Nature of Operations	9 Months Ended
Sep. 30, 2019
Accounting Policies [Abstract]
Nature of Operations	Nature of Operations Penn Virginia Corporation (together with its consolidated subsidiaries, unless the context otherwise requires, “Penn Virginia,” the “Company,” “we,” “us” or “our”) is an independent oil and gas company engaged in the onshore exploration, development and production of oil, natural gas liquids (“NGLs”) and natural gas. Our current operations consist of drilling unconventional horizontal development wells and operating our producing wells in the Eagle Ford Shale (the “Eagle Ford”) in Gonzales, Lavaca, Fayette and DeWitt Counties in South Texas.

The entire disclosure for the nature of an entity's business, major products or services, principal markets including location, and the relative importance of its operations in each business and the basis for the determination, including but not limited to, assets, revenues, or earnings. For an entity that has not commenced principal operations, disclosures about the risks and uncertainties related to the activities in which the entity is currently engaged and an understanding of what those activities are being directed toward.

Reference 1: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/disclosureRef
-Publisher FASB
-Name Accounting Standards Codification
-Topic 275
-SubTopic 10
-Section 50
-Paragraph 1
-Subparagraph (a)
-URI http://asc.fasb.org/extlink&oid=99393423&loc=d3e5967-108592

Reference 2: http://www.xbrl.org/2003/role/disclosureRef
-Publisher FASB
-Name Accounting Standards Codification
-Topic 275
-URI http://asc.fasb.org/topic&trid=2134479

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