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After Mark Zuckerberg’s seemingly cautious sip of stout beer on Stripe co-founder John Collison’s “Cheeky Pint” podcast became a topic of conversation on social media, a new debate has erupted: Which tech executives can hold their liquor the most?
Shortly after Zuckerberg’s much-mocked appearance, the tech podcast ETN developed the so-called “Cheeky Pint Benchmark” and published a ranking of the guests’ Guinness consumption, measured to the sixth of a pint.
Elon Musk, the richest man in the world, currently tops the rankings after drinking three full pints during his appearance on Collison’s show.
Introducing The Cheeky Pint Benchmark. We made our intern watch every episode of Cheeky Pint to bring you this breakdown of pints drank by guests to the nearest sixth. Congratulations to @elonmusk who is currently in the lead with three full pints of Guinness. https://t.co/YTTP4P6BSA
— etn. (@etnshow) October 13, 2026
Tech Beer Drinkers Competition
The graphic triggered the competitive reactions typical of the tech world: Antonio García Martínez, director at Base, described the benchmark as “weak overall”.
1. Richest man in the world drank the most 2. This is pretty weak sauce in general, though not bad for people on a public podcast with a reputation on the line 3. Kind of curious if the Collisons match their guests
— Antonio García Martínez (agm.eth) (@antoniogm) October 13, 2026
Martin Casado, a partner at Andreessen Horowitz, joked that he would drink so much when he was a guest on the podcast that the index would need a new scale.
If they invite me, you’ll need to make this log scale.
— martin_casado (@martin_casado) October 14, 2026
The benchmark is based on a viral clip in which Zuckerberg appears to grimace after taking a sip of Guinness during a recent, over two-hour episode with Meta’s Chief AI Officer Alexandr Wang.
An X user came to Zuckerberg’s defense, arguing that the Guinness was “a show at best,” and pointing out that the Meta CEO had still drunk two beers during the interview.
Zuckerberg himself simply replied: “That’s just my facial expression.”
zuck is getting a lot of hate for this video but (1) guinness is performative at best and (2) he had two beers during the interview https://t.co/6dVFA78nZV
— wahndo (@Wahndo_) October 13, 2026
Wang also seemed to pick up on the joke and responded to a fan-created “tech founder beer matrix” that categorized founders on a spectrum from “beer sippers” to “beer drinkers” and from “good friend” to “bad friend”.
The table clearly placed Wang – although he hadn’t finished a whole pint in the podcast – on the side of the “beer drinkers”, alongside personalities such as Elon Musk, Larry Ellison and former Apple CEO Tim Cook.
you can’t possibly actually think i’m the same quality hang as tim apple
— Alexandr Wang (@alexandr_wang) October 14, 2026
Intercom co-founder Des Traynor took offense at being placed on the “beer snippers'” side of The Matrix, stating that he was the first “multi-pint drinker” to appear on “Cheeky Pint” and that his episode included an extensive discussion about beer.
This is the most insulted I’ve ever been on Twitter in ~20 years, and that’s saying something. Not to pull receipts, but I was the first multi-pint drinker on Cheeky Pint, and we spoke in detail about various beers on the episode itself.
— Des Traynor (@destraynor) October 13, 2026
The ranking methodology is already under criticism. Will O’Brien, founder of the autonomous watercraft company Ulysses, argued that the figures should be adjusted for episode length by using pints per hour instead of the raw totals.
He also said that other alcoholic beverages should be taken into account when determining who is “actually drinking”.
Totally inaccurate chart and not a proper way of measuring this metric. The pints should be normalized by time. It should be pints per hour. Elon was on for like 5 hours. Not fair vs other guests. Also some guests drank non-Guinness alcohol. They should be accounted for. The goal here is to see who’s actually DRINKING. The metrics need improving.
— will o’brien (@Willob) October 14, 2026
Tarek Mansour, co-founder of Kalshi, also objected to the “Cheeky Pint Benchmark” and explained that he had to leave his performance early. However, he did find a silver lining: he had drunk more than Marc Andreessen, co-founder of Andreessen Horowitz.
This is unfair. I had to walk out mid pod. At least I beat @pmarca though
— Tarek Mansour (@mansourtarek_) October 13, 2026
Musk, on the other hand, basked in the glory of his first place in the ranking and responded with beer mugs and a laughing emoji – adding that he “almost never” drinks alcohol.
🍻 🤣 Funny thing is that I hardly ever drink alcohol!
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) October 13, 2026
New trend in the Valley students or Smoking and fast food, perhaps?
But: a small group of founders, engineers and investors has turned to cigarette smoking – in an industry that has previously been known for its obsession with health.
The jokes come at a time when an increasingly sharp divide is emerging in Silicon Valley between those who like to live unhealthily from time to time and those who want to optimize every aspect of their health.
Robinhood CEO Vlad Tenev also wrote this week that he had “been hearing more and more about AI researchers starting to smoke,” adding: “Superintelligence is just around the corner.”
Hearing more and more AI researchers are taking up smoking … superintelligence is near
— Vlad Tenev (@vladtenev) October 12, 2026
Shyam Sankar, CTO of Palantir, commented that AI researchers are starting to smoke to signal their confidence that artificial intelligence will cure cancer.
Following Sankar’s comments, longevity entrepreneur Bryan Johnson – known for his fanatical pursuit of health – joked that he was ready to switch to smoking, alcohol, fast food and energy drinks.
ok, I’m in. pivoting to: > smoking, drinking, fast food > hard drugs, all-nighters, ragers > STIs, sun burns, deafening concerts https://t.co/Fra0WqfCi3
— Bryan Johnson (@bryan_johnson) October 13, 2026
Currently, the emerging trend in the tech industry seems to be less about optimizing life expectancy and more about proving that one is relaxed enough not to worry about it.
