Germany has a new paradox in its drinking culture. Young men are drinking less often, far less often than at any point in half a century, but when they do drink, nearly half of them still drink to excess. The latest Bundesinstitut für Öffentliche Gesundheit (BIÖG) survey, conducted between April and July 2025, puts the figures in stark relief: 45.8% of men aged 18 to 25 reported at least one episode of Rauschtrinken, defined as five or more drinks on a single occasion in the previous 30 days, while only 34.7% said they consumed alcohol at least once a week. The weekly figure is the lowest since the series began in 1973.
A plateau that refuses to break
The binge-drinking rate among young men has hardly moved. In 2023 it stood at 46.2%; the 0.4-percentage-point dip in 2025 is statistically negligible. BIÖG describes the level as "continuing on a high plateau, as it has for years." The only recent interruption came in 2021, when pandemic restrictions pushed the rate down to 37.8%. That anomaly disappeared as social life reopened. For young women the trajectory is different: binge drinking fell from 32.0% to 26.1% between 2023 and 2025, a meaningful decline that widens the gender gap to nearly 20 percentage points.
The survey, known as the Drogenaffinitätsstudie, interviewed 7,001 people aged 12 to 25. Its scale and consistency make it the most reliable longitudinal picture of substance use in Germany. The definition of Rauschtrinken, five standard glasses on one occasion, aligns with the World Health Organization's heavy episodic drinking threshold, allowing international comparison. By that measure, Germany's young men remain among the heaviest episodic drinkers in Europe, even as their overall consumption frequency declines.
Weekly drinking collapses across the board
The drop in regular drinking is not confined to young men. Among women aged 18 to 25, weekly use fell to 14.3%. Among 12‑ to 17‑year-olds, 9.2% of boys and 4.1% of girls reported drinking at least once a week. These are historic lows. Twenty years ago, three-quarters of adolescents had tried alcohol; today the figure is 60.7% for boys and 57% for girls. The average age of first drink has held at 15, and first intoxication at 16, suggesting that initiation is not happening earlier, it is simply becoming less universal.
Public-health researchers attribute the frequency decline to several forces: stricter enforcement of the legal purchase age (16 for beer and wine, 18 for spirits), school-based prevention programmes, and a cultural shift in which sobriety or moderation carries less stigma among Generation Z. The Federal Statistical Office (Destatis) has documented a parallel fall in per-capita pure-alcohol sales since the early 2000s, supporting the survey's self-reported data.
Why the binge persists
If young people are drinking less often, why does the binge rate stay so high among men? Sociologists point to the ritual function of heavy drinking in male peer groups, festivals, football weekends, university initiations, where intoxication remains a bonding mechanism. The beverage mix matters, too: cheap high-strength premixed drinks and energy-drink combinations lower the price per unit of alcohol, making rapid intoxication affordable. Tax policy has not kept pace; Germany's alcohol excise duties are among the lowest in the EU, and a proposed reform to index them to inflation stalled in the Bundestag last year.
There is also a measurement nuance. The survey captures a 30-day recall window. A respondent who binges once a month, say, at a festival, counts the same as one who does so every weekend. The weekly-drinking metric captures habit; the binge metric captures intensity. The divergence suggests a polarisation: a shrinking cohort of frequent moderate drinkers, and a stable cohort of infrequent but heavy drinkers.
The pandemic blip and what it revealed
The 2021 dip to 37.8% is instructive. With clubs closed, festivals cancelled, and gatherings banned, opportunities for social binge drinking evaporated. The rate rebounded fully once restrictions lifted, confirming that the behaviour is socially mediated rather than driven solely by individual pathology. It also showed that the underlying propensity is elastic: when the environment changes, the behaviour can shift rapidly. That insight is relevant for policy, environmental levers such as opening hours, outlet density, and event licensing can move the needle.
Early onset, long shadow
The age of first intoxication, 16 on average, coincides with a critical neurodevelopmental window. The prefrontal cortex, governing impulse control and risk assessment, does not fully mature until the mid-20s. Hendrik Streeck, the federal government's commissioner for addiction issues, put it bluntly: "Alcohol hits young people at a life phase in which brain and body are still developing. Alcohol can disrupt this development, which is why binge drinking is particularly risky for young people." His office has called for stricter marketing curbs on sweetened alcoholic beverages that appeal to adolescents, a measure the current coalition agreement mentions but has not yet legislated.
Epidemiological evidence links early heavy episodic drinking to higher lifetime risk of alcohol-use disorder, cognitive deficits, and accidents. A 2023 cohort study by the German Centre for Addiction Research (DZSK) found that men who reported monthly binge drinking at 18 were three times more likely to meet dependence criteria at 30 than those who did not. The BIÖG data cannot establish causality, but the association is consistent across European cohorts.
Gender divergence and the marketing question
The sharp fall in young women's binge drinking, from 32.0% to 26.1% in two years, has no single explanation. Some researchers cite the rise of "sober curious" social-media communities, which are disproportionately female. Others note that alcopop-style drinks, historically marketed to young women, have lost shelf space to hard seltzers and craft beers that skew male. The industry disputes any causal link, arguing that product innovation follows demand. What is clear is that the gender gap in heavy episodic drinking, which narrowed through the 2000s, has widened again.
Policy landscape: incremental steps, structural gaps
Germany's federal structure complicates alcohol policy. The Jugendschutzgesetz sets purchase ages, but enforcement is a state (Land) responsibility, and test-purchase compliance varies widely. Advertising restrictions are governed by a voluntary industry code that the WHO has repeatedly criticised as insufficient. At EU level, the Europe's Beating Cancer Plan recommends minimum unit pricing and health-warning labels; Germany has adopted neither. The coalition's 2021 agreement promised a "comprehensive alcohol strategy", a draft was circulated in 2024 but remains unpublished.
Taxation remains the most effective lever. A 2022 OECD modelling exercise estimated that raising excise duties to the EU median would cut heavy episodic drinking among 18‑ to 25‑year-olds by roughly 8% and generate €1.2 billion in additional revenue annually. The finance ministry has resisted, citing cross-border shopping and the cultural significance of beer. The result is a policy vacuum where public-health targets, the national strategy aims to reduce adult binge drinking to below 20% by 2030, have no credible pathway.
People mentioned
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Hendrik Streeck
Organisations
Bundesinstitut für Öffentliche Gesundheit · Bundesministerium für Gesundheit
