11 best alcohol-free beers for Sober October: Low ABV tipples that are as good as the real deal
Behind water and tea (yes, even beating wine and coffee), beer is said to be the third most popular drink in the world – but it’s taken years for brewers to crack an alcohol-free version that rivals the real deal.
There was a time when going without booze meant opting for fresh OJ or lime and soda in the pub, but now, breweries are catching on to a boom in all things low ABV.
Far from being reserved for Dry January or Sober October – or for people who are hungover or pregnant – there’s been an unprecedented rise in consumers opting for non-alcoholic alternatives. When they were once shamed for forgoing a beer, younger people especially are interested in alcohol-free (AF) beverages to protect their physical and mental health, rather than guzzle down the pints multiple times a week.
The generation of “sober sceptics” has fizzled out, and more and more people are realising that you don’t need to drink – or pay for – a high-ABV beer to socialise. This helps to explain why the UK’s “lo ’n no” market in the UK is predicted to increase a whopping 31 per cent by 2024, according to IWRS.
Now, many of these AF beers are as good as – if not sometimes better than – the real deal. Instead of tasting like soggy cardboard or flat, watered-down lager with no oomph to speak of, AF beers boast impressive head retention, sumptuous mouth feels (the sensation on your tongue) and a body that would rival the “full-fat” stuff.
How we tested
Over the course of a month, we tested a range of non-alcoholic beers, all under 0.5 per cent ABV – with the help of a very grateful husband.
We used our knowledge as a beer writer to judge each beer on aroma, appearance, taste, mouthfeel and the can’s appearance (we’re a sucker for nice branding).
We judged a range of low ABV beers – including non-alcoholic alternatives to lagers, pale ales, sour beers, IPAs and more – to come up with a list of the best alcohol-free beers you can buy in 2022. We’ll drink to that.
The best alcohol-free beers for 2022 are:
Best overall alcohol-free beer – Merakai Brewing Co This Is A Thirst Trap: £2.25, Merakaibrewing.com
Best alcohol-free IPA – Big Drop Brewing Co Paradiso Citra IPA: £1.20, Waitrose.com
Best alcohol-free NEPA – Good Karma Beer Co Positive Vibrations: £20.18 (pack of eight), Drydrinker.com
Best alcohol-free fruit beer – Erdinger alkoholfrei grapefruit: £4.50 (pack of four), Tesco.com
Best alcohol-free pineapple beer – Wild Beer Co pineapple IPA soda: £2.29, Wisebartender.co.uk
Best German-style alcohol-free beer – Sheep in Wolf’s Clothing Brewery Easy Rinder hefeweizen: £3.75, Siwcbrewery.com
Best alcohol-free lager taste – Drynks Unlimited Smashed lager: £9.49 (pack of three), Amazon.co.uk
Best alcohol-free beer for a session – Infinite Session IPA: £19.99 (pack of 12), Amazon.co.uk
Best alcohol-free pale ale – Mash Gang Chug: £18 (pack of six), Mashgang.shop
Best alcohol-free stout – Nirvana Brewery dark and rich stout: £45 (pack of 24), Nirvanabrewery.com
Best alcohol-free beer collaboration – Bellfield and Jump/Ship Brewing Ship’s Bell dry hopped lager: £21.05 (pack of eight), Drydrinker.com
Merakai Brewing Co This is a Thirst Trap
After tasting this beer for the first time, we were wowed! Our eyebrows shot up into our hairline somewhere and we had to double-check we were definitely drinking an AF pale ale. Expletives followed, then the rest of the can quickly disappeared. This is Merakai’s first alcohol-free beer, and it’s exceptional. It’s the most convincing alcohol-free alternative we’ve had to date, without scrimping on a thick and juicy body, pale-ale style or taste.
Since it’s brewed with ekuanot cryo and mosaic spectrum hops – plus copious amounts of both mango and papaya puree – the beer is super juicy, hazy on appearance and layered with tropical and stone fruits. It has such a soft, creamy mouthfeel that it almost feels wrong.
Merakai is also committed to raising awareness of discrimination and harassment in the beer and brewing industry, and works with the beer community to raise awareness of neurodivergence and mental health. It’s a pretty special beer, then. This is a thirst trap you’ll want to get stuck into, time and time again.
