Alcohol statistics

Find out more about alcohol and its effect on life across the UK.

Alcohol impacts our health and wellbeing in many different ways, from causing headaches, sleepless nights, and feeling “off” the next day, to an increased risk of more serious long-term health conditions like increased blood pressure, cholesterol and even types of cancer

Alcohol is sometimes used by people to try manage symptoms of anxiety and depression, but alcohol is likely to make those symptoms worse in the long run (Mental Health Foundation, 2022)

Read our factsheet on alcohol and mental health

Alcohol is a causal factor in more than 200 diseases, injuries and other health conditions, including high blood pressure, liver disease, and cancers (Rehm et al., 2010)

According to Cancer Research UK, drinking alcohol causes 7 different types of cancer:

  • Breast cancer and bowel cancer, two of the most common types
  • Mouth cancer
  • Some types of throat cancer: oesophagus (food pipe), larynx (voice box) and pharynx (upper throat)
  • Liver cancer

Read our factsheet on alcohol and cancer

Alcohol is the biggest risk factor for death, ill-health, and disability among 15-49 year-olds in the UK, and the fifth biggest risk factor across all ages (Burton et al., 2016)

The alcohol industry has a vested interest in selling more alcohol, and uses marketing, pricing strategies, and widespread availability to encourage the consumption of alcohol. This is why the three most effective and cost-effective ways to reduce alcohol harm are to increase its price, restrict its marketing, and reduce its availability (WHO, 2024).

Find out more about our work to influence alcohol policy in the UK.

International evidence shows that, broadly, when alcohol is more affordable, more is consumed. When alcohol becomes less affordable, less is consumed (Gallet, 2007; Wagenaar et al., 2009; Fogarty, 2010).

The more available alcohol is, the more likely people are to drink more and experience more harm (Dimova et al., 2023).

Producers and retailers of alcohol spend billions of pounds every year trying to persuade us to buy their products.

Research has shown that there is a causal relationship between exposure to alcohol marketing and underage drinking (Sargent and Babor, 2020)

According to a 2024 rapid literature review:

  • Alcohol marketing is likely to trigger cravings for alcohol consumption in people with, or at increased risk of, an alcohol problem.
  • Studies have also found that alcohol marketing is perceived to act as a trigger by people in recovery from alcohol problems.

Read our policy insights page to find out more.

The Chief Medical Officers’ low-risk drinking guidelines recommend that adults do not drink more than 14 units a week, spread evenly over 3 or more days.

Read more about units and check your consumption with our unit calculator

Around 1 in 5 people in the UK report not drinking alcohol at all:

Units of pure alcohol consumed each week

  • In England in 2024, the mean number of units consumed by all adults aged over 16 years of age was 12.8 (NHS Digital, 2026)
  • In Scotland in 2024, the average number of units of alcohol consumed by all adults aged 16+ who drink was 11.3 units (Scottish Government, 2025)
  • In Wales in 2022/23, average annual alcohol consumption in units amongst those who drink was 508 units per year (Welsh Government, 2023). According to Alcohol Change UK calculations, this equates to 9.74 units per week

Across the four nations, a significant proportion of adults regularly drink over the Chief Medical Officers’ low-risk guidelines:

“Children and their parents and carers are advised that an alcohol-free childhood is the healthiest and best option. However, if children drink alcohol, it should not be until at least the age of 15 years.” - Chief Medical Officer for England, 2009

Read our blog post on Alcohol and parenting: children and teenagers

According to NHS England (2024), in England in 2023:

  • 37% of pupils aged 11-16 said they had ever had an alcoholic drink
  • Prevalence increases with age, from 15% of 11 year olds to 62% of 15 year olds
  • 5% of all pupils said they usually drank alcohol at least once per week, similar to 6% in 2021
  • The proportion of those drinking alcohol at least once per week also increases with age, from 1% of 11 year olds to 11% of 15 year olds

According to the Department of Health (2023), in Northern Ireland in 2022:

  • 31% of pupils said they have ever had an alcoholic drink
  • Prevalence increases with age, from 11% of pupils aged 11-12 (in Year 8), to 64% of pupils in year 12 aged 15-16 (in Year 12)
  • Boys were more likely to report having taken a drink (33%) than girls (29%)
  • Around half (46%) of those young people that reported drinking alcohol indicated they had been drunk at least once
  • The proportion was similar for boys (45%) and girls (47%)

According to the Scottish Government (2023), in Scotland in 2021/22:

  • 33% of students aged 12-14 (in S2), and 59% of students aged 14-16 (in S4) have ever had an alcoholic drink
  • 2.3% of S2 students and 9.6% of S4 students drink alcohol about once a week
  • 10% of S2 students and 33% of S4 students drink alcohol at least once a month

