The healthiest vodka, ranked.

Corn-based, carbon-filtered, unflavored vodkas score lowest. Tito's and Smirnoff No. 21 are both corn-based, gluten-free, and additive-free. Premium wheat vodkas like Grey Goose and Belvedere are equally clean by chemistry but contain trace gluten compounds.

Any unflavoured vodka with no additives, because at 40% they all sit at the floor of the congener scale and score 2 out of 10 here. "Cleanest" only separates them on two things: the base, where corn (Tito's, Smirnoff No. 21), potato (Chopin, Luksusowa) and grape (Cîroc) avoid gluten grains entirely, and additives, where unflavoured vodka is allowed none in practice. Skip anything flavoured, which carries added sugar.

Distillation removes gluten proteins regardless of the source grain, so all properly distilled vodka is technically gluten-free. However, a small subset of severely gluten-sensitive drinkers still react. If that's you, stick to corn-based (Tito's, Smirnoff) or potato-based vodkas.

Vodka causes the mildest hangover of any common spirit at equal ethanol doses. Multiple controlled studies place vodka at the lowest end of congener-related hangover severity. Hangovers from vodka are almost always volume-driven, not chemistry-driven.

Vodka edges out tequila on chemistry purity. Even 100% agave tequila contains trace congeners and is allowed up to 1% additives. Plain vodka with soda water is the lowest-impact drink you can order at most bars.

Seven on this page avoid gluten grains at source. Luksusowa and Chopin are distilled from potato, Cîroc from Mauzac Blanc and Ugni Blanc grapes, Haku from rice, and Tito's, Smirnoff No. 21 and Deep Eddy Original from corn, which is a grain but not a gluten grain. Everything else here is wheat, rye or barley, or does not name its grain. Distillation removes gluten peptides from all of them, so this is a question about the small minority who react anyway rather than about coeliac safety in the legal sense.

Not on chemistry. Potato and grain vodkas both sit at the very bottom of the congener scale and score identically here. Potato vodka matters for one reason: there is no grain in it at all, so it sidesteps the gluten question entirely rather than relying on distillation to have removed the problem. Chopin is also deliberately under-filtered, which gives it more texture. That is a flavour difference, not a health one.

About 98 calories in a 1.5oz pour at 40% ABV, and every one of them is ethanol. Unflavoured vodka contains no sugar, no carbohydrate and no fat, so at the same proof every bottle on this page is within a calorie of every other. Mixers are where the calories actually come from: tonic or cranberry adds 80 or more, soda water with lime adds none. The flavoured vodkas are a separate case and do carry sugar.

No, and vodka is the category where that is easiest to demonstrate. Grey Goose, Belvedere, Svedka and Absolut all score a 2 on this site's hangover index because they are all heavily rectified neutral spirits with no additives and no sugar. Price in vodka buys water source, packaging and marketing. It does not buy a lower congener load, because the congener load is already at the floor.

Much less than the label implies, and there is no regulated definition of a "pass" so the numbers are not comparable between brands. Deep Eddy claims ten, Luksusowa three, and Absolut runs a continuous still where no count is meaningful at all. All three land at the same very-low congener score. Beyond roughly four passes you are removing progressively less of progressively less.

It is a different product from the one this page ranks. Unflavoured vodka is ethanol and water with nothing added. The flavoured lines carry added sugar, citric acid and often colouring, which puts them closer to a pre-mixed cocktail than to a spirit. Every chemistry figure on this page describes the original bottling only. If the label names a fruit, none of it applies.