filled up with 98 octane using the recommended fuel stations from MotorMouth and compared the results with my previous month of filling up.

So, what's the verdict?

The results are in. It works!

Using this app over the course of a month of regular driving, I managed to considerably reduce my total fuel expenses to $162 (down from $171 the month prior), saving between 5-8 per cent compared to what I’d typically spend.

The app successfully showed me cheaper alternatives for every top-up and I was able to find the most convenient, cost-effective petrol station each time.

However, this was not without its downsides. My driving became a lot more deliberate. Planning trips around which fuel station to visit often required me to drive further and use more fuel to locate the cheaper servos. Additionally, I found myself filling up at more independent and lesser-known fuel stations, such as Metro Petroleum and Speedway.

The truth is there will always be a demand for fuel, and regardless of any strategies you use, your fuel expenses will still roughly follow the curve of the average fuel price. There aren’t any apps that can prevent you from paying more as the price of fuel rises across the country.

What the MotorMouth app does promise, though, is that regardless of the average price, you’ll have access to the best deal you can get every time – if you're willing to put in a little extra effort to locate the savings.