Non-Alcoholic Beer Is No Longer an Apology

I surf most Tuesday mornings. Which means Monday evenings I’m not drinking — or at least, not drinking much. And I’ll be honest: for years that felt like a compromise at the table. You order the non-alcoholic option and you get a Heineken 0.0 or nothing worth mentioning. That is changing. Fast.

Non-alcoholic beer is no longer a niche wellness trend. According to data cited by Backbar’s 2026 beer trend report, NA beer on-premise has seen 33.7% year-on-year growth, and serious bars are now treating it as a mandatory category alongside craft and macro. Having a quality NA IPA or craft lager on tap is, in 2026, as essential as having a light option.

The Dutch context

The Netherlands has been ahead of this curve for longer than most realise. Alcohol-free beers have shown the strongest overall growth in the Dutch market for eight consecutive years, according to Bordbia research. Heineken and Brand were early movers, but what’s exciting now is that smaller, independent breweries are getting serious about the format. A well-made NA from a local microbrewery is a completely different proposition from a corporate 0.0.

Den Haag is interesting here because the drinking culture is different from Amsterdam. People here are often regulars at a local terras rather than bar-hopping tourists. That regulars culture means there’s more patience for quality over novelty — and it means a good NA option can become a genuine fixture on a tap list rather than a seasonal experiment.

What to look for

The best NA beers right now are built from the same ingredients as their alcoholic counterparts — quality malt, real hops, proper fermentation — with the alcohol carefully removed or never produced in quantity to begin with. Ask your taproom what’s on. If the answer is still just “we have Heineken 0.0,” push them. The category has genuinely moved on, and your neighbourhood bar should too.