What Percentage of Americans Smoke in 2026? Latest Data

If you are asking what percentage of Americans smoke, the latest national figure is about 9 to 10 percent of adults: 9.2% in the 2025 National Health Interview Survey and 9.9% in 2024. That is roughly 1 in 11 to 1 in 10 adults, down from about 42% in 1965. This guide gives the number with its survey year, shows the trend, the age and sex split and how many have quit, and says plainly which figures come from secondary sources.

The latest number: about 9 to 10 percent of US adults

The most recent national figure is 9.2% of US adults who currently smoke cigarettes (95% confidence interval 8.7% to 9.7%) in the 2025 National Health Interview Survey (NHIS). It comes from the CDC National Center for Health Statistics’ NHIS Adult Summary Health Statistics, a dataset last updated on 27 August 2026. The Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids state data table, printed 9/18/2026, shows the same national figure. CDC’s earlier early-release estimate for 2025, published in May 2026 before final data editing and weighting, was 9.1% (8.6% to 9.7%).

The year before, NHIS 2024 gave 9.9% (95% CI 9.5% to 10.4%) in the same CDC dataset, which matches a data brief from the CRST and CAsToR research groups. That brief calls its findings preliminary. The CDC series reads 14.0% for 2019, 12.5% for 2020, 11.5% for 2021, 11.6% for 2022, 10.8% for 2023, 9.9% for 2024 and 9.2% for 2025, so 9.2% is the lowest value in that series. A report in Tobacco Asia on the 2024 analysis puts the number of adults who smoked at about 25.2 million.

There is no single, clean “2026 figure”. Surveys are published a year or more after the data are collected, so a page with 2026 in its title is reporting data from 2024 or 2025. The table below shows each number with its year.

The numbers differ slightly because they come from different releases and methods. For example, the Healthy People 2030 page lists 10.1% for 2024 while CDC’s NHIS summary gives 9.9% for the same survey year, and the early release for 2025 differs from the final figure by 0.1 percentage points. We do not average them. The honest summary is roughly 1 in 11 to 1 in 10 adults.

Cigarettes versus any tobacco product

Cigarette smoking is not the same as tobacco use. In the CRST and CAsToR analysis of NHIS 2024, cigarettes were 9.9% of adults, e-cigarettes 7.0%, cigars 3.7% and smokeless tobacco 2.6%. The products overlap, so the shares do not add up. Tobacco Asia’s report on the same analysis puts use of at least one tobacco product, including cigarettes, cigars, e-cigarettes or smokeless tobacco, at 18.8% of adults, about 47.7 million people.

For comparison, the CDC reported in its 2022 data that 19.8% of adults, 49.2 million people, used a tobacco product, so overall use fell slightly while cigarette smoking fell faster. The brief defines current cigarette smoking as having smoked at least 100 cigarettes in a lifetime and now smoking every day or some days.

The trend since 1965

In the mid-1960s a little over 4 in 10 American adults smoked. The American Lung Association’s trends brief shows 42.4% in 1965 and 11.6% in 2022 in its data table, a fall of about 73%. Its text describes the fall from 42.6% to 11.6%, so we say about 42%. Here are selected years from the table.

The drop from 14.0% in 2017 to 11.6% in 2022 is a 17% fall over five years in the brief’s own words. Between 2022 and 2025 the CDC survey figures above continue downward to 9.2%. Survey methods change over time, and the brief marks a methodological note on its 1997 column, so treat decade-to-decade comparisons as approximate rather than exact. Source: American Lung Association, Overall Smoking Trends.

People who smoke now smoke fewer cigarettes a day

The decline is not only in how many people smoke. The American Lung Association brief shows that among current smokers, the share smoking more than 24 cigarettes a day fell from about 25% in 1974 to about 8% in 2022. The share smoking 15 to 24 a day fell from about 43% to 34%, and the share smoking fewer than 15 a day rose from about 32% to 58%.

