Go home, Paris. You're not as drunk as us.



The U.S. is among the world’s upper-echelon in terms of alcohol consumption by volume. Per capita, however, America is far from an international heavyweight. Product review and comparison firm CompareCamp pulled together alcohol sales data from all over the world to see which countries hit the bottle the hardest.

Wine Consumption by Volume

America for the first time unseated France as the world’s leader in wine consumption by volume. Americans in 2013 downed nearly 30 million hectoliters of wine, according to the International Organisation of Vine and Wine.

A standard wine bottle has a volume of .75 liters, so that means nearly 4 billion bottles of wine were consumed in the U.S. during 2013 – or 12 percent of the wine consumed worldwide.

Annual Wine Production

France is on track to produce 45 million hectoliters of wine in 2014, up from 42 million from 2013, according to France 24. While this isn’t necessarily indicative of improved wine drinking habits, France’s wine output could land it the title of the world’s biggest wine producer.

Italy, a historical powerhouse in terms of wine production, suffered from a harsh winter and only expects 41 million hectoliters of Italian wine by year’s end, according to France 24. The Spanish Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Environment reports Spanish wine production at 51 million hectoliters in 2013, so France will still need to unseat Spain to claim an international winemaking title.

The most recent estimates of U.S. wine production from America’s Wine Institute estimated domestic wine production to be 28.5 million hectoliters annually. So the U.S. still has a ways to go to catch European winemakers.

Wine Consumption per Capita

When broken down into consumption per person, Europe blew the rest of the world out of the water. Nine out of the top 10 wine consuming countries per capita are European, the one exception being 10th-ranked Norfolk Island, near New Zealand.

The Vatican dominated wine consumption per capita, with each citizen consuming an average of nearly 74 liters of wine every year. That’s nearly 100 bottles of wine per person in 2013, proving that Vatican residents are either heavy wine drinkers, avid Communion-goers, or both.

The average American consumed one-seventh of the wine the average Vatican citizen took out during 2013. At slightly more than 10 liters – or 13 bottles – of wine per person, the U.S. ranked 56th internationally.

Beer Consumption by Volume

The most recent international beer consumption data by volume places the U.S. solidly in second place. At 242 million hectoliters of beer consumed in 2012, the U.S. nearly doubled third-place Brazil’s annual beer consumption.

But China dwarfed the U.S. beer market as the Chinese consumed more than 440 million hectoliters of beer. That’s nearly 125 billion standard 12-oz. bottles of beer.

Additionally, the top two beers sold during 2013, Snow and Tsingtao, are likely two beers that Americans have never heard of. Both come from China-based breweries, and Snow’s sales by volume more than double those of Bud Light, the world’s third-most popular beer.

Beer Consumption per Capita

Beer consumption per capita, like wine consumption, is dominated by European countries. Nine of the top 10 countries are somewhere on the European continent, the exception being No. 8 Venezuela.

Topping the list is the Czech Republic, with more than 418 12-oz. beer bottles downed per person during 2012. Germany, Estonia, Poland and Ireland round out the top five in terms of beer consumption per capita.

The U.S. ranks 14th on the world’s list of beer consumption per capita, faring slightly better than 56th place in wine consumption per capita. At 217 12-oz. beer bottles per year, the average U.S. citizen is more than 200 beers shy of a Czech citizen’s annual intake.