“The numbers are pretty clear,” says James Smith, Head of Vaping Community at online vape specialist Discount Vape Pen. “Younger consumers have made up their minds about alcohol, and they’re looking for something that fits their lifestyle better. For a lot of them, dry herb and vaporizer products are filling that gap.”

The numbers Smith is referring to are hard to argue with. From 1997 to 2023, at least 60% of Americans reported drinking alcohol. That figure fell to 62% in 2023, 58% in 2024, and has since dropped further to 54%, a level not seen since the 1950s, according to Gallup. Global data firm IWSR found that US alcohol volumes fell 2.6% in 2023 and 2.8% across the first seven months of 2024, with beer, wine, and spirits all affected.

This is far from a blip. Alcohol use among 18-to-34-year-olds has dropped from 72% in 2010 to just 50% in 2024. Young adults are stepping back from drinking for a mix of reasons: health awareness, tighter budgets, and a quieter shift in what socializing actually looks like.

The health argument has changed

For years, moderate drinking carried a kind of cultural immunity. There was a notion that a glass of wine with dinner was practically medicinal. Now, that consensus has all but collapsed and for the first time in Gallup’s trend, a majority of Americans say that drinking in moderation is bad for one’s health, up from just 25% who held that view between 2001 and 2011.

The Surgeon General’s office has also waded in. In early 2025, the US Surgeon General recommended that alcoholic drinks carry updated cancer warning labels, a move that put alcohol in the same public health conversation as tobacco for the first time in decades.

The money argument is just as loud

“Nowadays, it’s $17 for a drink at the club,” one student told The Columbia Chronicle. “Not a lot of people want to spend that kind of money.” For Gen Z, the economics of a night out have made alcohol an increasingly hard sell. A bar tab that once felt routine now competes with rent, student debt, and the general cost of being alive in 2025.

Nearly half of Americans are trying to drink less in 2025, with the level of interest in sober-curious lifestyles up 44% over the past two years.

So what’s replacing it?

The short answer: a lot of things. Non-alcoholic beer, adaptogen drinks, and cannabis products are all picking up market share. Non-alcoholic beer purchases in US alcohol-buying households increased 22% from December 2023 to November 2024. Cannabis consumption has now surpassed alcohol on a daily-use basis in the US, and US sales of cannabis beverages are projected to reach $2.8 billion by 2028.

But it’s not just cannabis drinks driving the shift. Dry herb vaporizers and portable vape hardware have become a fixture of how younger consumers engage with cannabis. According to data from Headset, Gen Z and Millennial consumers make up nearly 71% of all vape pen sales in the United States. A Civic Science survey found that 90% of Gen Z Dry January participants planned to replace alcohol with another substance, and for one in three of those aged 21 to 25, cannabis was the choice.

Headset’s demographic data shows that Gen Z spends less per trip, shops less frequently, and buys lower-dose products at higher rates than older consumers — a pattern that points to intentional, controlled consumption rather than straight substitution.

“California Sober” goes national

The phrase “California Sober”, i.e. cutting out alcohol while keeping cannabis, has moved from a niche lifestyle choice to a mainstream reference point. Zero-proof bars, sober meetups, and even sober travel have appeared nationwide. Celebrities including Bella Hadid, Blake Lively, and Lewis Hamilton have backed non-alcoholic drinks brands, while artists across hip-hop and pop have been openly associated with cannabis culture for years.

Whether this represents a permanent cultural shift or a generational correction is still being debated. What the data makes clear is that Americans’ relationship with alcohol has changed, and the alternatives are no longer niche.