Objective: To describe drinking patterns among individuals who prefer drinking wine, beer or spirits. Design: Cross-sectional study obtaining detailed information on intake of wine, beer and spirits and on frequency of alcohol intake. Adjustment for gender, age, smoking habits, educational attainment and body mass index. Setting: Denmark. Subjects: 27, 151 men and 29, 819 women, randomly selected from Copenhagen and Aarhus, Denmark. Main outcome measures: Drinking pattern—steady or binge drinking. Results: A vast majority (71%) of both men and women preferred wine or beer. At all levels of total alcohol intake, beer drinkers were most likely to be frequent drinkers. Thus, light drinkers of beer had an odds ratio for being frequent drinkers of 1.97 (95% confidence limits 1.50–2.58) as compared to light drinkers of wine (total alcohol intake 3–30 drinks per month), while people who preferred beer had an odds ratio of 1.29 (1.19–1.40) compared with wine drinkers in the moderate drinking category (31–134 drinks per month). There were no significant differences in total alcohol intake between individuals preferring different alcoholic beverages. Conclusion: If binge drinking is less healthy than steady drinking, the relation between wine intake and coronary heart disease mortality could be subject to negative confounding, since beer drinkers seem to have the most sensible drinking pattern. Sponsorship: Danish Cancer Society and the Danish National Board of Health. European Journal of Clinical Nutrition (2000) 54, 174–176