Distillers Turkey
A one-page guide to Turkey for the spirits trade: the country, its people, its economy and how it drinks.
At a glance
- Capital
- Ankara
- Official languages
- Turkish
- Currency
- Turkish lira (TRY)
- Time zone
- UTC+3 (TRT)
- Area
- 783,562 km²
People
- Population
- 85.8 million (2025)
- Population growth
- 0.4% a year
- Living in towns and cities
- 89.5%
- Aged under 15
- 21.0%
- Aged 65 and over
- 10.6%
- Life expectancy
- 77.4 years
Economy
- GDP
- US$1.60 trillion (2025)
- GDP per person
- US$18,676 (2025)
- Economic growth
- 3.7% (2025)
- Inflation
- 34.9% (2025)
Climate
Varied: northern coasts are warm in summer, cool-cold in winter and wet all year; western and southern coasts have hot dry summers and mild wet winters; the interior has harsher winters, big temperature swings and low rainfall.
Alcohol
- Alcohol is
- Legal
- Legal drinking age
- 18
- Alcohol per adult a year
- 2.1 litres of pure alcohol (2022)
- Traditional drinks
- Raki (aniseed grape spirit; the most popular alcoholic drink), Wine
Sources: World Bank (population, economy and demographics), WHO Global Health Observatory (alcohol per adult and drinking mix); Wikipedia - Alcohol in Turkey; Wikipedia - Turkey (basics, climate); IMF DataMapper WEO (GDP, population, growth, inflation; retrieved 26 Oct 2026); UN Comtrade (HS 2208); WHO Global Health Observatory; Wikipedia - Legal drinking age; Drinks International - Raki: the lion's share (2019); Wikipedia - Tekel. Figures are the latest each source publishes; the year is shown beside each one.