How Long Until I Pass a Breathalyzer After a Pint of Vodka?

If you’re the kind of person who drinks pints of vodka, it might be years or never. A pint of vodka is like 11 or twelve shots, and you might give it 13 or 14 hours—though the more, the better, for a quicker sobering up.

A Tricky Question

That’s a tricky one because predicting when you’ll pass a breathalyzer is like guessing when a magician will pull the rabbit out of the hat—it depends on a whole lot of factors, and there’s always a chance of a disappearing act. The alcohol might magically not be out of your system. A pint of vodka packs a wallop, so it might take longer than your average thimble-full of cough syrup. Realistically, it could be anywhere from a few hours to... well, let’s just say you might be better off using your phone for flashlight duty instead of trying to navigate the highway. The best course of action? Avoid the whole ordeal altogether! Enjoy your drink, have a blast, and let someone else be the hero. Your liver and your future self will thank you!

Even After Sleep, Food, You Can Still Blow Over

Even after sleep and food, you can still blow over the next day. That’s a fact—my own husband can attest to this. A pint of vodka contains about eight servings or drinks. Each drink will raise your Blood Alcohol Content (BAC) by about 0.025 for the average person. It takes your body about one hour to process 0.02 BAC.

So, if you binge drank a pint of vodka, this would raise your BAC to a point of approximately 0.2. If your body is typical, it would take about 10 hours to reach a zero content BAC. You could reduce this time slightly by about an hour or so if you drink water, other non-alcoholic beverages, eat food, or exercise. But for the most part, time is the only attribute that will sober you up. I owned a high-quality portable breathalyzer that I was able to calibrate, same as a police officer might use in a roadside stop. It provided accurate readings, and I would use it occasionally to learn about how alcohol is processed. My numbers here were gathered from these tests. When I use the term 'average', this mostly concerns weight in the 130-200lb range.

Other Factors

Other factors can affect how quickly your body processes alcohol. People with health conditions may not process alcohol the same way a healthy person does. Some people have naturally lower or higher tolerances. I wish alcohol-serving establishments were compelled to have BAC readers for patrons to use for a nominal cost, like $1, so they can gauge where they are in terms of intoxication. I think this would assist responsible people when deciding if they are safe/legal to drive a car.