(TNND) — Tobacco use is down to a 25-year low among American teenagers, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The CDC said last week that 2.25 million middle and high school students reported tobacco use in the 2024 National Youth Tobacco Survey, down from 2.8 million in 2023.

The progress is largely due to a sizable drop in e-cigarette use, the CDC said.

This year, 1.63 million teens reported e-cigarette use, down from 2.13 million a year ago.

Cigarette smoking reached the lowest level ever recorded by the survey at just 1.4% of students.

Deirdre Lawrence Kittner, the director of CDC's Office on Smoking and Health, called the decline “an extraordinary milestone for public health.”

Use of tobacco products in any form is unsafe, and nearly all tobacco use begins during youth, the CDC said.

"We must remain committed to public health efforts to ensure all youth can live healthy, tobacco-free lives,” Kittner said in a news release.

Youth e-cigarette use declined to the lowest level in a decade.

But e-cigarettes remained the most commonly used tobacco product (5.9%) for teens.

Nicotine pouches became the second-most commonly used tobacco product among youth (1.8%), followed by cigarettes (1.4%), cigars (1.2%), smokeless tobacco (1.2%), other oral nicotine products (1.2%), heated tobacco products (0.8%), hookahs (0.7%) and pipe tobacco (0.5%).

Brian King, the director of the Food and Drug Administration's Center for Tobacco Products, said in a news release that we’re “headed in the right direction” but “can't take our foot off the gas.”

Health officials stressed the need to address disparities.

For example, tobacco use increased among American Indian or Alaska Native students, and current use of nicotine pouches increased among White students.