Alcohol consumption in Finland continued its downward trend in 2025, with sales through shops, restaurants and other domestic channels falling compared with the previous year, according to new figures released by the Finnish Institute for Health and Welfare (THL).
Recorded alcohol consumption, which includes retail purchases and alcohol served in restaurants and bars, fell by 4.5 per cent from 2024 levels. The figure amounted to approximately 6.9 litres of pure alcohol per resident aged 15 or older.
Across the country, recorded consumption totalled about 33.3 million litres of pure alcohol during the year.
Retail sales through supermarkets, Alko stores and other outlets declined by 4.3 per cent, while alcohol consumption in restaurants and licensed venues fell by 4.5 per cent.
THL said alcohol sales decreased in every wellbeing services county. The largest decline was recorded in Southwest Finland.
When broken down by beverage type, strong beer was the only category to register growth. Consumption of all other alcoholic drink categories fell compared with the previous year.
Despite the decline in domestic sales, THL said it cannot provide an estimate of Finland’s total alcohol consumption for 2025 because of changes in the way data on traveller imports and foreign online purchases is collected.
Those two categories have accounted for roughly 15 per cent of total alcohol consumption in previous years.
At the beginning of 2025, data collection shifted from telephone interviews to an online panel system. According to THL, the results produced by the two methods differ significantly and cannot be reliably compared or combined.
“Total consumption cannot currently be estimated because the data basis for traveller imports and online purchases is not comparable with previous years,” said Marke Jääskeläinen, Development Manager at THL.
HT