Most Tequila Drinkers Take Shots + 10 Other Surprises

You probably know more about tequila than most people who drink it. A national survey The Tequila Report conducted recently shows how wide that gap can be.

We surveyed 1,000 U.S. adults age 21 and older who drink tequila at least once a month. Results are weighted to the U.S. Census on age, region, gender and ethnicity. The survey is the backbone of our new 41-page research report, Tequila's 10% Problem.

This isn't a survey of enthusiasts. It's a survey of everybody: the person who orders a margarita on Friday, the person with four bottles on their bar cart, and the person who takes a shot at a wedding and hits the dance floor.

Here are 11 things they told us, and how you compare.

Thirty-five percent of tequila drinkers say they're drinking more tequila than they were a year ago. Only 9% say they're drinking less. The rest say about the same.

That runs against the national trend. Gallup's 2026 poll found that 54% of U.S. adults say they drink alcohol at all, matching the lowest figure in the history of Gallup's polling.

The increase is concentrated among people who already love tequila. Among those who drink it roughly weekly, 58% say they're drinking more. Among monthly drinkers, it's 13%.

It also skews young. Fifty-three percent of drinkers ages 21 to 29 say they're drinking more tequila, compared with 14% of drinkers in their 60s.

If you drink tequila every week, you're part of the group pulling the whole category forward.

Among those drinking more, 42% say it's because of better taste. New styles or flavors follow at 37%. Appreciation for how tequila is made comes in at 36%, and friends and family drinking more at 33%.

Lower on the list: finding a favorite cocktail (28%), connection to Mexican culture (23%) and visiting Mexico (19%).

One popular idea barely registers. Only 20% of people drinking more say tequila is a healthier choice than other alcohol. Appreciation for how tequila is made outranks the health argument by about 15 points.

The 9% who are drinking less mostly aren't unhappy with tequila. About half say they're drinking less alcohol in general. A third cite health, and a third cite money.

The surprise is where some of them are going. Among people cutting back on tequila, 18% say they're using cannabis instead. That's more than the 11% switching to other spirits, beer or wine, and roughly triple the 6% moving to hard seltzer or canned cocktails.

The group drinking less is small, so treat this as a signal. But tequila's competition isn't only the bottle next to it on the shelf. Sometimes it's the dispensary.

For all the attention on sipping, 61% of tequila drinkers say they often or almost always drink tequila as a shot. That nearly matches the 64% who often or almost always drink it in cocktails such as margaritas.

Forty percent often or almost always drink it neat.

The shot is especially common among younger drinkers. Seventy-three percent of drinkers ages 21 to 29 regularly take tequila as a shot.

None of these habits is wrong. But if you mostly drink tequila neat, you're in the minority.

There's a clear split by gender in how people drink tequila.

Women are more likely than men to drink tequila in cocktails, 72% versus 57%. Men are more likely to drink it neat, 47% versus 32%.

That gap matters more than it might seem. Much of what's written about tequila, including tasting notes and reviews, assumes the reader is drinking it neat. But most tequila drinkers, and nearly three-quarters of women who drink it, regularly have it in a cocktail. How about you?

We asked people what they like most about their favorite tequila, in their own words.

Fifty-three percent of everyone who answered used the same word: smooth.

Nobody said minerality. Almost nobody mentioned how the agave was cooked or crushed. Most drinkers have one word for a good tequila, and it's the same word everyone else uses.

Smooth usually means a tequila doesn't burn on the way down. That's useful, but it doesn't tell you what the tequila tastes like or why you liked it.

A few better questions to ask yourself next time:

If you want help finding the words, our story on what cooked agave actually tastes like is a good place to start. And if smooth is still what you're after, we have a list of 55 excellent smooth tequilas.

We asked tequila drinkers what they typically spend on a 750ml bottle. Among people who buy each style:

The median blanco buyer spends $40, and 82% of blanco buyers typically spend $50 or less.

Splurges are common but occasional. About half of tequila drinkers have bought a bottle costing $100 or more, often for gifts.

Weekly drinkers splurge far more often. Sixty-seven percent of them have bought a $100 bottle, compared with 30% of monthly drinkers.

Most tequila drinkers keep two budgets: an everyday number around $40, and a bigger one for gifts, celebrations and special releases. If $40 is your everyday number, you're right in the middle of the market.

Reposado is the only style of tequila still growing in stores.

Over the past year, retail sales of reposado rose 2.1%. Blanco fell 6%. Añejo fell 11.4%, and extra añejo fell 14.6%. Over two years, the number of reposado bottles sold is up 49%.

Reposado rests in oak for at least two months. That gives it color and usually a slightly sweeter, rounder taste than blanco. Drinkers can taste the difference right away and match it to what the label says.

Drinkers are also paying for it. In stores, the average reposado sells for about $9 more than the average blanco. In our survey, people said they'd pay only about $5.50 more. Reposado is one of the few places in tequila where the price people actually pay is ahead of what they say they'll pay.

Older styles are a harder sell. Drinkers said they'd pay only about $4.60 more for añejo than for reposado, a small step up for a tequila that spends at least a year in a barrel. Just 6% of tequila drinkers buy no blanco at all. But 19% buy no añejo, and 25% buy no extra añejo.

If you've mostly been drinking blanco, try a reposado from the same brand side by side. You'll taste exactly what a few months in a barrel does.

We tested 10 occasions for drinking tequila. A night out at a bar was a tequila occasion for 60% of drinkers.

Dinner at a restaurant ranked last. Just 28% of tequila drinkers say they drink tequila with a restaurant meal.

That's a missed opportunity for drinkers, too. Blanco's bright, peppery agave flavor works with plenty of foods beyond tacos, and an aged tequila can take the place of a glass of wine or whiskey after dinner.

Next time you're out to eat, ask what tequila the restaurant carries. Or if you're doing the cooking, check out our article on how to pair tequila and food without screwing it up.

Drinkers who identify as Mexican or Mexican American stand out on almost every measure. (This group is 150 of our 1,000 respondents.)

They also own nearly four different bottles of tequila at home on average, about a third more than other drinkers. Sixty percent say Mexican brand ownership matters to them, compared with 42% of all tequila drinkers.

We asked an open question: What have you always wondered about tequila?

The most common answer, by far, was how it's made. Next came why brands taste different, agave and farming, and why tequila only comes from Mexico. Questions about aging and the worm came up about equally often.

Here are short answers to the questions that came up most.

How is tequila made? Blue Weber agave grows for years before it's harvested. The heart of the plant is cooked, which turns its complex carbohydrates into sugars yeast can ferment. Then it's crushed to separate the sweet liquid from the fibers, fermented and distilled at least twice. Unaged tequila is bottled as blanco. Aged tequila rests in oak barrels first.

Why do brands taste so different? Nearly every step changes the flavor: where the agave grew, how it was cooked, how it was crushed, how it fermented, how it was distilled and how long it aged. Two blancos made from the same kind of agave can taste very different.

What about the worm? There has never been a worm in tequila. The larva some people remember shows up in certain bottles of mezcal, a different agave spirit. More people in our survey wondered about the worm than about why añejo costs more.

Why does añejo cost more than reposado? Time and loss. Reposado ages from two months to one year. Añejo ages from one to three years, and extra añejo at least three. Barrels cost money, and a portion of the tequila evaporates every year it sits.

Why does tequila only come from Mexico? Tequila is a protected designation of origin. By law, it can only be made from blue Weber agave in Jalisco and designated areas of four other Mexican states.

The full research also covers how Americans actually choose a tequila, what matters on a label and where tequila brands are headed next.

Download Tequila's 10% Problem free. The report was sponsored by PKGD Group.