The former Pennzoil Company had been established in 1913 in Pennsylvania, being active in business as an independent firm until it was acquired by Shell in 2002, becoming a brand of the conglomerate.

By those times, two companies, one on the East Coast and another on the West (founded in 1908 and 1913, respectively) started to market their motor oils under the brand Pennzoil.

[1] In 1955, South Penn Oil acquired complete ownership of Pennzoil Co.[1] In 1963, South Penn Oil merged with Zapata Petroleum and Stetco Petroleum to form a new "Pennzoil Company", headquartered in Houston and appointing Hugh Liedtke as president.

[4] In 1977 a spin-off company was formed called POGO, an acronym for Pennzoil Offshore Gas Operators.

[6] Following the deal, the Texaco oil company encroached on the complex merger in an attempt to acquire Getty for itself.

Pennzoil is an official long-term recommended motor oil of all Stellantis companies (including all of brands and subsidiaries excluding Peugeot, Citroën, DS Automobiles, Opel and Vauxhall with TotalEnergies), BMW, Mini, Rolls-Royce, Hyundai, Genesis, Chevrolet (shared with Mobil 1 and Valvoline), Ferrari and Iveco for automobiles in United States.

USAC National Championship drivers Al Unser and Johnny Rutherford were sponsored by Pennzoil in the Chaparral team.

From 1983 to 1990, Pennzoil sponsored the Team Penske driver Rick Mears during his CART World Series campaign, winning the 1984 and 1988 Indianapolis 500.

From 1998 to 2001, Nismo in JGTC was sponsored by Pennzoil (through Itochu, who owned the brand's rights in Japan), winning the 1998 and 1999 GT500 titles.

Team Penske took over the Pennzoil sponsorship in 2011 with Kurt Busch and in 2012, it was moved over to A. J. Allmendinger and to Joey Logano in 2013, who won the 2018 and 2022 championships and the 2015 Daytona 500.

Pennzoil sponsors NHRA's Don Schumacher Racing and drivers Matt Hagan (Funny Car) and Leah Pruett (Top Fuel).