Each year we witness the arrival of new drinks trends and the ebb or flow of existing ones. Last year demonstrated that celebrity-backed drinks are going nowhere, with the likes of Jamie Foxx endorsing a new whisky, Dr Dre and Snoop Dogg releasing an RTD cocktail and opera singer Andrea Bocelli launching a new range of Italian wines. Luxury drinks-based ‘experiences’ were on the rise, with a new Belmond English wine route and exclusive tourist attractions in whisky. Sake, too, continues to gather pace in the wine world and find its way on to an increasing number of restaurant drinks lists.
At the start of the new year, we spoke to experts and reviewed the research to see what’s predicted to be the big drinks trends in 2025. Agave spirits appear to be here to stay for the foreseeable future, with interest in mezcal having risen in the last year to almost rival that of Tequila. The Martini was big in 2024, with Alice Lascelles’ new book crowning its popularity and The Connaught Bar confirmed as the place in London to drink the classic cocktail. Sustainability remains an issue of consumer concern, so there will be an increasing number of wines sold in PET bottles and other alternative packaging, an initiative already expanded at The Wine Society in 2024.
What look set to be the big drinks trends for 2025? We picked out five highlighted by industry experts in the spirits, wine and no-and-low categories.
Five drinks trends in 2025
1. Brothtails
Incorporating savoury flavours into cocktails has been much-explored in recent years and the forecast for 2025 is that that this will progress to another level with the arrival of ‘brothtails’. The cocktail consultancy Sweet&Chilli uses the moniker in its 25 for 2025 report, noting that the popularity of bone broth ‘due to its much-hyped restorative properties’ is a great fit for gastronomic mixology. ‘The umami flavours of stock pair surprisingly well with nutty, creamy vodkas as well as the more intuitive spirit pairings of, say, bourbon or Scotch.’ It’s an idea also covered in the Bacardi Cocktail Trends Report 2025, which suggests that ‘innovators aren’t just blurring the boundaries between food and drink but pushing them to extremes’, citing new cocktails that count dried prawn, fish sauce and chicken consommé as ingredients.
2. Lower alcohol wines
The UK Government’s complex and controversial new tax system on alcohol, which introduces up to 30 different levels of duty on wine according to its exact ABV, comes into force in February after the end of an ‘easement period’. As Richard Siddle, editor-in-chief at The Buyer, told David Kermode in a recent episode of The Drinking Hour podcast discussing drinks trends for the year, ‘duty is going to be the big story in 2025’. The result will be reflected in the wines on offer: ‘we’re going to see some very different wine choices both in terms of what retailers are looking to list but what also what’s available for consumers to buy,’ Siddle says. An effort to maintain certain price points in supermarkets will mean an increase in the number of wines at ‘around 11% and 10% ABV on shelves’, while independent wine merchants, argues Siddle, have an opportunity to broaden their horizons. ‘Place likes Slovenia, the Balkan countries, [countries in] northern Europe; there are a lot more wines being made in those parts of the world where the wine is naturally lower in alcohol.’
3. Moderation
‘Moderation is a consistently growing trend, with 74% of UK adults reducing their alcohol consumption’, says Laura Willoughby of Club Soda. The changing habits of drinkers, even those who don’t plan to go teetotal in 2025, is set to continue as a phenomenon, following last year’s trend of ‘zebra striping’ (a term to describe alternating between alcoholic drinks and soft options on nights out to reduce overall alcohol consumption). Willoughby expects to see more alcohol-free wines, pioneered by the likes of Noughty, Moderato and Zeno, in restaurants, plus cocktails crafted with ‘functional’ alternatives to conventional spirits made by the likes of Smiling Wolf. ‘Expect growth in mid-strength wines, spirits, and functional ingredients, coupled with innovation in packaging and single-serve formats,’ she adds. With an increasing number of alcohol-free beers becoming available on draught in pubs, there are set to be more no-and-low options to suit all tastes in 2025 as people moderate their drinking.
4. Californian wine
The wine world continues to move in the direction of lighter, purer and fresher styles and Martin Rolph, head of buying at Berry Bros. & Rudd, believes that in California, ‘many producers have followed the global trend’. This, he says, has resulted in ‘some fantastic wines’ that are set to ‘challenge consumers’ perceptions’ in 2025. Napa Valley still suffers from an association with the forcefully oaked and extracted style of wine widely made in the 1990s and early 2000s but this is changing at many estates. There are also producers in Sonoma producing wines of elegance, finesse and a sense of place, which suit modern tastes. Rolph believes Californian wine is embarking on a new path: ‘Gone are the days of heavily extracted blockbuster wines that miss the mark for freshness and overall balance’ and 2025 promises to be a year in which perceptions shift and more wine drinkers cotton on to contemporary California.
5. The ‘premiumisation’ of US whiskey
Beyoncé’s new whisky was the biggest celebrity-backed drinks release of 2024 and is indicative of US whisky’s move upmarket – she even dropped the ‘e’ in ‘whiskey’ to emphasise the positioning of SirDavis as an equal to premium Scotch and Japanese bottlings. December saw the US Government’s TTB ratify American Single Malt Whiskey as a distinct, legal category, giving the country’s producers further confidence to invest in a category that has widely been considered the pinnacle of whisky internationally in modern times. Its emergence as an official style in the US is set to enhance the reputation of American whisky around the world; the country’s best bourbons and ryes have long deserved serious reverence as sipping whiskies but expect the new American Single Malt Whiskey category to push the image of US whisky further upmarket in 2025.