What Non-Alcoholic Actually Means
One name covers an enormous number of different drinks. Here is what it actually means, why the labels disagree, and how we handle it.
"Non-alcoholic" is an umbrella, not a number. In the US it covers anything under 0.5% ABV, which includes drinks at 0.0% and drinks with a trace. Two things vary independently: how much alcohol is left, and whether there was ever any to begin with. Every bottle we sell publishes both.
How this section works
The Basics · a note from the desk
Most people arrive here because a label did not make sense. Non-alcoholic or alcohol-free? sets out what those two words mean, and why one of them is regulated on beer while neither is on much else.
Underneath that is usually a simpler question — whether there is any alcohol in the glass at all. It is split in two because the answers differ: does non-alcoholic beer have alcohol and is non-alcoholic wine really alcohol-free do not land in the same place, and that difference is most of the subject. If the question is practical rather than curious, will non-alcoholic beer show up on a breathalyzer covers the situation people actually worry about.
How a drink got that way shapes how it tastes, and there is more than one route. How dealcoholized wine is really made and how non-alcoholic beer is really made take the two apart; they are not the same craft, and beer has options wine does not.
The rest is housekeeping. How long non-alcoholic spirits keep once opened is the question nobody thinks to ask until a bottle has been open a month, and seltzer, sparkling water and tonic separates four things that look identical on a shelf. When you would rather buy than read, what to buy first starts from four bottles.
— The Dry Pour
Everything in The Basics
Explainer · Reviewed October 2026Will Non-Alcoholic Beer Show Up on a Breathalyzer or Urine Test?
Not on a breathalyzer, under normal conditions. Here is what each test actually measures, the two situations where a reading can appear, and who genuinely needs to care.
Explainer · Reviewed August 2026The Growing Popularity of Non-Alcoholic Beverages
Not a fad — and the reason it is not explains what has appeared on the shelf since, and why the good bottles are no longer the cheap ones.
Comparison · Reviewed August 2026Seltzer vs Sparkling Water vs Tonic: What’s the Difference?
Three of the four are almost the same drink. The fourth is an ingredient — and in a non-alcoholic glass that matters more than it does in an alcoholic one.
Explainer · Reviewed August 2026Beyond Imitation: The Evolution of Non-Alcoholic Beverages
The category began by copying drinks people already knew. The bottles that stopped copying are the most interesting ones on the shelf.
Explainer · Reviewed August 2026How Long Do Non-Alcoholic Spirits Keep Once Opened?
Shorter than a spirit and longer than a juice, and the honest answer is that it depends on the bottle. We went to the producers, because the figures circulating online turn out to be a decade of one another’s homework.
Explainer · Reviewed August 2026Is non-alcoholic wine really alcohol-free?
Almost every bottle contains a trace, and it is insignificant. The harder question is that nothing about how this gets labelled is standardized — so here is what four bottles on our shelf actually print.
Not sure where to start?
Browse the full catalog →A lot to walk into. These are the ones we hand people who would rather skip the reading.
If you have not tried any of this yet
From our shop
BeaStill not sure what the label means?Ask Bea →More from The Dry Pour
All of it →Who writes this, and how
The Dry Pour is written by the people who run the shop. We buy everything we sell and taste most of it. Where we have not tasted something, we say so and describe it from the label and the producer rather than pretending otherwise.
We publish ABV, calories and sugar on every product we list, and we print what the producer states rather than a tidied-up version of it — which is why you will see both 0.0% and 0% on this site, because they are not the same claim.
What suits you depends on what you like drinking. Our job is to give you enough to decide. More about us.
