National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS)

The National Youth Tobacco Survey (NYTS) datasets are available for public use, so that researchers and public health managers can explore the data in detail. In addition, states can compare their estimates of prevalence of youth tobacco use with national data.

The NYTS was designed to provide national data on long-term, intermediate, and short-term indicators key to the design, implementation, and evaluation of comprehensive tobacco prevention and control programs. The NYTS also serves as a baseline for comparing progress toward meeting selected Healthy People 2030 goals for reducing tobacco use among youth:

  • TU‑04 – Reduce current tobacco use in adolescents
  • TU‑05 – Reduce current e-cigarette use in adolescents
  • TU‑06 – Reduce current cigarette smoking in adolescents
  • TU‑07 – Reduce current cigar smoking in adolescents
  • TU‑08 – Reduce current use of smokeless tobacco products among adolescents
  • TU‑09 – Reduce current use of flavored tobacco products in adolescents who use tobacco
  • TU‑22 – Reduce the proportion of adolescents exposed to tobacco marketing

Items measured as part of the NYTS survey include correlates of tobacco use such as demographics, minors’ access to tobacco, and exposure to secondhand smoke.

The NYTS provides nationally representative data about middle and high school youth’s—

  • Tobacco-related beliefs
  • Attitudes
  • Behaviors
  • Exposure to pro- and anti-tobacco influences

Data are available in SAS®, Microsoft Access®, and Microsoft Excel® formats, as well as PDFs of the questionnaire, codebook, and methodology report. If you do not have Microsoft Access®, you may download a free version of EPI Info to view the datasets.

To extract the data files (for NYTS 2011-2022 and earlier data), you must have zip software. You may download a trial version of WinZip at http://www.winzip.com/.

Historical NYTS Data and Documentation

CDC expects that users of the NYTS data set will adhere to the following standards for the analysis and reporting of research data. All research results should be presented and/or published in a manner that protects the confidentiality of participants. NYTS data will not be presented and/or published in any way in which an individual or school can be identified. Therefore, users will:

  1. Not attempt to link nor permit others to link the data with individually identified records in another database.
  2. Not attempt to learn the identity of any person or school included in the data and will not deliberately combine this data with other CDC or non-CDC data for the purpose of matching records to identify individuals or schools. If you should inadvertently discover the identity of any person or school, you will ensure the identity of any person or school is kept confidential, and not used in any publications and/or presentations.
  3. Not imply or state, either in written or oral form, that interpretations based on analysis of the data reflect official CDC policies or positions.
  4. Understand that sub-national analyses are not appropriate for this national sample and will not be conducted.
  5. Because of the implementation of COVID-19 protocols across the country when the 2021 NYTS was conducted (January 18–May 21, 2021), the survey was administered online to allow eligible students to complete the survey at home, school, or somewhere else. Therefore, the 2021 NYTS results cannot be compared with results from previous NYTS surveys that were primarily conducted on school campuses.

    In 2022, the NYTS continued to be administered online. Because of changes in methodology, including differences in survey administration and data collection procedures, the ability to compare estimates from NYTS 2022 with those from previous NYTS waves is limited; differences between estimates might result from changes in methodology, actual behavior, or both.

By using these data you signify your understanding of the above-stated terms.

Download NYTS 2011-2022 and earlier data