According to the Health Behaviour in School-Aged Children study (2023), in Wales in 2021/22:

  • 14% of girls and 20% of boys aged 11 have ever drunk alcohol
  • 46% of girls and 42% of boys aged 13 have ever drunk alcohol
  • 76% of girls and 68% of boys aged 15 have ever drunk alcohol
  • 1% of girls and boys aged 11 have been drunk at least twice
  • 9% of girls and 6% of boys aged 13 have been drunk at least twice
  • 35% of girls and 26% of boys aged 15 have been drunk at least twice

According to NHS Digital (2026) in England in 2024:

  • Among men, the highest proportion of non-drinkers was in West Midlands (36%) and the lowest proportion was in South West (14%)
  • Among women, the highest proportion of non-drinkers was in West Midlands (36%), and the lowest proportion was in South East (21%) and South West (21%)
  • Men living in Yorkshire & the Humber were the most likely to drink more than 14 units of alcohol per week (36%), and those living in the West Midlands were the least likely to do so (16%)
  • Women living in Yorkshire & the Humber were the most likely to drink more than 14 units of alcohol per week (20%), and those living in the West Midlands were the least likely to do so (10%)

The proportion of adults who had not drunk alcohol in the last 12 months in England had remained stable between 2011 and 2023, with between 17% and 20% reporting not drinking alcohol. In 2024, this figure rose slightly to 23% (NHS Digital, 2026).

The COVID-19 pandemic polarised drinking patterns, with people previously consuming alcohol at lower levels further decreasing their drinking, and people previously consuming alcohol at higher levels further increasing their drinking (Public Health England, 2021)

Read our research on drinking in the UK during lockdown and beyond

Since 2005, the overall amount of alcohol consumed in the UK, the proportion of people reporting drinking alcohol, and the amount of alcohol people report consuming have all fallen. This trend is especially pronounced among younger people (Office for National Statistics, 2018)

Read our factsheet on drinking trends in the UK.

According to DHSC (2025), in England in 2023/24:

  • There were 280,747 admissions where the primary diagnosis was an alcohol-related condition (504 per 100,000 people)
  • There were 1,018,986 admissions where the primary or secondary diagnosis was an alcohol-related condition (1,824 per 100,000 people)
There has been an increase in alcohol-related hospital admissions from 2021/22:
  • There were 262,094 admissions where the primary diagnosis was an alcohol-related condition (475 per 100,000 people)
  • There were 942,260 admissions where the primary or secondary diagnosis was an alcohol-related condition (1,705 per 100,000 people)

In Northern Ireland, there are around 23,490 hospital admissions every year due to alcohol (University of Sheffield, 2023). In 2021/22-2023/24 there were 525 alcohol-related hospital admissions per 100,000 population (NISRA, 2024).

According to Public Health Scotland (2026):

  • In 2023/24 there were 29,430 alcohol-related hospital admissions (stays) (494 per 100,000 people)
  • This is a decrease on the 32,301 admissions in 2023/24 (548 per 100,000 people)

According to Public Health Wales (2025):

  • In 2023/24, there were 12,236 alcohol-specific admissions involving 8,147 unique individuals (258 per 100,000 people)
  • The number of unique individuals admitted for alcohol-specific conditions has decreased by 18.6 per cent over the last 5 years
  • The number of unique individuals admitted for an alcohol-attributable condition in 2023/24 was 32,789, remaining stable from the previous year

In 2023, there were 10,473 deaths (15.9 per 100,000 people) from alcohol-specific causes registered in the UK, the highest number on record (Office for National Statistics, 2025)

The number recorded in 2023 was 4% higher than in 2022 (10,048 deaths; 16.6 per 100,000) and 38% higher than in 2019 (7,565 deaths; 11.8 per 100,000), the last pre-coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic year (Office for National Statistics, 2025)

Consistent with previous years, the rate of alcohol-specific deaths for males in 2023 remained around double the rate for females, at 21.9 and 10.3 deaths per 100,000 people, respectively (Office for National Statistics, 2025)

There were 7,922 deaths due to alcoholic liver disease in the UK in 2023, making up 75.6% of all alcohol-specific deaths (Office for National Statistics, 2025)

Read our fact sheet on Alcohol and the liver

By constituent country (Office for National Statistics, 2025):

  • England: 8,276 deaths, 15.0 per 100,000 people
  • Northern Ireland: 341 deaths, 18.5 per 100,000 people
  • Scotland: 1,277 deaths, 22.6 per 100,000 people
  • Wales: 562 deaths, 17.7 per 100,000 people

These statistics cover only alcohol-specific deaths, caused wholly by alcohol, such as alcohol poisoning and alcohol related liver disease. This does not cover alcohol-related deaths, which include alcohol-specific deaths and deaths partially attributable to alcohol, such as deaths from cardiovascular diseases and cancers.

