Sweet crude

Sweet crude is crude oil with low sulfur content, which costs less to refine into clean fuels and therefore usually trades at a premium to sourer grades.

Sweet crude contains relatively little sulfur, which means a refinery can turn it into gasoline, diesel, and other clean fuels with less processing than a sourer oil would require. This lower cost to refine is why sweet crude has historically traded at a premium to sour grades, though the exact gap depends on how much of each type of refining capacity is available at the time.

WTI and Dated Brent, the two most widely quoted crude oil benchmarks, are both light, sweet grades, which is part of why they are useful reference points: light, sweet oil can be processed by the widest range of refineries worldwide, making it the most broadly comparable type of crude. The opposite grade, with more sulfur, is sour crude.