That matters for two reasons. People who smoke fewer cigarettes often believe they do not need help, yet they face real health risks and can still be dependent. And the money side shrinks less than the headline suggests: a person at 10 cigarettes a day still spends a large amount over a year. Our weekly spending guide is a quick way to put a number on it.

By age and sex: who smokes most

The pattern in the 2025 NHIS is the reverse of what many people expect: the youngest adults smoke the least, and adults aged 50 to 64 the most.

Adults aged 50 to 64 had the highest rate at 12.3%, while 18-to-34-year-olds had 5.7%. Men were more likely than women to smoke cigarettes, 10.9% against 7.5%. The CRST and CAsToR brief on 2024 data splits the ages more finely and finds the same shape: 3.4% of 18-to-24-year-olds, 13.0% of 35-to-54-year-olds and 10.1% of those 55 and older. For race, income, education and region, see our full breakdown in smoking demographics statistics for 2026.

E-cigarette use in adults

NHIS 2025 puts current adult e-cigarette use at 6.6% (95% CI 6.2% to 7.1%), down from 7.0% in 2024 and well below the cigarette-smoking rate of 9.2%. Use is highest among the youngest adults: 12.6% of 18-to-34-year-olds in 2025, against 7.7% of those 35 to 49, 3.6% of those 50 to 64 and 1.1% of adults 65 and older. In 2022 the American Lung Association table put current adult e-cigarette use at 6.0%.

The age patterns for cigarettes and e-cigarettes are almost opposite, which is why the total tobacco figure is much higher than the cigarette figure. For more, see vaping statistics for 2026.

How many have quit: the quit ratio and quit attempts

The American Lung Association reports that in 2022 there were approximately twice as many former smokers as current smokers among adults. In the CDC’s 2022 data, 67.7% of adults who smoked said they wanted to quit, 53.3% had tried to quit in the past year and 8.8% had successfully quit in the past year (CDC, smoking cessation statistics, page reviewed 17 September 2024; the page blocks automated downloads, so we read it through a fetch tool and quote only these three figures).

Put plainly, most people who smoke want to quit, about half try each year and a small share succeed in any single year, which is why repeated attempts are normal. Our guide to how many ex-smokers there are and quit smoking success rates go deeper.

If you are in the shrinking minority, iQuit gives you tools for exactly the moments the statistics describe. SOS craving support includes breathing exercises, grounding and craving surfing, streak shields help you restart after a slip, and the AI coach offers free daily messages. It is free on Google Play and the App Store.

State by state, a threefold gap

The national rate hides large differences. The CTFK table, using 2025 state surveys (BRFSS), lists adult smoking at 5.7% in Utah and 17.8% in West Virginia, with Utah ranked lowest. For the full table see smoking rates by state in 2026, and for the wider context our overview of smoking cessation statistics for 2026.

The national target: 6.1% by 2030

Healthy People 2030 set a goal of reducing current cigarette smoking among adults to 6.1%, from a baseline of 14.2% in 2019. Its page lists 10.1% for 2024. At the 9.2% NHIS 2025 figure the country is closer to the target but still about 3 percentage points above it. Source: Healthy People 2030, objective TU-02.

Methodology: NHIS versus BRFSS, and what we did not verify

• NHIS (National Health Interview Survey) gives national adult estimates. We read the 2019 to 2025 national, age and sex figures directly from the CDC NCHS NHIS Adult Summary Health Statistics dataset. The CTFK table says its national adult rate comes from the 2025 NHIS and its state rates from the 2025 Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System (BRFSS), with California, Mississippi and Nevada from 2024.
• Current smoking means at least 100 cigarettes in a lifetime and smoking every day or some days now (CDC NHIS definition; CRST and CAsToR technical notes).
• Secondary sources: the 18.8% any-tobacco share and the counts of 25.2 million and 47.7 million adults come from a Tobacco Asia report on the CRST and CAsToR analysis, and we did not find them on a CDC table. The 2022 cessation figures come from a CDC page reviewed 17 September 2024.
• Not spliced: we show different releases side by side but never merge them into a single series.

The 2026 in the title refers to when the guide was written. The newest data year is 2025.

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