U.S. West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI) <CLc1> for November, that is expiring on Thursday, was at $83.17 a barrel, up 35 cents, or 0.4%.
Register now for FREE unlimited access to Reuters.com RegisterU.S. crude inventories fell unexpectedly last week - down 1.7 million barrels, weekly government showed, against expectations for a build of 1.4 million barrels.
SPR levels fell 3.6 million barrels to just over 405 million, the lowest since May 1984.
The EU's sanctions on Russian crude and oil products will take effect in December and February, respectively.
There were also some signs of resurgent Chinese oil demand, including private mega refiner Zhejiang Petrochemical Corp (ZPC) and state-run ChemChina receiving further import quotas.