How many drinks is binge drinking?
NIAAA counts 4 or more US drinks for women, or 5 or more for men, in about two hours as binge drinking. The same counts on any one day, at any pace, are its line for a heavy drinking day.
Binge drinking sounds like a college party or a night nobody remembers. By NIAAA’s count it’s much more ordinary than that. Four glasses of wine at a long dinner can be enough for a woman, and four restaurant pours are more than five standard drinks.
What we’d do
Count by the pour, and keep any one evening under the day line for you. Spacing drinks out lowers your peak, which is safer in the moment, but it doesn’t get them out of your blood sooner, so your night pays the same. If you’re near the line, make the next drink a 0% one.
NIAAA’s lines
| NIAAA line | Women | Men |
|---|---|---|
| Binge drinking, in about 2 hours | 4 or more drinks | 5 or more drinks |
| Heavy drinking, on any day | 4 or more drinks | 5 or more drinks |
| Heavy drinking, in a week | 8 or more drinks | 15 or more drinks |
| High-intensity drinking | 8 or more drinks | 10 or more drinks |
High-intensity drinking is twice the binge line or more. The federal drug use survey counts binge drinking a little differently, as the same 4 or 5 drinks on one occasion, at the same time or within a couple of hours, on at least one day in the past month.
These are US standard drinks of 14 g of alcohol each, according to NIAAA. Four 6 oz glasses of 13.5% wine are 5.4 of them, and three 16 oz IPAs are 5.6.
Does spacing them out help?
Pour four buckets of water into a tub with a slow drain. Pour them fast and the water climbs higher. Pour them slowly and it never gets as high. Either way the tub takes about as long to empty, because the drain runs at one speed.
Your liver is the drain. A 2010 review found it clears about the same amount an hour once the first drink or two is in. On our engine, a 150 lb woman who has four drinks from 8pm, food not known:
| How she drinks them | Peak | Mostly cleared |
|---|---|---|
| All four in about two hours | highest | about 7:05am |
| One an hour | about 17% lower | about 7:10am |
| One every hour and a half | about a third lower | about 7:20am |
For a 190 lb man having five, one an hour instead of all in two hours lowers his peak by about a third, and he’s mostly cleared about 5:25am instead of 5:05am. Slower drinking is safer at the peak, and it gives no sleep back.
When it becomes an emergency
NIAAA says the level can keep rising after the last drink, and that cold showers, coffee and walking don’t reverse an overdose. If someone is confused, can’t stay awake or can’t be woken, is vomiting, has a seizure, is breathing slowly (fewer than 8 breaths a minute) or with 10 seconds or more between breaths, or has bluish or pale, clammy skin, call 911 right away. Don’t leave them to sleep it off.
When will tonight's drinks clear?
Bed at 11:00pm
Mostly cleared by 2:50am
That's about 3.8 hours of your sleep with alcohol in your blood (3.1 to 4.9 if your liver runs faster or slower).
Restaurant pour6 oz, 13.5%, 1.35 US drinks- Restaurant pour6 oz, 13.5%, 1.35 US drinks
REM: More REM lost. Your evening is 0.56 g of alcohol per kg of body weight.
The full clock, with the band, the same drinks two hours earlier and what your heart does.
4 sources
- National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Drinking Levels and Patterns, updated January 2026niaaa.nih.gov
- National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, What Is A Standard Drink? Updated December 2025niaaa.nih.gov
- National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism, Understanding the Dangers of Alcohol Overdose, updated December 2025niaaa.nih.gov
- Jones AW, Evidence-based survey of the elimination rates of ethanol from blood with applications in forensic casework, Forensic Science International, 2010pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
