On August 4, 2026, US President Donald Trump said a deal over the Strait of Hormuz could be reached "tomorrow or the next day," adding that "a lot of progress has been made" (The Guardian, 2026-08-05). Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent echoed that assessment, according to the same source. Iran's Foreign Minister Abbas Araqchi separately told Reuters that Tehran's negotiations with Oman were in their final stages (Reuters, 2026-08-02.

But the two sides are not really talking about the same thing.

The Strait of Hormuz is a narrow strip of water between Iran and Oman. Before the current conflict, about a fifth of all the world's oil and gas passed through it on ships. It has been effectively shut since February 28, 2026, causing global energy prices to shoot up. The shutdown followed fighting in the Gulf that broke out after a June 2026 agreement between the US and Iran fell apart within about a week, with each side blaming the other for breaking the deal.

That June agreement, promoted by the White House as "America First in Action," was supposed to reopen the strait so ships could pass through without paying tolls, and require Iran to give up its nuclear program (White House, 2026-06-19. The administration listed "Hormuz Fully Reopened" among its top achievements. It did not hold. Trump's stated objectives against Iran, laid out by the White House in April 2026, included obliterating Iran's missile production, annihilating its navy, and severing its support for designated terrorist groups (White House. A national emergency with respect to Iran had been reaffirmed by executive order in February 2026 (White House, 2026-02-06.

The current talks are not direct US-Iran negotiations. They go through Oman, a country that has often acted as a go-between for the two. Iran's state-run broadcaster IRIB, citing an informed source, reported that any agreement between Iran and Oman on ship passage "has nothing to do with the immediate opening of the strait" and that the talks are "purely Iranian-Omani" with "no connection to the United States" (The Guardian, 2026-08-05. Iranian Foreign Ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei reinforced that line on August 2, stating that the strait "will never return to the situation that existed before the war" and that the Omani agreement does not mean reopening (IRNA, 2026-08-02.

Tehran's conditions for any reopening are clear. IRIB reported that "if US violations continue, the Strait of Hormuz will not open even with an agreement between Iran and Oman," and that opening depends on "a change in behaviour and correction of US violations." A central Iranian demand is the removal of the US naval blockade on Iranian ports, which means American warships are blocking ships from entering or leaving Iran's harbors. Iran has also pushed for greater control of the strait itself, a demand Washington firmly rejects (The Guardian, 2026-08-05.

Iran's Parliament Speaker added a time limit in early July, stating that passage through the strait would be free of charge for only 60 days and that Iran would not back down from its rights in the waterway (IRNA, 2026-07-01. On July 9, Iran said foreigners "have no stake" in the strait and warned about a gradual reopening (IRNA, 2026-07-09. The United States, for its part, has sought free transit through the strait during the talks (Reuters, 2026-07-11.

Trump's description of the prospective deal includes "the immediate, complete and total opening of the strait" and "an end to Iran's nuclear threat" (Al Jazeera, 2026-08-02. He also said he expected negotiations to begin within a day or two to reopen the strait and create a pathway for Iran to address its nuclear program (The Guardian, 2026-08-03.

The central problem is that Trump is describing a comprehensive US-Iran settlement, while Tehran is describing a maritime arrangement with Oman that explicitly excludes Washington and does not guarantee reopening. The June agreement, which similarly paired strait reopening with nuclear concessions and a US blockade lift, lasted about a week before fighting resumed. Whether the current Omani channel can avoid the same fate is the question the next 48 hours will begin to answer.

The broader context here is that Iran's threat calculus has not softened. Tehran has explicitly warned that if the United States continues to threaten Iran, the strait stays shut, agreement or not. The proposed June agreement called for both reopening the strait and lifting the US naval blockade on Iranian ports (Reuters, 2026-06-12. Neither condition has been fulfilled. What has changed since June is the involvement of Oman and the narrowing of the negotiating track to a maritime framework between just two countries, which may lower the political temperature but also lowers the ceiling of what any deal can deliver.

For energy markets, the difference between a limited arrangement for ship passage and a full reopening of the strait is everything. A framework for Omani-flagged or jointly managed vessel passages would not restore the pre-war flow of a waterway carrying 20 percent of global oil and gas. It would be a first step, not a resolution.