How Many Martinis Does James Bond Drink? The Full Count

Short Answer

How many martinis does James Bond drink? In Ian Fleming’s novels, Bond drinks 35 martinis in total: 19 vodka martinis and 16 gin martinis. In the films, he drinks about 20 vodka martinis. The martini is Bond’s signature drink, but it is far from his most frequent one — across Fleming’s books he drinks 317 alcoholic drinks in total, and champagne, not the martini, tops the list at 65. So the short answer to how many martinis does James Bond drink is 35 in the books and around 20 on screen, out of hundreds of drinks overall.

It is one of the most asked questions about the character, and the answer surprises almost everyone who asks it. How many martinis does James Bond drink, really? The man famous for ordering his martini “shaken, not stirred” actually drinks far more champagne, bourbon and whisky than martinis. The martini is the drink Bond is remembered for, but it is not the drink he reaches for most often.

Fleming gave his hero a very wide bar tab, and the films narrowed it down to the one order that looked best on camera. This article counts every martini, book by book and film by film, explains why different tallies disagree, and settles the question of how many martinis does James Bond drink once and for all.

How Many Martinis Does James Bond Drink in the Books?

The most widely quoted tally of Fleming’s novels gives a clear answer to how many martinis does James Bond drink in the books: 35 martinis across the twelve novels and the short stories. That breaks down as 19 vodka martinis and 16 gin martinis. The count comes from readers who went through every Fleming book and logged every drink Bond orders or is served, and it has been repeated by reference works and fan tallies for years. It is the figure you will find in most Bond reference guides, and it is the one this article uses as its headline number.

One detail in that tally deserves attention. The Vesper, the cocktail Bond invents in Casino Royale (1953), is counted separately from the 35, because it is a drink of its own: three measures of Gordon’s gin, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet, shaken very well until it is ice-cold. Bond orders the Vesper only once in all of Fleming’s novels. It is the most famous drink in the series and the rarest one Bond ever orders, which is a fitting contradiction for a character built on them.

There is one honest complication. Not every counter agrees on the exact figure, because Fleming does not always name the spirit when Bond orders a martini. A second detailed breakdown of the novels counts 41 vodka martinis, a higher figure than the widely quoted 19, and puts gin martinis at 19 rather than 16. The difference comes down to how each counter treats the martinis Fleming describes without specifying gin or vodka. So if you see a different number elsewhere, it is not necessarily wrong — it is a different counting rule. What every tally agrees on is the scale: martinis are a small fraction of Bond’s drinking. The 317-drink total is the number that puts the martini count in perspective.

Bond’s Full Bar Tab: 317 Drinks in the Novels

To understand how many martinis does James Bond drink, you have to see the whole tab. Across Fleming’s novels, Bond drinks 317 alcoholic drinks in total — about one drink every seven pages. Here is how that total breaks down, using the most commonly cited tally:

Drink	Times in the novels
Champagne	65
Bourbon	57
Whisky (Scotch)	42
Vodka martini	41 in one detailed count; 19 in the widely quoted tally
Sake	37
Cognac	24
Gin (including gin martinis)	21
Red wine	21

The table tells a story the films never do. Champagne is Bond’s most frequent drink in the books, at 65 glasses — nearly twice the martini count. Bourbon comes second at 57, and whisky third at 42. Bond is, on the page, a champagne and bourbon drinker who happens to be famous for martinis.

His tastes also follow his location: he drinks 37 sakes, almost all of them in You Only Live Twice (1964), where 35 of those sakes are consumed during his long stay in Japan. Fleming wrote Bond’s drinking the way a travel writer writes a menu — the drink changes with the country, and the martini is only one item on a very long list.

Some books are thirstier than others. Casino Royale, the first novel, gives Bond 13 drinks, including the Vesper and several vodka martinis. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1963) is the heaviest book of all, with 46 drinks and the widest variety in the series — everything from Pouilly-Fuissé white wine and Taittinger champagne to bourbon, vodka and tonics, double brandy and ginger ales, whisky and sodas, and even a flask of Enzian schnapps.

Live and Let Die gives him 23 drinks, Moonraker 18, Diamonds Are Forever 26, Dr. No 19, and The Living Daylights 14. The pattern is consistent: Fleming’s Bond drinks constantly, and the martini is simply the order he is most often seen making.

