The increase in supply of crude has led to a dramatic slump in its price which has refused to bounce back as initially speculated. In effect, oil and gas industry is experiencing turmoil in its businesses and operations; therefore it is essential that there is a re-structure in these activities to negate the effect. This can only be attained if it adopts a smarter and cost-effective approach. The only acceptable condition under which chemical enhanced oil recovery can continue to apply in this era of low crude oil price is if the chemicals are cheap, multifunctional and considered to be smart. This study presents a review of chemical enhanced oil recovery and its applicability in uneconomic times. The success of CEOR is highly dependent on the microscopic and macroscopic recovery mechanisms involved as well as the reservoir rock physico-geochemical nature. Synergistic methods in CEOR is considered to be cost-effective as they exploit a combination of recovery mechanisms simultaneous in order to improve sweep efficiency, however before deployment, the technique and design must be tested extensively via lab core floods, pilot projects and dedicated numeric simulations. A Cheaper and potentially cost-effective chemical agent is the new breeds of giant-molecule surfactants. A special type of polymeric surfactants is the wormlike micelle solutions that even have superior rheological properties as they possess the tendency to increase recovery at minimal cost.