Doing dry January? These are the healthiest non-alcoholic beers in 2025

Ground Picture // Shutterstock

Doing dry January? These are the healthiest non-alcoholic beers in 2025

After a long holiday season indulging in sweet treats and perhaps a few too many spirits, January can be a great time to reset and return to healthy habits. Dry January, a health campaign that originated in the U.K. in 2013, encourages participants to abstain from alcohol for the entire month of January. 

Drinking too much alcohol has been found to cause heart and liver damage, disrupt mood, sleep, and behavior, and more. While a month of sobriety may seem daunting, it can come with significant benefits, including weight loss, better sleep and mental health, and a reduction in blood sugar. 

One of the most difficult aspects of Dry January can be avoiding the temptation of alcohol and figuring out what to order in social settings where friends or family members are drinking. In recent years, however, both smaller breweries and longstanding beer corporations have developed non-alcoholic, or NA, beers. Between 2022 and 2023, nonalcoholic beverage sales increased by 32%, while total alcoholic beverage sales for the same period only increased by 1%, according to a Pennsylvania State University report.

While NA beers are generally low in sugar, they vary widely when it comes to calorie and carbohydrate content. The list below can help you determine which drinks have hidden calories and sugar, as well as the ones best consumed in moderation.

Hims analyzed the top-selling NA beer brands and ranked 25 popular NA beers based on four types of nutritional data:

• Calories: Research shows that even when drinks have a high calorie count, people don’t compensate by reducing calorie intake in other areas of their diet. This means that beverages with a lot of calories add to a person’s daily intake, which can lead to weight gain or make it more difficult to lose weight.
• Carbohydrates: Foods like whole grains and vegetables that are high in healthy carbohydrates—sugar molecules that provide fuel for the body—are a crucial part of a healthy diet. But much like white bread or sweetened soda, the carbs in beer (both alcoholic and non-alcoholic) contain little to no nutritional value because they lack vitamins, minerals, and fiber.
• Sugar: Traditional beer recipes don’t include sugar, but some brewers add it to drinks to create fruity flavors, so it’s something to watch out for.
• Additives and natural flavorings: While research on color and flavor additives remains sparse, some studies have shown excess consumption of food and beverage additives to cause health issues such as asthma, heart difficulties, cancer, and obesity.

Key Findings

• Suntory, Guinness, and BrewDog have the three most health-conscious options for non-alcoholic beers. They contain the lowest combined total of calories and carbs and do not have added sugar.
• In many cases, NA beers contained fewer calories than their alcoholic counterparts. Guinness 0, Budweiser Zero, Coors Edge Non-Alcoholic Brew, and Heineken® 0.0 are all lighter than the traditional beers sold by those companies. 
• NA beers that mimic IPA or stout beers ranked at the bottom of this list. These options, which are considered to be “heavier” beers, had the highest calorie and carb counts, and in some cases contained added sugar. Still, even the heaviest NA beers contain fewer calories than the average alcoholic beer. 

Ready to find your favorite NA beer for Dry January and beyond? Read on for a list ranked based on the selected data points and methodology explained below.

Non-Alcoholic Beers Ranked from Most to Least Health-Conscious

1. Suntory ALL-FREE (Suntory)
2. Guinness 0 (Guinness)
3. Elvis AF (BrewDog)
4. Hazy AF (BrewDog)
5. Punk AF (BrewDog)
6. Suspended in a Sunbeam Pils (Go Brewing)
7. Coors Edge Non-Alcoholic Brew (Coors)
8. Upside Dawn Golden (Athletic Brewing)
9. Alturas Non-Alcoholic Golden Ale (Atmos Brewing)
10. Budweiser Zero (Budweiser)
11. Non-Alcoholic Juicy IPA (Grüvi)
12. Non-Alcoholic Golden Era (Grüvi)
13. Run Wild IPA (Athletic Brewing)
14. Kora Non-Alcoholic Craft Hazy IPA (Atmos Brewing Company)
15. Prophets Hazy IPA (Go Brewing)
16. Free Wave Hazy IPA (Athletic Brewing)
17. Heineken® 0.0 (Heineken®)
18. Special Effects IPA (Brooklyn Brewery)
19. Lagunitas IPNA (Lagunitas)
20. West Coast IPA (Bravus Brewing Co.)
21. Special Effects Hoppy Amber (Brooklyn Brewery)
22. Trail Pass IPA (Sierra Nevada Brewing Co.)
23. Blood Orange IPA (Bravus Brewing Co.)
24. Oatmeal Dark (Bravus Brewing Co.)
25. Sunshine State Tropical IPA (Go Brewing)

Non-Alcoholic Beer Nutrition: Trends and Insights

Wondering which drinks are best and worst in specific nutrition categories? Hims broke down the data to help you make mindful choices based on your own personal health goals. 

