Miami's Clubgoers Are America's Drunkest, Study Shows

It turns out the city where Diddy punched Drake in the face, Nicki Minaj made fun of a homeless person, Joaquin Phoenix fought a fake heckler, Pitbull built a thriving rap career, and Cuba Gooding Jr. ate a smartphone has something of a drinking problem when it goes clubbing. Who knew?

A new, super-unscientific study shows Miamians ingest so much alcohol Friday through Sunday that our collective blood alcohol content over the weekend is tops in the nation. But there's more. The Miami Beach megaclub LIV takes home the honors as the drunkest club in the good old U.S. of A., according to a study/brazen PR grab from the breathalyzer company AlcoMate. The firm conducted breathalyzer tests on people outside the three highest-traffic clubs in 33 U.S. cities for three consecutive weekends. The company claims to have surveyed more than 1,000 people from 8 p.m. to 2 a.m. every night.

The average person stumbling around a generic, red-blooded American town had a BAC of 0.19 — but Miamians pole-vaulted to an average of 0.251.

"Of course!" you shout. "Miami is full of tourists who spend all their time drinking. That fact must have skewed the data!" Sure, that's likely true, especially because Miami narrowly edged out Las Vegas, which ranked at 0.250.

It's worth noting that Honolulu, Miami's fellow tropical-tourism hot spot, ranked dead last on the list, with a typical weekend BAC of just 0.021. (Though Honolulu isn't exactly known for its nightclubs.)

Austin, Texas, came in third, with a weekend BAC of 0.243. From there, Chicagoans notched 0.233, and Miller-swilling Milwaukeeans drank their way to 0.231.

Because AlcoMate's representatives spent three weeks loitering outside clubs, the company also tallied up which clubs spit out the drunkest patrons — and Miami won again. LIV's patrons were ranked the drunkest of any dancing establishment surveyed.

There is, by the way, no evidence that any of those people drove or did anything stupid after imbibing. "We cut people off constantly, and our guest safety is primary," LIV owner David Grutman says. "We walk people into cabs and Ubers. And we're responsible vendors. That is why you see so few incidents at LIV."

Sadly, the study didn't say where else AlcoMate's reps hung out around town, so there's no info about which other two clubs contributed to Miami's high BAC ranking.

So here's to you, science, for confirming everything we already knew (and feared) about ourselves. As for which American city consumes the most weekend drugs, well, who knows?