Teen vaping has hit a milestone worth noting. Fresh federal data shows past-year drug use among American students sitting at 21.1% in 2025, just a hair above the all-time low of 19.7% set back in 1992. The sharpest declines began in 2021 and kept going straight through 2025, with nicotine vaping part of that broader downward story.
The numbers come from the University of Michigan’s long-running Monitoring the Future survey, which tracks substance use among 8th, 10th, and 12th graders every year.
The grade-by-grade vaping picture
Nicotine vaping follows a clear ladder by grade: the older the students, the higher the rate. Here is where each group landed in 2025:
| Grade | Past-year nicotine vaping |
|---|---|
| 8th grade | 8.5% |
| 10th grade | 14.3% |
| 12th grade | 20% |
For comparison, marijuana use ran close to vaping in every grade, at 7.6%, 15.6%, and 25.7% respectively, and alcohol outpaced both.
A turning point that started in 2021
The most striking takeaway is timing. After years of concern about teen vaping, the sharp drop since 2021 suggests the tide turned without fanfare. The Monitoring the Future survey is the gold standard here, so these are not loose estimates.
The same federal data also shows provisional overdose deaths among adolescents ages 12 to 17 falling 29.6% to 300 in the 12 months ending January 2026, down from 426 the year before. That lines up with the survey’s broader picture of declining use.
What this means for the vaping conversation
Low teen use matters because it reshapes the policy debate. When youth vaping rates sit near historic lows, the argument shifts from crisis response to maintenance: keeping legitimate adult access open while preserving the guardrails that got rates down. The FDA-authorized vapes list shows what legal adult vaping looks like under strict federal oversight, a system designed to serve smokers, not hook teens.
The work is not done. One in five high school seniors still vaped in the past year, and that is not a number to celebrate. But the direction is unmistakable, and the official record now tells a different story from the youth-epidemic narrative. Our vaping safety guide breaks down what the science says for adult readers.
Source: White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, Office of Data and Research, October 2026 report on student drug use.