Which NA Beers Have the Most Calories?

Drinks With the Most Calories

1. Bravus Oatmeal Dark (110 calories)
2. Go Brewing Sunshine State Tropical IPA (102 calories)
3. Brooklyn Brewery Special Effects Hoppy Amber (96 calories)

Drinks With the Fewest Calories

1. Suntory All-Free (0 calories)
2. Guinness 0 (17 calories)
3. BrewDog Elvis AF, Hazy AF, Punk AF (20 calories each)

Which NA Beers Have the Most Carbohydrates?

Drinks With the Most Carbs

1. Bravus Oatmeal Dark (25g)
2. Go Brewing Sunshine State Tropical IPA (23g)
3. Bravus Blood Orange IPA (21g)

Drinks With the Fewest Carbs

1. Suntory All-Free (1g)
2. BrewDog Elvis AF, Hazy AF, Punk AF (2.3g each)
3. Guinness 0 (3.8g)

Which NA Beers Have The Most Sugar?

Drinks With the Most Sugar

1. Bravus Blood Orange IPA (17g)
2. Go Brewing Sunshine State Tropical IPA (16.7g)
3. Guinness 0 (0.7g)

Drinks With the Least Sugar

All the other NA beers on this list contained no sugar.

Which NA Beers Contain Additives?

Ten of the 25 beers on our list—including Suntory All-Free, Guinness 0, and Heineken® 0.0— contained additives such as flavorings and food coloring. As noted above, research on the long-term health effects of those additives is limited, though it never hurts to consume potentially harmful ingredients in moderation.

Methodology: How Scores Were Calculated

Hims referenced two sources to compile a list of the most popular non-alcoholic beers in the United States: the top selling non-alcoholic beers on Amazon, and a 2024 ranking of the best non-alcoholic beers on the market. Two brands were eliminated—Weihenstephaner Hefeweissbier and Clausthaler—as they’re not available widely in the United States. 

Using a standard 12-ounce serving, Hims analyzed the following nutritional data:

• Calories
• Carbohydrates
• Sugar
• Additives

The top-ranking drinks on the list have the lowest total number of calories, carbohydrates, and sugar, as well as limited additives. Hims added five points to the drinks that contained flavorings or colorings to account for the fact that additives are not numerically calculated on nutrition labels. Drinks that didn’t have additives received zero points in that category. After totaling the values in each of the four categories, the non-alcoholic beers were ranked from lowest to highest overall value. Get the data here.

Tips to Reach Your Wellness Goals This Dry January and Beyond

Between New Year’s resolutions, early sunsets, cold weather, and the end of the holiday season, January can bring a combination of stress and mood changes. That can make it difficult to stick to a commitment like Dry January or other ambitions related to your health. Remember that perfection shouldn’t be the enemy of good; if you stray from your goal or decide to indulge in a beer with friends, you can always come back to your new habit the next day.

Here are some ways to stay aware of your alcohol consumption and prioritize other wellness goals in the new year:

1. Try a mindfulness or meditation practice. Meditation can have numerous positive effects on your health and wellbeing, including helping to control feelings of stress and anxiety when your schedule gets overwhelming. 
2. Aim for 30 minutes of exercise, five days a week. Regular physical activity has been shown to reduce anxiety and depression, improve sleep, regulate blood sugar, and improve bone and joint health. Perhaps instead of meeting your friends for a drink, you can schedule a walk or a session at the gym this January. 
3. Get a good night’s sleep. Research shows that sleep debt can cause weight gain, fatigue, impaired cognitive function, and an increased risk of chronic disease. When you’ve slept well, you’re more likely to stick to your new routines and prioritize healthy habits. 

This story was produced by Hims and reviewed and distributed by Stacker.