Ask most operators which category has grown fastest in British pubs over the past decade and you will hear craft, or cocktails, or Guinness. The actual answer is the one that used to sit dusty in a fridge behind the mixers.
Low and no alcohol beer volumes in the UK have grown by 870% since 2013, according to the British Beer and Pub Association, which describes it as the sector’s biggest growth category. Around 200 million low and no beers were drunk in 2025, the category’s strongest year on record, and the BBPA forecast more than 64 million pints across summer 2026 alone: roughly eight million more than the previous summer.
This is no longer a niche to be accommodated. It is a mainstream revenue line, and most venues cannot tell you what theirs is worth.
Low and no accounts for close to 3% of the UK’s total beverage alcohol market by volume, per IWSR data cited by the BBPA. Availability has followed: by January 2024, 87% of pubs served at least one low or no alcohol beer, and the proportion offering a draught option had risen to 8%, up from just 2% at the end of 2019. Roughly a quarter of managed pubs now pour an alcohol-free beer on draught.
IBISWorld’s UK pubs and bars analysis flagged that approximately one in four 18 to 24 year olds now abstains from alcohol entirely. That is not a customer who will grow out of it. Heineken UK has put the figure at 10.9% of on-trade customers choosing a low or no alternative when eating or drinking out.
Meanwhile “zebra-striping”, alternating alcoholic and alcohol-free drinks across a session, has become common enough that brewers now describe it as a distinct occasion. That customer is not spending less. They are staying longer.
Greene King reported alcohol-free drink sales up 36% year on year across its 1,600 managed pubs, with more than 70% of that volume coming from packaged low and no beers and ciders. Lumina Intelligence’s 2026 alcohol trends work found alcohol-free beers up 38% and alcohol-free cocktails up 27%, with growth concentrated in the flexible categories that suit shorter, more individual visits.
The temptation is to treat low and no as a stocking decision: put two more lines in, done. That misses where the money is.
Premium and above brands account for around two thirds of no-alcohol beer volume, per IWSR. Customers buying alcohol-free are not buying down; they are buying a premium product at a premium price with no duty attached. A pub selling alcohol-free at near-parity pricing on a lower-cost product is looking at a healthier margin than the equivalent lager, provided it knows that is what is happening.
A group of four where one person is not drinking used to be a group that went somewhere else, or a group that left early. A credible low and no offer keeps the whole party in the building for the whole session. The value of that customer is not their own spend; it is the three spends they would otherwise have taken with them.
Lumina’s data shows pub visits becoming more intentional and more drink-led, with lunch and dinner occasions weakening. Low and no travels into occasions that alcohol does not: the lunchtime meeting, the designated driver, the midweek visit before an early start, the daytime sport.
Here is the practical issue. In a large number of venues, low and no products are still rung through on a generic bar button, a “bottled beer” key, or worse, whatever key is nearest.
When that happens you cannot answer basic questions:
You cannot manage a category you cannot see. Setting up low and no as a properly defined product group in your EPOS software, with its own reporting hierarchy, is a half-hour job that turns a guess into a number. Modern EPOS systems report by category, by day part and by site, which is exactly the granularity this decision needs.
Once low and no has its own category, twelve weeks of sales data will tell you which lines earn their fridge space. Delisting a poor performer is easier when you can point at the number rather than argue about it.
Low and no historically suffered from being hidden. Customers had to ask, and asking felt like an admission. Digital signage and menu screens put the range in front of people at the moment they are deciding, and can flex by day part: a lunchtime board that leads with alcohol-free, an evening board that does not. We covered how to get a return from screens in Beyond the Menu Board.
The most effective place to offer an alcohol-free option is where the order is being taken. On handheld EPOS or a self-service kiosk, the range appears alongside the alcoholic equivalents rather than three screens away, which removes the need for anyone to ask.
The BBPA has argued that growth is being constrained by the UK’s definition of “alcohol free”, currently set at no more than 0.05% ABV, against a 0.5% threshold used in many other markets. The trade body has called for alignment, on the basis that it would open the category to more British brewers. If that change comes, expect the range available to you to widen further. It is worth building the reporting now so you can judge new lines properly when they arrive.
If you cannot currently produce a report showing low and no as a percentage of your drinks sales, that is the place to start. CCR Systems configures EPOS systems and reporting for pubs, bars and clubs across the North West and beyond, and has done since 1982.
Call 0151 644 8296, email contact@ccrsystems.co.uk or ask us to review your reporting setup.