Data shows that the true number of alcohol-related deaths is much higher.

According to OHID (2025), in England in 2023, there were:

  • 8,276 alcohol-specific deaths
  • 22,644 alcohol-related deaths, almost 3 times higher than the alcohol-specific deaths reported

According to Public Health Scotland, in Scotland in 2020, there were:

  • 1,185 deaths wholly attributable to alcohol (alcohol-specific)
  • 1,635 deaths partially attributable to alcohol
  • 2,820 deaths in total, just over double the alcohol-specific figures announced

According to Public Health Wales, in Wales in 2023, there were:

  • 562 alcohol-specific deaths
  • 683 alcohol-related deaths, more than 20% higher than alcohol-specific deaths reported by ONS

Between 2012 and 2019, rates of alcohol-specific deaths in the UK had remained stable, with no statistically significant changes in the age-standardised rate (Office for National Statistics, 2024 )

Compared with the pre-coronavirus pandemic period, alcohol-specific death rates have risen in all four UK countries (Office for National Statistics, 2024)

People’s drinking patterns changed during the COVID-19 pandemic. Two separate modelling studies looked at these shifts in drinking during the pandemic and modelled the long-term health impacts of several different scenarios for how these changes might develop in the future. Both studies found that alcohol-specific deaths will increase dramatically, alongside other alcohol-related harm (Institute of Alcohol Studies and Health Lumen, 2022) (The University of Sheffield, 2022)

In 2023, 10,473 deaths from alcohol-specific causes were registered in the UK. This is the highest number on record. However, the rate of alcohol-specific deaths (15.9 per 100,000 people) decreased slightly compared with 2022, (16.6 deaths per 100,000 people) (Office for National Statistics, 2025).
ASDR 2001 23 V2

Alcohol can cause problems across the social scale. However, health harms are much more pronounced in areas of high deprivation, even though average consumption is usually lower in these areas. This is known as “the alcohol harm paradox”.

Consumption

According to NHS Digital (2026), in England in 2024:

  • 84% of people living in the least deprived areas drank alcohol
  • 61% of people living in the most deprived areas drank alcohol

According to the Northern Irish Government (2025), in Northern Ireland in 2024/25:

  • 81% of people living in the least deprived areas drank alcohol
  • 75% of people living in the most deprived areas drank alcohol

According to the Scottish Government (2023), in Scotland in 2022:

  • 85% of people living in the least deprived areas drank alcohol
  • 73% of people living in the most deprived areas drank alcohol

According to the Welsh Government (2023), in Wales in 2022-23:

  • 88% of people living in the least deprived areas drank alcohol
  • 76% of people living in the most deprived areas drank alcohol

Hospitalisations

  • In Northern Ireland in 2020/21-2022/23, people in the most deprived areas (1,026 admissions per 100,000 population) were more than three times more likely to be admitted to hospital for an alcohol-related cause than people in the least deprived areas (294 admissions per 100,000 population) (Department of Health, 2024)
  • In Scotland in 2024/25, people in the most deprived areas (782 patients per 100,000 population), as measured by SIMD, were seven times more likely to be admitted to hospitals for conditions wholly attributable to alcohol than those in the least deprived areas (116 patients per 100,000 population) (Public Health Scotland, 2026)
  • In Wales in 2023/24, the proportion of all patients admitted for alcohol-specific conditions who lived in the 10 per cent of most deprived areas was 2.8 times higher than those from the least deprived areas (Public Health Wales, 2025)

Deaths

  • In England in 2023, people in the most deprived areas were more than 3 times more likely to die solely due to alcohol compared to people in the least deprived areas (Office for National Statistics, 2025)
  • Between 2019 and 2023, the percentage of alcohol-specific deaths in Northern Ireland's most deprived areas (37.6%) was almost four times that of the least deprived areas (9.8%) (Northern Ireland Statistics and Research Agency, 2023)
  • In Scotland in 2023, alcohol-specific death rates in the most deprived areas were 4.5 times more than those in the least deprived areas (National Records of Scotland, 2024)
  • In Wales in 2023, people in the most deprived areas were almost 3 times more likely to die solely due to alcohol compared to people in the least deprived areas (Office for National Statistics, 2025)

Read our research on Understanding the alcohol harm paradox

Read our factsheet on Alcohol and inequalities

According to the Office for Health Improvement & Disparities (2024), in England in 2023/24:

  • There were 94,172 people in contact with services for alcohol treatment only
  • 56,429 (59.9%) were male and 37,744 (40.1%) were female
  • There were an additional 42,198 people in contact with services for non-opiate and alcohol treatment
  • 30,101 (71.3%) were male and 12,097 (28.7%) were female

