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Topline
Fewer American adults than ever are drinking alcohol, a new Gallup poll showed Wednesday, while more people admit that even moderate alcohol consumption is bad for their health.
Friends toast each other as they drink a beer.
AFP via Getty Images
Key Facts
Only 54% of adults told Gallup they drink at all, the most recent data shows, a record-low number and a 4% drop from 2024.
Young people self-reported a lower amount of drinking compared to their older peers, with 50% of people ages 18 to 24 saying they drink alcohol, compared to 56% of people over age 35.
Men reported drinking more (57% compared to 51% of women), and white adults (56%) said they drink more than people of color (52%).
For the first time in the history of Gallup’s poll, a majority of Americans also said that drinking in moderation, even “one or two drinks a day,” is bad for their health.
Fifty-three percent of respondents said drinking was unhealthy, a sharp rise from the 28% who believed that to be true in 2018 and 39% in 2023.
Fewer people also said they believed drinking could be beneficial—25% of people believed that in 2005, down to 19% in 2016 and 6% this year.
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Surprising Fact
The number of Republicans who say they drink dropped significantly from 2023. That year, 65% of Republicans said they drink, compared with 46% in 2025. Comparatively, 55% of Independents reported drinking this year (a 6 percentage point drop from 2023) and 61% of Democrats said they drink (down 3%).
Contra
Despite less drinking, sales of alcohol remain virtually unchanged. Total alcohol sales of beer, wine, spirits, seltzers and ready-to-drink cocktails fell in 2024 for the first time in three years, according to data firm NIQ, but barely—sales dipped less than 1%, from $113.6 billion to $112.9 billion.
Key Background
Generation Z, people born between 1997 and 2012, have always reported drinking less than their older peers. There’s no one clear reason for alcohol’s decline in popularity among Gen Z, but experts have pointed to several possible factors, including the rise of the legal drinking age to 21 and the way social drinking has evolved. Sybil Marsh, a doctor and addiction specialist, told Time “there was a time where drinking some alcohol was a badge of maturity and was sophisticated. But now, it’s only one out of a whole range of ways that people can relax or show sophistication and so on.” The shift away from drinking in young people has also changed the alcoholic beverage industry. The no- and low-alcohol drink industry is expected to grow by 25% between 2022 and 2026, according to data from drinks market analysis firm IWSR, and legacy alcohol brands like Anheuser-Busch have said nonalcoholic options are starting to account for higher percentages of sales.
Tangent
The “sober curious” lifestyle—which means a person is trying out alcohol abstinence—is growing in popularity among Gen Z and millennials. The hashtag #sobercurious has over 142,000 videos on TikTok of creators sharing their experience with the movement, almost twice as many from May 2024. Sober-curious trends like Dry January and Sober October, which involve drinking no alcohol for the month, have also gained popularity. Some 35% of American adults participated in the Dry January challenge in 2022, compared to 21% in 2019.