How Many Martinis Does James Bond Drink in the Films?

The film count is smaller and simpler. How many martinis does James Bond drink in the films? About 20 vodka martinis across the 25 Eon films, out of roughly 102 alcoholic drinks in total on screen. Champagne leads again, at 32 glasses. The films also show Bond drinking at a remarkable pace: on average, he has a drink every eleven minutes of screen time. That is the film series compressing a lifetime of drinking into two hours at a time.

There is one striking difference between the books and the films. On screen, Bond’s martinis are almost always vodka martinis. He has yet to enjoy a gin martini — what purists would call a proper martini — in any of the films, while in the books he drinks gin martinis 16 times. The film Bond is a vodka-martini man through and through, and the phrase “shaken, not stirred” is always attached to a vodka martini. That is a choice the films made early and never revisited, and it is why the film count and the book count describe two slightly different drinkers.

The Craig era is the thirstiest of the film eras. In Casino Royale (2006), Daniel Craig’s Bond has 12 drinks in a single film, one fewer than the 13 the literary Bond manages in the novel of the same name. Craig’s Bond is also the only one of the six actors to have more martinis than kisses on screen, a statistic that says as much about the colder, harder Bond of the Craig films as it does about his bar tab. Earlier Bonds spread their drinking more thinly; Craig’s Bond drinks with intent, and the camera notices every glass.

The Vesper: Bond’s Most Famous Martini, Ordered Only Once

No answer to how many martinis does James Bond drink is complete without the Vesper, because it is the drink that made the question famous. Bond invents the Vesper in Casino Royale, the first novel, published in 1953. He orders it in the casino at Royale-les-Eaux and gives the bartender the recipe in full: “Three measures of Gordon’s, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet. Shake it very well until it’s ice-cold, then add a large thin slice of lemon peel.”

He names it after Vesper Lynd, the Treasury agent sitting beside him, and tells her that when he finds a better name he will let her know. He never does, and the name sticks.

What makes the Vesper remarkable is how rarely Bond returns to it. He orders it only once in all of Fleming’s novels. In the 2006 film of Casino Royale, the Vesper gets its moment of glory — Bond orders it, explains it, and drinks it with Vesper herself — but the novels treat it as a one-off invention rather than a habit. The drink that defines Bond in the popular imagination is, in the books, a single scene. That is worth remembering the next time someone assumes Bond drinks Vespers all day: he invented one, named it after a woman, and then went back to his vodka martinis, his champagne and his bourbon.

The Vesper also explains why the martini count is so often misunderstood. Many readers remember the Vesper scene and assume it represents Bond’s everyday order. It does not. Bond’s everyday order in the novels is a vodka martini, and his most frequent drink is champagne. The Vesper is a piece of theatre — a man showing off for a woman in a casino — and Fleming knew it. He gave Bond one unforgettable cocktail and then let the character drink like a normal, if heavy, drinker for the rest of the series.

Bond’s Real Favourite Drink Is Not the Martini

If the numbers answer how many martinis does James Bond drink, they also answer a question nobody thinks to ask: what does Bond actually drink most? The answer is champagne. In the novels, Bond drinks champagne 65 times — more than any other drink, and nearly double the martini count. In the films, champagne leads again, at 32 glasses against 20 vodka martinis. The martini is the signature; champagne is the habit.

Bourbon is the other surprise. Bond drinks bourbon 57 times in the novels, more than whisky at 42, and Fleming writes him ordering bourbon and water, bourbon on the rocks, and bourbon with soda in book after book. Ian Fleming himself preferred a gin martini, shaken, and he gave that preference to his hero in part — but he gave Bond a much broader palate than the films ever show. The film Bond is a vodka-martini man. The book Bond is a man who drinks whatever the country he is in drinks best: sake in Japan, bourbon in America, champagne in France, and a martini when he wants to make an impression.

That breadth is the point of counting. How many martinis does James Bond drink is a fun question, but the full tally shows a character Fleming wrote as a connoisseur, not a one-drink man. Bond knows his wines — the Mouton Rothschild ’53 claret in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the Taittinger champagne, the Pouilly-Fuissé — and he orders with the confidence of a man who has spent years in the best hotels in Europe. The martini is the shorthand. The 317 drinks are the character.

