Recently, most drilling for oil and gas has focused on the Marcellus Shale, The Marcellus Shale, a deep rock layer that holds large amounts of natural gas. It can now be reached using new drilling methods such as hydraulic fracturing, leading to thousands of wells, economic growth, and concerns about water, land rights, and regulations. The Utica Shale is also being explored, mostly in the Northern Panhandle and far western areas. This is especially true when gas prices are low because Utica Shale can produce both oil and gas.

Some older methods, like vertical drilling, are still used in the upper Devonian shales. In most of the state west of the Allegheny Front, natural gas is found more often than oil, typically in thin sandstone layers from the Devonian and Mississippian time periods. Oil is mainly found in northern and central West Virginia.