The States That Drink the Most Beer in America (2024) [MAP]

Americans love beer. According to new data from the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism (NIAAA), 6.3 billion gallons of beer were consumed in the United States in 2022. It’s an amount that makes wine’s 910 million gallons and spirits’ 715 million gallons pale in comparison. But consumption habits tend to vary from region to region.

The South drinks the most beer by a mile, with a whopping 2.4 billion gallons consumed. That’s nearly 1 billion gallons more than the West, which ranks second with 1.5 billion gallons consumed in 2022. Consuming the least is the Northeast, which reports just over 1 billion gallons. However, when broken down per capita, it’s actually the West that drinks the most beer, with 1.06 gallons consumed per year per person. The Northeast still ranks last with 0.96 gallons per capita, while the Midwest and South report 1.04 gallons and 1.01 gallons per capita, respectively.

Interested to see how your state stacks up? Check out our maps below to discover how much beer every state drinks by volume and per capita. And check out our map of the states that drink the most alcohol in America.

The States That Drink the Most Beer Per Capita

Per capita, New Hampshire appears to drink the most beer, but it’s important to note that the state does not have a sales tax on alcohol. As such, it’s likely that drinkers from neighboring states cross the border to stock up on booze, thus inflating the state’s apparent consumption. Montana is second, while Vermont rounds out the top three. At the bottom end, Utah, which has some of the strictest alcohol laws in the country, drinks the least per capita with just 0.5 gallons.

The States That Drink the Most Beer in Ethanol

In what shouldn’t come as a surprise, the states with the largest populations tend to be the ones that consume the most alcohol. As such, the nation’s most populous states — California, Texas, and Florida — claim the top three spots with 797.6 million, 619.8 million, and 439.8 million gallons, respectively. Wyoming, the least populated state, drinks the least beer by volume, with just 12.9 million gallons consumed.

Ranking the States

Gallons per Capita

Rank
State
Gallons of Ethanol Per Capita*

1
New Hampshire
1.66

2
Montana
1.58

3
Vermont
1.54

4
North Dakota
1.38

5
Pennsylvania
1.33

6
Nevada
1.30

7
Maine
1.28

8
South Dakota
1.26

9
Louisiana
1.24

10
Hawaii
1.23

11
Oregon
1.21

12
Wyoming
1.20

13
Wisconsin
1.19

14
Iowa
1.18

15
New Mexico
1.17

16
Texas
1.15

17
Mississippi
1.14

18
Colorado
1.13

19
Washington, D.C.
1.13

20
California
1.10

21
West Virginia
1.10

22
Nebraska
1.09

23
Ohio
1.07

24
Kansas
1.06

25
Minnesota
1.06

26
Delaware
1.05

27
Florida
1.04

28
Missouri
1.04

29
Arizona
1.03

30
North Carolina
1.03

31
Tennessee
1.01

32
Illinois
1.00

33
South Carolina
1.00

34
Alaska
0.99

35
Alabama
0.95

36
Indiana
0.95

37
Oklahoma
0.94

38
Michigan
0.93

39
Arkansas
0.92

40
Kentucky
0.92

41
Georgia
0.89

42
Virginia
0.89

43
Washington
0.84

44
New York
0.83

45
Massachusetts
0.80

46
Idaho
0.74

47
New Jersey
0.74

48
Rhode Island
0.74

49
Connecticut
0.72

50
Maryland
0.63

51
Utah
0.50

Gallons Overall

Rank
State
Gallons of Beer Overall

1
California
797.6M

2
Texas
619.8M

3
Florida
439.8M

4
Pennsylvania
324.1M

5
New York
304.9M

6
Ohio
233.9M

7
Illinois
233.7M

8
North Carolina
204.6M

9
Georgia
177.6M

10
Michigan
175.2M

11
Virginia
144.1M

12
Arizona
140.9M

13
Tennessee
132.4M

14
Wisconsin
130.8M

15
New Jersey
127.4M

16
Colorado
123.2M

17
Washington
122.4M

18
Missouri
119.1M

19
Indiana
118.6M

20
Minnesota
111.4M

21
Massachusetts
106.5M

22
Louisiana
103.8M

23
South Carolina
98.7M

24
Oregon
97.1M

25
Alabama
89.4M

26
Kentucky
76.9M

27
Nevada
76.7M

28
Maryland
72.0M

29
Iowa
69.6M

30
Oklahoma
68.7M

31
Mississippi
61.5M

32
Kansas
56.7M

33
Arkansas
51.4M

34
Connecticut
49.4M

35
New Mexico
46.1M

36
New Hampshire
44.6M

37
Nebraska
38.8M

38
West Virginia
36.8M

39
Maine
34.1M

40
Hawaii
33.1M

41
Montana
33.1M

42
Utah
29.5M

43
Idaho
26.0M

44
South Dakota
20.7M

45
Delaware
20.1M

46
North Dakota
19.6M

47
Vermont
19.3M

48
Rhode Island
15.4M

49
Washington, D.C.
14.3M

50
Alaska
13.2M

51
Wyoming
12.9M

*This data uses an estimate of average ethanol content of sold or shipped beer into gallons of ethanol (pure alcohol) before calculating per capita consumption estimates. For this data, the alcohol by volume value for beer is 0.045.

*Image retrieved from Odelia Cohen via stock.adobe.com

The article The States That Drink the Most Beer in America (2024) [MAP] appeared first on VinePair.