5 Martini Facts Every Bond Fan Should Know

Here is the count behind how many martinis does James Bond drink, in five facts worth remembering:

1. 35 in the books, about 20 in the films. The widely quoted novel tally is 19 vodka martinis and 16 gin martinis. The film tally is about 20 vodka martinis, and Bond has yet to drink a gin martini on screen.
2. The Vesper was ordered only once in the novels. Bond invents it in Casino Royale (1953) and never orders it again in Fleming’s books, even though it became the most famous cocktail in the series.
3. Champagne beats the martini. Bond drinks champagne 65 times in the novels and 32 times in the films. Bourbon is second in the books at 57. The martini is the signature, not the staple.
4. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service is the thirstiest book. Bond drinks 46 times in that novel, the most in the series, with the widest variety of drinks Fleming ever gave him.
5. Daniel Craig’s Bond drinks the hardest on screen. Craig’s Bond has 12 drinks in Casino Royale alone, and he is the only Bond actor with more martinis than kisses on screen.

Our Take

The martini count is the perfect Bond statistic because it is both exact and misleading. How many martinis does James Bond drink? Thirty-five in the books, about twenty in the films. Those are real, countable numbers, and they settle the question.

But they also miss the point Fleming was making. Bond’s drinking was never about the martini. It was about a man who knew what to order everywhere in the world, who could walk into a casino in France, a bar in Jamaica or a hotel in Japan and order the right thing without thinking. The martini is the line everyone remembers. The 317 drinks are the man.

The films understood this better than the fans sometimes do. They kept the martini and dropped most of the rest, because a two-hour film needs a signature, not a spreadsheet. That was the right call for cinema, and it is why “shaken, not stirred” is one of the most quoted lines in film history.

But the books tell a richer story. Fleming’s Bond is not a man with one drink. He is a man with a palate, a memory for vintages, and a bar tab that runs to 317 drinks across fourteen books. The martini count is the headline. The full count is the character — and the character, as ever with Bond, is more interesting than the catchphrase.

Frequently Asked Questions

How many martinis does James Bond drink in total?

How many martinis does James Bond drink in total? In Ian Fleming’s novels, Bond drinks 35 martinis: 19 vodka martinis and 16 gin martinis. In the films, he drinks about 20 vodka martinis. Across the novels he drinks 317 alcoholic drinks in total, so martinis make up only about one in nine of his drinks.

How many martinis does James Bond drink in the films?

Bond drinks about 20 vodka martinis across the 25 Eon films, out of roughly 102 alcoholic drinks in total on screen. Champagne is his most frequent film drink, at 32 glasses. He has a drink on screen about once every eleven minutes, and he has never had a gin martini in any of the films.

What is the Vesper martini?

The Vesper is the cocktail Bond invents in Casino Royale (1953): three measures of Gordon’s gin, one of vodka, half a measure of Kina Lillet, shaken very well until ice-cold, with a large thin slice of lemon peel. Bond names it after Vesper Lynd. He orders it only once in all of Fleming’s novels.

What is James Bond’s favourite drink?

Bond’s most frequent drink is champagne, which he drinks 65 times in Fleming’s novels and 32 times in the films. Bourbon is second in the books, at 57. The vodka martini is his signature drink and his most famous order, but it is not the drink he orders most often.

Does James Bond drink more in the books or the films?

Bond drinks far more in the books: 317 alcoholic drinks across Fleming’s novels, against roughly 102 drinks across the 25 films. The books also give him a much wider range — champagne, bourbon, whisky, sake, cognac, wine and martinis — while the films concentrate on the vodka martini and champagne.

Read Also:

For the fullest account of Bond’s drinking across the books and films, see Quill & Pad on the drinking habits of 007, and for the history of the famous order itself, Wikipedia on “shaken, not stirred”.

So, how many martinis does James Bond drink? Thirty-five in the books, about twenty in the films, and one Vesper that changed cocktail history. The next time Bond orders his martini shaken, not stirred, remember the other 282 drinks in the novels that never made it into the catchphrase — the champagne, the bourbon, the sake and the whisky that make 007 a connoisseur, not just a catchphrase.