August 14, 2025
The survey found that over half of U.S. adults now believe that having ‘one or two drinks a day’ could have health risks.
Fewer Americans are drinking alcohol as growing health concerns reshape attitudes toward even moderate consumption, a new Gallup poll shows.
According to the survey, released on August 13, 53% of U.S. adults believe having “one or two drinks a day” poses health risks; 28% felt that way in 2015. This shift is especially pronounced among young adults.
“Older folks may be a little more hardened in terms of the whiplash they get with recommendations,” said Lydia Saad, Gallup’s director of U.S. social research. “It may take them a little longer to absorb or accept the information. Whereas, for young folks, this is the environment that they’ve grown up in…it would be the first thing young adults would have heard as they were coming into adulthood.”
Overall, just 54% of Americans now report drinking alcohol—the lowest level in three decades and one of the lowest since Gallup began tracking the question in 1939. For much of that history, at least 60% of U.S. adults said they drank liquor, beer, or wine.
Government data had shown alcohol consumption rising before the COVID-19 pandemic, but recent trends—particularly among younger adults and teens—point to a decline. Even among people who still drink, the poll suggests they do so less frequently. Only about a quarter of adults surveyed said they’d had a drink in the previous 24 hours, a record low, and roughly four in 10 reported it had been more than a week since their last drink.
Public health experts have increasingly warned that alcohol, once thought to have benefits for heart health, is linked to cancer and other serious risks. Countries worldwide have updated guidelines to reflect the growing scientific consensus that no level of alcohol consumption is risk-free.
According to the Associated Press, the U.S. is expected to release new dietary guidelines later this year under Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.. It is unclear whether recommendations for drinking will change to align with the Gallup studies’ results.
The poll highlights a generational divide: about two-thirds of adults aged 18 to 34 see moderate drinking as harmful, compared to about half of Americans over 55. In 2015, just two in 10 older adults shared that belief.
The Gallup findings suggest Americans may be reevaluating not only how much they drink, but whether drinking should remain a routine part of everyday life.
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