The Best Dutch Alcohol-Free Beer: From Heineken 0.0 to a Trappist World First
Published July 2026 · 7-minute read · by Rich, founder of Unhopped
Ask most people to name a Dutch beer and you’ll get Heineken, Amstel, maybe Grolsch. But the Netherlands’ real claim in 2026 is what it’s done without alcohol: from the beer that mainstreamed 0.0 worldwide to a Trappist abbey brewing a world first, Dutch brewing has embraced alcohol-free more completely than almost anywhere. Here’s the landscape — and the nine Dutch beers in our directory.
Heads up: this page contains affiliate links. If you buy through them we may earn a small commission at no extra cost to you. Rankings are never influenced by commission. Read our full disclosure.
Why the Netherlands punches above its weight in alcohol-free
Three things happened. First, in 2017 Heineken launched Heineken 0.0 and put its full global marketing machine behind it — more than any single product, it made ordering a 0.0% unremarkable in pubs from Amsterdam to Auckland. Second, Dutch craft got there early: the same year, Utrecht’s vandeStreek released Playground, the first alcohol-free IPA from a Dutch craft brewery, brewed with a yeast that barely produces alcohol rather than stripping it out afterwards. And third, the trend reached places nobody expected — Amsterdam’s Lowlander has moved its whole botanical range to no-and-low, and even the Trappist monks of Koningshoeven joined in. The Dutch didn’t treat alcohol-free as a compromise category; they treated it as beer.
The big names: Heineken 0.0, Amstel 0.0 & Desperados
Heineken 0.0 remains the reference point: brewed then gently de-alcoholised and blended for balance, it’s crisp, lightly malty, only 21 kcal a bottle, and available practically everywhere — the beer that made 0.0% normal. Its stablemate Amstel 0.0 is maltier and a touch fuller, a solid session lager at 25 kcal. And Desperados Lemon 0.0 covers the party end — a citrus-laced 0.0 for people who want something sweeter and louder.
Buy Heineken 0.0 on Dry Drinker →The craft pioneers: vandeStreek
If one brewery earns the Netherlands its place on this list, it’s vandeStreek — the Utrecht outfit of brothers Sander and Ronald van de Streek. Playground IPA is the beer that started it: peachy, citrusy, properly bitter, and one of the most decorated alcohol-free IPAs anywhere. Fun House NEIPA is its softer, juicier sibling, and Bumper Blond shows the brothers can do restraint too — a clean Belgian-leaning blond at 0.5%.
Buy Playground IPA on Dry Drinker →The botanical brewer: Lowlander
Lowlander is the most distinctive brewer here. Founder Frederik Kampman came from the gin world — he developed botanical gins before wondering what herbs, spices and fruit could do in beer — and revived a genuinely old Dutch tradition of botanical brewing from the days when Dutch ships came home loaded with spices. Because botanicals carry flavour, alcohol doesn’t have to: the brewery now makes only no- and low-alcohol beers, brewed with things like leftover orange peel and reclaimed spruce needles, and donates 1% of sales to nature causes. We list Lowlander 0.00 Wit — a zesty, coriander-bright wit at 35 kcal — and the seasonal Pumpkin Weizen.
The world first: an alcohol-free Trappist beer
The one to bring out at dinner. La Trappe Nillis comes from Koningshoeven Abbey near Tilburg — where Trappist monks have brewed since 1884 — and it is the world’s first alcohol-free Trappist beer, launched in 2021 for the abbey’s 140th anniversary. The name plays on the Latin nihil (nothing) and nods to the Nile, whose source lies in Uganda, home of the abbey’s daughter monastery — and part of the proceeds fund the brothers’ projects there. In the glass it’s dark amber, malty and caramel-sweet with a pleasant bitterness: proof that alcohol-free can carry real Trappist character. It took Gold at the 2022 Dutch Beer Challenge.
Buy La Trappe Nillis on Dry Drinker →A note on ratings
Some Dutch beers in our directory show a 0.0 score — that simply means they haven’t been rated in the Unhopped app yet, not that they scored badly. Scores fill in as the community rates them.
Answer 5 quick questions and our Beer Finder will match you from 220+ reviewed alcohol-free beers.
Dutch alcohol-free beers in our directory
All nine, in one place: Heineken 0.0, Amstel 0.0, Desperados Lemon 0.0, vandeStreek Playground IPA, Fun House NEIPA, Bumper Blond, Lowlander 0.00 Wit, Lowlander Pumpkin Weizen, La Trappe Nillis. For neighbouring scenes, see our German and Belgian round-ups.