THE O2L WORLD CUP OF NON-ALCOHOLIC BEERS: FULL RESULTS & ANALYSIS
Unless you’ve been living under a bridge so far in 2025, we’re sure you’ll have all heard about the World Cup of Non-Alcoholic Beers competition we ran throughout January this year.
No? Oh, OK. Well, here’s some more information about what we’ve been doing to help pass the time in the longest month of the year.
What is the best non-alcoholic drink for Dry January?
This is the ultimate question we wanted to put to the test.
Having done Dry January every year for the past four years, we’ve tried a huge number of different non-alcoholic beers and ciders. Some have been great, others not so great, but all the while we’ve always wanted to find a way to separate the best from the rest. So that’s exactly what we did.
Introducing the World Cup of Non-Alcoholic Beers
For 2025, we wanted to utilise the help and incredible expertise of our lovely gaggle to work out the ultimate non-alcoholic beer.
While everyone’s different and there’s obviously personal preference to take into account, we thought it’d be interesting to find out what the general consensus was by running a literal popularity contest via Instagram. (insert not-so-subtle plug to follow our Insta page here 👀)
Here’s how it worked:
The Full Results
Round of 32
32 non-alcoholic beers entered, yet only 16 could make it through. Here’s how each match went down:
Matchday 1
Tie: Brewdog Punk AF vs. Free Damm
Date: 02/01/2025
Result: 69 – 31
Matchday 2
Tie: Guinness 0.0 vs. Stella Artois AF
Date: 02/01/2025
Result: 87 – 13
Matchday 3
Tie: Brooklyn Special Effects vs. Lucky Saint Hazy IPA
Date: 03/01/2025
Result: 39 – 61
Matchday 4
Tie: Big Drop Paradiso Citra IPA vs. Leffe Blonde 0%
Date: 04/01/2025
Result: 72 – 28
Matchday 5
Tie: Estrella Galicia 0.0 vs. IMPOSSIBREW
Date: 05/01/2025
Result: 65 – 35
Matchday 6
Tie: Big Drop Pine Trail Pale Ale vs. UnBarred LowKey Pale Ale
Date: 06/01/2025
Result: 82 – 18
Matchday 7
Tie: Beavertown Lazer Crush vs. Bavaria 0.0
Date: 07/01/2025
Result: 73 – 27
Matchday 8
Tie: Wiper & True Kaleidoscope vs. Beak Brewery FLWRS AF IPA
Date: 08/01/2025
Result: 25 – 75
Matchday 9
Tie: Days Pale Ale vs. Mash Gang CHUG XPA
Date: 09/01/2025
Result: 27 – 73
Matchday 10
Tie: Clear Head IPA vs. Peroni Nastro Azzurro 0.0
Date: 10/01/2025
Result: 61 – 39
Matchday 11
Tie: Erdinger Alkoholfrei vs. Thatchers Zero
Date: 11/01/2025
Result: 87 – 13
Matchday 12
Tie: Corona Cero vs. Becks Blue
Date: 12/01/2025
Result: 82 – 18
Matchday 13
Tie: Lucky Saint Lager vs. Tiny Rebel Clwb Tropica Non-Alc
Date: 13/01/2025
Result: 35 – 65
Matchday 14
Tie: Heineken Zero vs. Budweiser Zero
Date: 14/01/2025
Result: 82 – 18
Matchday 15
Tie: Harvey’s Sussex Best Low Alc vs. Big Drop Galactic Milk Stout
Date: 15/01/2025
Result: 33 – 67
Matchday 16
Tie: San Miguel 0.0 vs. Only With Love Juicy AF
Date: 16/01/2025
Result: 29 – 71
Round of 16
After hundreds of votes and some pretty tasty matchups, we knew the 16 teams making it through. So into the Round of 16 we went!