Buy now £2.25, Merakaibrewing.com
Big Drop Brewing Co paradiso citra IPA
A very close second in our round-up of the best alcohol-free beers is the stunning Paradiso Citra IPA. The award-winning beer of 2021’s World Beer Awards is impressive – right from its amber colour to its flavourful, bitter twist at the very last mouthful.
It’s a close imitation of the much-loved IPA (India Pale Ale) – the aroma permeates the room when you crack it open, and it’s packed with bitter grapefruit and refreshing notes. It’s moreish and resinous, with a little pine and malty, biscuit-y afternotes.
We love the emerald-green can, and the price, too. This beer isn’t vegan, but Big Drop is doing amazing things when it comes to changing the face of AF beer, and we’re here for it.
Buy now £1.20, Waitrose.com
Good Karma Beer Co Positive Vibrations
We’re talkin’ ’bout the good vibrations… and Good Karma Beer Co is all about keeping positive, without the need for alcohol. With a focus on sustainability, mindfulness and mental health, the brand has an electric attitude when it comes to shifting beer and brewing towards a more positive, diverse mindset. Its NEPA (which stands for New England Pale Ale) is no exception.
The can is eccentric, eye-catching and bright. The beer itself is light straw in colour, hazy, and has an impressive white frothy head retention for an AF beer. It’s all heady tropical fruits and pineapple on the nose, and tastes so juicy, with a great body and mouthfeel. It’s a refreshing, bright pale with a classic citrus bitterness and herbaceous quality at the end – no doubt thanks to the addition of motueka and azacca hop extract.
What’s more, every purchase of Good Karma beer helps to build a better future by directly supporting environmental restoration charities and educational projects.
Buy now £20.18, Drydrinker.com
Erdinger alkoholfrei grapefruit
Forget all you know about bitter grapefruit, as this beer will change the face of the fated fruit for you. Pouring a bright, radiant-pink colour, this isotonic wheat beer from the German brand is crisp and summery.
It has a perfectly balanced sweet to sour ratio, with a slight bitterness. It’s all pink grapefruit on the nose but is absolutely delicious. We would’ve liked a little more fizz but it still had bite.
According to Erdinger, its “alkoholfrei” grapefruit beer is all-natural, and contains vitamins B9, B12 and C – as well as being an isotonic, meaning it helps rehydrate you after exercise. It’s maybe the healthiest, most nutritional beer we’ve ever had… if that’s a thing.
Buy now £4.50, Tesco.com
Wild Beer Co pineapple IPA soda
If you’re looking for an AF beer that’s refreshing, tasty and perky, then this is it. This Shepton Mallet-based brand has hit the alcohol-free jackpot with its series of IPA sodas.
Our favourite was the delicately sweet and sour pineapple IPA soda – perfect for hot weather. It’s essentially like fizzy pineapple juice. It left a satisfying fizz on the tongue but didn’t linger, and the heady sweetness of pure pineapple combatted the tart, acidic lime perfectly.
We didn’t get many classic IPA notes at all – even though the brew is made with citra hops and 85 per cent pale ale, we thought it verged on a sour more than an IPA, but it still tasted amazing.
It’s so easy to drink, too, and a great substitute to a pint or the classic lime and soda, if you’re looking for something a little lighter, yet don’t want to scrimp on taste.
Buy now £2.29, Wisebartender.co.uk
Sheep in Wolf’s Clothing Brewery Easy Rinder hefeweizen
If you’re not familiar, a “hefeweizen” is a style of German “weiss beer”, meaning “white beer”. It’s one of our favourite go-to beers, and this alcohol-free alternative from new kid on the block, Sheep in Wolf’s Clothing Brewery, is sehr gut.
It transports us right back to Oktoberfest, thanks to its classic amber colour and intoxicating notes of sweet banana, vanilla pod and bitter cloves. The blend of banana and vanilla carries on into the taste at first, then crashes into an intensely comforting malty, wheaty, breadiness that we know and love about classic German styles. A lemony aftertaste lingers alongside the soft, creamy texture of this weiss beer – deserving of a huge, heavy stein to go with it.
For a 0.2 per cent beer, it’s pretty impressive and one to savour – a true sheep in wolf’s clothing indeed. It’s no wonder it won Gold in the 2022 European Beer Challenge in the full-strength Bavarian Hefeweizen Category. Prost!
