So, do the kids like to drink alcohol or not?
A new survey finds 73% of Gen Z aged over 21 are drinking alcohol — but high schoolers are still skipping booze.
The rise of a “clean living,” alcohol-free generation of young people has been much reported as shifting attitudes toward drinking, declining in-person socialization, and spiking interest in sober-curiosity, including “Dry January,” have all become associated with Gen Z.
But new research suggests that once today’s youth reach their 21st birthday and enter the working world, they become partial to a tipple.
According to an IWSR survey for 2025 reported by the Financial Times on Wednesday, 73% of Gen Z respondents (from legal drinking age to 27 years) said they had consumed alcohol in the past six months, up noticeably on the 66% recorded in 2023.
Still, the Gen Z cohort below legal drinking age are increasingly less prone to rebelling by hitting the bottle.
A Monitoring the Future national survey conducted by the University of Michigan found that the proportion of 17- to 18-year-olds in the US who reported drinking alcohol in the last year had fallen to 42% in 2024. That follows a broad downward trend that’s been observed since the ’90s across all groups of teen respondents.
YOLO
The drop in risky behaviors — with studies showing that adolescents in many high-income countries are steering clear of alcohol, drugs, sex, and smoking — suggests that some members of the younger generation have taken the “you only live once” millennial mantra in its most conservative interpretation.
Another explanation is that Gen Z is perhaps not so much “clean” as they are image-conscious in an age of social media.
And, when they do decide to drink, there’s evidence suggesting that young people are consuming smaller quantities of higher-quality drinks, with a Vogue Business feature published Tuesday saying that members of Gen Z “drink less, post more, and prefer their cocktails canned, collabed and content-friendly.”