Matchday 17
Tie: Brewdog Punk AF vs. Guinness 0.0
Date: 17/01/2025
Result: 20 – 80
Matchday 18
Tie: Lucky Saint Hazy IPA vs. Big Drop Paradiso Citra IPA
Date: 18/01/2025
Result: 67 – 33
Matchday 19
Tie: Estrella Galicia vs. UnBarred LowKey Pale Ale
Date: 19/01/2025
Result: 23 – 77
Matchday 20
Tie: Beavertown Lazer Crush vs. Beak Brewery FLWRS AF IPA
Date: 20/01/2025
Result: 28 – 72
Matchday 21
Tie: Mash Gang CHUG XPA AF vs. Clear Head IPA
Date: 21/01/2025
Result: 50 – 50 (3 – 2 AET)
Matchday 22
Tie: Erdinger Alkoholfrei vs. Corona Cero
Date: 22/01/2025
Result: 35 – 65
Matchday 23
Tie: Tiny Rebel Clwb Tropica Non-Alc vs. Heineken Zero
Date: 23/01/2025
Result: 71 – 29
Matchday 24
Tie: Big Drop Galactic Milk Stout vs. Only With Love Juicy AF
Date: 24/01/2025
Result: 33 – 67
Quarter Finals
We had our final eight quarter-finalists. And with just a week left to go of the competition, we knew that one of these eight would be our winner. But who would it be?
Quarter Final 1
Tie: Guinness 0.0 vs. Lucky Saint Hazy IPA
Date: 25/01/2025
Result: 57 – 43
Quarter Final 2
Tie: UnBarred LowKey Pale Ale vs. Beak Brewery FLWRS AF IPA
Date: 26/01/2025
Result: 82 – 18
Quarter Final 3
Tie: Mash Gang CHUG XPA AF vs. Corona Cero
Date: 27/01/2025
Result: 67 – 33
Quarter Final 4
Tie: Tiny Rebel Clwb Tropica Non-Alc vs. Only With Love Juicy AF
Date: 28/01/2025
Result: 33 – 67
Semi-Finals
Things were heating up. Within a matter of days, eight had become four and we had two incredibly tasty semi-finals lined up (in more ways than one).
Semi Final 1
Tie: Guinness 0.0 vs. UnBarred LowKey Pale Ale
Date: 29/01/2025
Result: 26 – 74
Semi Final 2
Tie: Mash Gang CHUG XPA vs. Only With Love Juicy AF
Date: 30/01/2025
Result: 42 – 58
The Final
It was the moment we’d all been waiting for. A true clash of the titans: UnBarred Brewery’s LowKey Pale Ale and Only With Love’s Juicy AF. But who would reign supreme?
Well, after a back-and-forth battle, one beer pulled away and never looked back….
After a month of gruelling matchups, the ultimate winner of the World Cup of Non-Alcoholic Beers was found to be none other than:
Unbarred LowKey AF Pale Ale
(with 78% of the vote)
In second place we had…
Only With Love Juicy AF
(with 22% of the vote)
Third-Place Playoff
Just for some added peace of mind, and mainly for graphic design purposes, we also wanted to know who would take the bronze medal.
So, in a clash of Australia vs. Ireland, coming in at third place was…
Mash Gang XPA AF
(with 58% of the vote)
Final Standings: The Top 10 Non-Alcoholic Beers for Dry January
And there you have it.
What a rollercoaster ride of emotions. Shock eliminations, nail-biting drama, surprise winners – it really had it all.
Here’s what you lot decided were your top ten non-alcoholic beers (based on voting percentages and some highly sophisticated statistical analysis):
UnBarred LowKey Pale Ale
Only With Love Juicy AF
Mash Gang CHUG XPA AF
Guinness 0.0
Corona Cero
Lucky Saint Hazy IPA
Tiny Rebel Clwb Tropica Non-Alc
Beak Brewery FLWRS AF IPA
Erdinger Alkoholfrei
Clear Head IPA
And with that, the World Cup of Non-Alcoholic Beers is officially complete.
A huge thank you to all those who took part! We hope you had as much fun voting as we did running it!
Check out our tournament tree below if you fancy reliving it all once more…
If you have any other ideas of World Cup-style competitions you’d like us to run, get in touch or follow us on Insta for updates. And don’t forget to vote for your favourite pub, beer, brewery and more to influence our various pub league tables!
