Seven key members of OPEC+, including Saudi Arabia and Russia, agreed on Sunday to raise oil production by 188,000 barrels per day from September, marking another step in the group’s gradual unwinding of voluntary output cuts.

The decision was confirmed in a joint statement by the seven participating countries: Saudi Arabia, Russia, Iraq, Kuwait, Kazakhstan, Algeria and Oman. Analysts had widely anticipated the move.

The September increase completes the rollback of the second of three production-cut packages that OPEC+ had introduced. Jorge Leon, analyst at Rystad Energy, said that ‘OPEC+ has finished unwinding its voluntary cuts,’ with the next challenge being the management of any surplus as export flows return to normal levels.

That normalisation, however, remains some way off. The Strait of Hormuz, a critical artery for Gulf oil exports, has been severely constrained amid the ongoing conflict in the Middle East, with Iran playing a central role in disrupting shipping. A brief uptick in traffic followed a US-Iran memorandum of understanding signed in June, but conditions have not substantially improved since. Leon cautioned that ‘today’s decision changes little in the near term because Hormuz remains constrained’ and that the real market impact will only materialise once standard export flows resume.

A further complication is that several OPEC+ members cannot meet their existing production targets due to declining capacity, which limits the practical significance of raising those targets further. Giovanni Staunovo, analyst at UBS, noted that the gap between official quotas and actual output makes headline increases less meaningful for the market.

Russia faces its own constraints. Ukrainian drone strikes on oil infrastructure have kept production hovering around nine million barrels per day, well below its stated target of 9.8 million barrels per day.

Looking further ahead, Leon suggested a pause is likely in the fourth quarter as the group turns its attention to quota negotiations for 2027. Analysts at DNB Carnegie similarly flagged that OPEC+ faces potentially difficult internal discussions over new production quotas beginning next year.

Some member countries, including Iraq, have expressed a desire to significantly boost output, though the path to doing so remains unclear given prevailing infrastructure and geopolitical constraints.

For now, the geopolitical backdrop is obscuring the true scale of the supply shift. As Leon put it, that picture will become considerably clearer once export flows genuinely begin to normalise.