Visit the National Drug Treatment Monitoring System for more statistics on alcohol treatment in England

According to the Northern Ireland Department of Health (2022), in 2021/22:

  • There were 1,473 people in alcohol treatment
  • 62.9% were male and 37.1% were female
  • There were an additional 1,142 people in drug and alcohol treatment
  • 78.5% were male and 21.5% were female

According to Public Health Scotland (2024), in 2023/24:

  • 8,682 people started specialist alcohol treatment
  • 63% were male and 37% were female
  • The median age of accessing treatment was 47 years old
  • The median age reported for first consuming alcohol was 16 years
  • The median age people deemed their alcohol use to be problematic was 30 years

According to Public Health Wales (2025), in 2023/24:

  • 6,748 (46.3%) of people assessed within substance misuse services were primary alcohol clients
  • 3,420 people (50.7%) were male and 3,328 (49.3%) were female
  • There were 4,682 people (46%) assessed for primary alcohol use not previously recorded as having an assessment with a substance misuse service in Wales

According to the Department for Transport (2025), estimates of casualties in collisions involving at least one driver or rider over the drink-drive limit in Great Britain for 2023 show that:

  • Between 230 and 290 people were killed in drink-drive collisions, with a central estimate of 260 deaths, a decline of 14% from 2022
  • About 1,860 people were killed or seriously injured (KSI), a decline of 3% from 2022
  • There were around 6,310 casualties of all severities, a decline of 6% from 2022

According to the Police Service of Northern Ireland, in 2024:

  • There was a total of 4,753 injury road traffic collisions recorded, resulting in 69 fatalities, 939 people seriously injured and 6,486 slightly injured.
  • Overall casualty levels decreased by 6.1% from 2023, they have continued to remain below pre COVID-19 levels. Conversely though, KSI casualties were 6.0% higher than 2023 and they remain persistently higher than the totals seen prior to 2020.
  • Drivers and passengers accounted for over three-fifths of all KSI casualties (63.5%).

Read our factsheet on Alcohol and transport

Drinking alcohol does not inevitably lead to violent behaviour, and most episodes of drunkenness pass without any violence. However, by lowering inhibitions and impairing judgement, alcohol can increase both aggression and our willingness to take risks.

In England and Wales:

According to the Police Service of Northern Ireland (2024):

  • Since 2012/13 around one in five crimes recorded by police have been flagged with an alcohol motivation
  • Around half of all violence with injury offences (45-58%) and two fifths of violence without injury offences (36-43%) have been given an alcohol motivation
  • The proportion of violence against the person offences with an alcohol motivation has fallen from 47% in 2012/13 to a low of 30% in 2020/21; the proportion in 2023/24 was 35%

The types of crime motivated by alcohol in 2023/24 were:

  • 34% violence without injury
  • 32% violence with injury
  • 11% criminal damage
  • 10% other offences
  • 8% theft including burglary
  • 5% stalking and harassment

In Scotland:

  • Where the victims were able to say something about the offender of violent crime in 2023/24, almost two-fifths (35%) believed them to be under the influence of alcohol (Scottish Government, 2025)
  • The proportion of violent crime involving alcohol has fallen since 2008/09: from 63% to 35%. This is even more significant for crime with alcohol only: falling from 39% to 4% (Scottish Government, 2025)
  • In 2024, 31% of prisoners stated they were under the influence of alcohol at the time of their offence. In 2019, this figure was 28%. (Scottish Prison Service, 2025)

Read our factsheet on Alcohol, crime, and disorder

The true cost of alcohol harm is impossible to fully measure. Behind the statistics are real people struggling with their health, friendships and family relationships under strain, and communities being impacted. However, it is undeniable that alcohol harm comes with a huge price tag.

According to the most recent estimates, alcohol harm costs the UK at least £35bn a year.

England: £27.44bn (Institute of Alcohol Studies, 2024)

  • NHS & healthcare: £4.91bn
  • Crime & disorder: £14.58bn
  • Wider economy: £5.056bn
  • Social services: £2.890bn

Northern Ireland: £679.8m (DHSSPC, 2010)

  • Healthcare: £122m
  • Social work: £48.5m
  • Fire and police services: £223.6m
  • Courts and prison services: £83.8m
  • Wider economy: £201.7m

Scotland: £5-10bn (Social Market Foundation, 2023)

  • Intangible costs: £2.0-7.2bn
  • Health and social care costs: £0.7-0.5bn
  • Labour and productivity costs: £1.2bn
  • Crime costs: £1.0-0.1bn

Wales: £800m (University of Sheffield, 2014)

Last updated: March 2026

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Find out more about the impact of alcohol on your health by reading our factsheets on everything from alcohol and mental health to parenting.