The Whiskey Highball is the simplest cocktail in the American canon and the parent of an entire family of related drinks. Two ounces of whiskey, four to six ounces of cold soda water, ice, no garnish past an optional lemon peel. The term "highball" referred to a tall glass long before it referred to a specific drink — the Whiskey Highball formalized the form around the turn of the 20th century, when the combination became the standard order at American hotel bars.
Highball: a tall glass, two-thirds full of cracked ice, with a jigger of any spirit poured over it, filled with seltzer.
Patrick Gavin Duffy, The Official Mixer's Manual (1934), recording the form that had been standard for thirty yearsHighball as a Glass, Then as a Drink
The word "highball" originally referred to a tall narrow glass — "high" as in "tall," "ball" as in "sphere" of liquid. The drink form (spirit + soda + ice in that glass) became standard practice in American hotel bars in the 1890s; the term "Whiskey Highball" appears in print in trade publications by 1898 and was firmly established by the time Prohibition arrived in 1920. After Repeal in 1933, the highball was one of the safest orders in a country that had forgotten how to drink cocktails properly — two ingredients, hard to mess up.
The form spawned variants: the Japanese Highball (Suntory's careful chilled-glass version), the Scotch & Soda (specifically Scotch whisky), the Bourbon Highball, the Rye Highball. Each is essentially the same drink with the whiskey choice as the variable. The Whiskey Highball page is the parent record; the others are dialect variants.
The Spec
Two ounces of whiskey of your choosing — bourbon, rye, Irish, Tennessee, Canadian, Scotch (technically a Scotch & Soda at that point). Pour into a highball glass with cubed ice, top with four to six ounces of cold club soda or seltzer, stir gently once, optional lemon peel.
Whiskey Choice
Any decent whiskey works. A 100-proof bourbon (Wild Turkey 101, Old Forester 100) gives the drink the most weight; an 80-proof bourbon (Buffalo Trace, Maker's Mark) is softer; a rye (Rittenhouse, Bulleit) brings more spice. Don't reach for the top shelf — the soda dilutes too much for a 12-year-aged whiskey to matter. Save the good bottle for an Old Fashioned or to sip neat.
Soda Quality
Cold and freshly opened is the only requirement. Topo Chico, Perrier, or a soda siphon are all fine; a flat tonic-water-grade bottle is not. The bubbles do active work in the cocktail — they release the whiskey's aroma at the surface. A flat highball is a glass of weak whiskey.
Garnish, or Not
A lemon peel expressed over the surface adds an aromatic top end that most American whiskeys benefit from. A lime wedge works with Scotch. No garnish at all is the older bar move and not wrong; the cocktail is built around two ingredients, and a third is editorial.
Bottom Line
The Whiskey Highball is the cocktail to order when you don't want to think about what you're drinking — a baseline that respects whatever whiskey you put in it and respects your evening enough not to demand a sour or a stirred drink. It's also the answer to "What should I make with this bottle I don't love?" — the soda hides the flaws of a mediocre whiskey better than ice or sugar or bitters do.