US drinking rate holds at a record low for a second year

The share of US adults who say they drink alcohol has remained at 54% for a second consecutive year, sustaining the lowest level in Gallup’s polling trend dating to 1939.

The result follows a marked decline from 62% in 2023 to 58% in 2024 and 54% in 2025. Gallup’s latest findings are based on interviews with adults conducted from July 1 to 19. The reduction since 2023 has appeared across men and women, White and non-White adults, and all age groups, with no significant changes among those groups in the past year.

Reported overdrinking has also fallen. Thirteen percent of adults now say they sometimes drink more than they believe they should, another record low. Among people who drink, the reported weekly average was 3.2 drinks, below the 3.9 average across the previous five measurements before last year.

Changing health attitudes may be contributing. Fifty-one percent of adults consider one or two alcoholic drinks a day harmful to health, while 86% have heard at least something about recent research into alcohol’s long-term effects. Seventeen percent have substituted nonalcoholic beer, wine or spirits for alcohol during the past year.

The survey does not measure alcohol-related illness or establish why drinking has declined. Harmful and binge drinking remain serious public-health challenges, but the latest results suggest the broader shift toward drinking less has endured.