Over 100 Million People Worldwide Use E-Cigarettes, Including at Least 15 Million Teenagers

Tashkent, Uzbekistan (UzDaily.com) — More than 100 million people around the world use electronic cigarettes or vapes, including at least 15 million teenagers aged 13 to 15.

These figures are contained in a new World Health Organization (WHO) report on global tobacco use trends from 2000 to 2024.

The study is based on more than 2,000 surveys covering 97% of the world’s population.

According to WHO estimates, around 86 million adults use vapes, primarily in high-income countries. At the same time, children are on average nine times more likely to use e-cigarettes than adults. “E-cigarettes are fueling a new wave of nicotine addiction. They are promoted as a harm reduction tool, yet in reality, they expose children to nicotine earlier and threaten to undo decades of progress made in tobacco control,” said Etienne Krug, Director of the WHO Department for Social Determinants of Health, Health Promotion, and Prevention.

Despite a global decline in smoking rates, the tobacco epidemic remains a pressing issue. From 2000 to 2024, the number of tobacco users worldwide fell from 1.38 billion to 1.2 billion. Since 2010, this figure has dropped by 120 million people, or 27%. Nevertheless, one in five adults on the planet remains dependent on tobacco, leading to millions of preventable deaths each year.

A decline in tobacco use has been observed among both men and women across all age groups, though women are quitting at a faster rate. This group achieved the global target of reducing tobacco use by 30% by 2025 as early as 2020 — five years ahead of schedule. The prevalence of smoking among women decreased from 11% in 2010 to 6.6% in 2024, while the number of female tobacco users fell from 277 million to 206 million.

Men, by contrast, are not expected to meet this target until 2031. Today, over 80% of the world’s tobacco users are men — nearly one billion people.

Although smoking prevalence among men has declined from 41.4% in 2010 to 32.5% in 2024, the pace of reduction remains insufficient, the WHO notes.