Buy now £3.75, Siwcbrewery.com
Drynks Unlimited smashed lager
“All of the lageriness and none of the booziness” is Drynks Unlimited’s tagline with its smashed lager – and it couldn’t be more right. This AF lager is brilliant. It’s so convincing, even though it’s one of the lowest ABV ratings on this list, clocking in at 0.0 per cent. It smells like holiday drinks by the pool, and tastes just as refreshing.
It’s pale and golden on appearance, complex and floral on the nose, and boasts that classic, unique lager crispness on the tongue. Barley and malts shine through to round it all off.
Smashed lager is also vegan and totally free from preservatives, flavourings, colours or sweeteners. All great reasons to get smashed then!
Buy now £9.49, Amazon.co.uk
Infinite Session IPA
Sometimes all you want is a crate of tinnies to head to the park with. But how about no hangover the next day and without scrimping on the taste? Infinite Session’s IPA does what it says on the tin and has been awarded our most sessionable AF beer.
It’s classic according to style and appearance, but we thought it was a little more West Coast IPA in taste. The brand double dry hops its IPA with citra and amarillo, giving it its classic citrus flavour – so that could be why. It had the bold, tropical fruitiness of classic IPAs but was perhaps more on the malty side.
The beer had a nice mouthfeel and was very drinkable – infinitely so. “More hops, less hangover” is a tagline we can stand by, too.
Buy now £19.99, Amazon.co.uk
Mash Gang Chug
There’s no denying that Mash Gang is changing the face of the “lo ’n’ no” movement by making AF beers cool. The brand has nailed the face and image of its brewery. It’s modern, it’s on-trend, it’s trippy – and its alcohol-free beer is just as impressive.
We loved chug, its vegan XPA (extra pale ale: a type of pale born in the US that isn’t quite a classic pale or an IPA) from its core range. We expected a lot from its impressive hop list – including galaxy, citra, el dorado, amarillo and vic secret – and, if anything, chug’s big taste exceeded our expectations.
It pours a hazy gold, with a flash of frothy white head and a boisterous pineapple, fruity nose. Pineapple continues when it comes to taste, bringing passionfruit along to the party before being joined by a citrus, almost grassy, bitterness.
Buy now £18.00, Wisebartender.co.uk
Nirvana Brewery dark and rich stout
With the term “nirvana” meaning an idyllic state of mind or place, Nirvana Brewery has created just that with its alcohol-free stout. Dark, rich and decadent, it’s all chocolate.
First, it pours a gorgeous chocolate brown, then it’s heady milk chocolate and inviting roasted coffee aromas on the nose, finishing with a sweet, smooth chocolate coating the tongue while you sip it. It’s one to savour as a dessert beer or for a lazy Sunday night (some people call it “Stout Sunday” after all!).
It’s unbelievably comforting, thanks to its malty backbone, and is vegan, gluten-free and proudly AF – like all of the independent, family-run Leyton-based brewery’s beers. This is a beer to enjoy and savour in peace.
Buy now £45.00, Nirvanabrewery.com
Bellfield and Jump/Ship Brewing Ship’s Bell dry hopped lager
Edinburgh breweries Bellfield and Jump/Ship Brewing have joined forces to brew a pretty impressive AF collaboration bev. The ship’s bell dry hopped lager from the duo is gorgeous – it’s refreshing, light and sweet – yet it’s totally sugar- and gluten-free.
Pouring a striking amber colour, this vegan lager pops with ripe, juicy peach and pineapple on the nose, thanks to the addition of mosaic and cryo hops – with sumptuous, fuzzy peach rolling into the taste. Though we’re not usually a fan of lagers, this one is uniquely sweet, without being too dry on the mouthfeel, and super fresh. All aboard, indeed.
Buy now £21.05, Drydrinker.com
The verdict: Alcohol-free beers
Forget everything you think you know about alcohol-free beers – these alternatives to the trusty pint are as great as the prospect of not having a hangover. They’re tasty, full of body and assertive aromas, so there’s no need to feel you’re missing out when opting for a “lo ’n no” drink.
We’d recommend Merakai’s impressive This Is A Thirst Trap pale ale, closely followed by Big Drop’s convincing classic IPA. Mash Gang is a brewery worth having on your AF radar, too, with exclusive drops of funny and funky “out-there” beers on limited runs.
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