Watch: We tried alcohol-free drinks for Dry January - some fared better than others

One of those which a lot of people over the age of 18 may have considered is giving up alcohol for the first 31 days of the new year, meaning that between January 1 and January 31, they won't touch a drop.

It's an idea which has seen the launch of 'Dry January', a campaign by Alcohol Change UK to go alcohol-free for the whole of the month. The group says giving up the booze could help improve sleep, provide a mental health boost and save money.

My own thought has been that it can be a good idea to make a change, but I also think that there's a way to do it to ensure that you're not drinking alcohol, but you can still enjoy the flavour of the drink.

In the last few years, non-alcoholic and low-alcohol drinks have become more palatable and enjoyable things to drink as the technology around the drinks has improved and companies have made the drinks more flavourful and tastier.

I've done a taste test of nine different drinks, which are a selection of ales, lagers and a cider, plus a bottle of Nozeco, a Merlot red wine and a gin and tonic can, to see what they taste like and whether I would recommend them.

The drink I didn't film was the Beavertown Lazer Crush, but which I also had a can of and wanted to share as an option as I think it's a very nice drink.

The beer by Beavertown Brewery uses a strain of yeast which ferments the beer without producing alcohol, which is then mixed with Azacca, Amarillo and Citra hops to produce an Indian Pale Ale (IPA).

I've tried it before and found it to be a very pleasant and very nice beer, with a strong cirtus flavour and the familiar Beavertown IPA aroma, but with only 0.3 per cent alcohol, which I worked out was what a ripe banana or a piece of rye bread produces.

For the actual taste test on the video, I tried Ghost Ship by Adnams (0.5 per cent), Doom Bar Zero (zero per cent), Erdinger Alkohol-frei (0.5 per cent), Thatchers Zero (zero per cent), Lucky Saint (0.5 per cent), Nozeco (0.5 per cent), Eisberg Merlot (zero per cent) and Gordon's 0.0% and tonic (zero per cent).

I tasted all eight and will provide notes on smell and taste, as well as how much they would cost to buy and a ranking out of 10.

Ghost Ship - It carries that very pungent smell of a good IPA, with a nice hoppy aroma, and has a very smooth taste, not too overpowering with the citrus flavour and leaving a nice aftertaste. 9/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £1.50 for a 500ml bottle.

Doom Bar Zero - I like Doom Bar as it's a very earthy drink and the zero-alcohol version matches that with a malty taste and a balanced flavour, while it smells very malty and has a subtle bitterness to it. 8/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £1.75 for a 500ml bottle.

Erdinger Alkohol-frei - The beer is advertised as an isotonic thirst-quencher, which technically makes it a sports drink. There isn't much of a smell as it's a lager, but it is refreshing and has a nice taste, although that taste does linger a little bit too long at the end of it. 6/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £1.65 for a 500ml bottle.

Thatchers Zero - The concept of an alcohol-free cider was a strange one to me, but it has that wonderful apple aroma when you smell it and the taste is crisp and refreshing, like drinking a really nice glass of fizzy apple juice. 8/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £1.95 for a 500ml bottle.

Lucky Saint - The smallest of the beer/cider selections, but it packs a proper taste, very citrusy and hoppy and without the lingering aftertaste of the Erdinger. It also has a nice aroma of hops and oranges. 8/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £1.95 for a 330ml bottle.

Nozeco - It's a hard trick to make champagne or prosecco taste like it should do without the alcohol in it. This product smells like a glass of prosecco, but it falls down on the taste, which is far too sweet for me and feels like it's compensating too much. 5/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £1.60 for a 200ml bottle.

Eisberg Merlot - Again, the trick is to make something which is from the fine vine taste like it's come from a chateau's vineyard. This does not do that, unfortunately, as while it has a pleasant smell and a fine nose, it tastes like blackcurrant squash, which I like, but just not from a wine. 4/10

You can buy a bottle of this from a supermarket for around £3.50 for a 750ml bottle.

Gordon's 0.0% and tonic - I'm not a gin and tonic drinker, but after adding ice and a slice, I gave this a try. I'll be honest, while it smelt of the juniper berries used to make it, it carried very little flavour apart from the lemon slice. 5/10

You can buy a can of this from a supermarket for around £1.50 for a 250ml can.

As well as these drinks, there are other options, depending on what your tastes are, with Banks's Brewery in Wolverhampton offering up Shipyard Low Tide from the Marston's range.

Whatever you decide to do during January, consider trying some of these non-alcoholic drinks and see what you think.