A depressant slows down the Central Nervous System. Example: alcohol.
A stimulant speeds up the Central Nervous System. Example: nicotine.
Tequila contains alcohol, so logically it should be classified as a depressant... but, there goes a famous claim saying that:
Unlike other forms of alcohol, tequila is not a depressant.
In other words, it says that tequila is the only alcoholic drink that's a stimulant, not a depressant.
The problem with this claim is that:
Tequila is most often made at a 38–40% alcohol content (76–80 proof), but can be produced between 31 and 55% alcohol content (62 and 110 proof).
Tequila's active ingredient is ethanol and ethanol is a known central nervous system depressant. As opposed to stimulating your brain, ethanol instead depresses it, causing lowers inhibitions and of course pleasure.
Furthermore, many people will argue that Tequila, a mix of alcohol and stimulants, has an overall effect which is not a depressant. This is FALSE.
Stimulants & Alcohol: A MASKING EFFECT When you mix alcohol with stimulants, the stimulants mask the effects
of how your body is experiencing the alcohol. Depending on how much
is consumed, over the course of however many hours, your Blood
Alcohol Levels may feel inaccurate due to the fact the stimulants are
interrupting the body’s natural ability to process the alcohol and
send you the appropriate messages. (ref)
Now they spoke about the masking effect only, but how do we know the alcohol will not have an overall effect of which is not depressant?
In a post by the National Council on Alcoholism and Drug Dependence, has announced that mixing energy drinks (stimulants with a lot of caffeine) with alcohol (depressant) can lead to “wide-awake drunkenness,” where caffeine masks the feeling of drunkenness but does not decrease actual alcohol-related impairment.
Also, apparently there are no clinical studies supporting tequila as a stimulant and/or not depressant.
In addition, one popular myth that persists to this day, tequila does contain mescaline. Tequila is a kind of mezcal, a distilled alcoholic beverage made from the maguey plant. Since mezcal's name is similar to mescaline, people probably thought tequila contained mescaline, and they thought mescaline is a stimulant (there is a controversy about this also). Despite the similar name, mezcal does not contain mescaline.
Conclusion: While tequila is made from a different plant than alcohols, it still has between 31% and 55% of alcohol. And the fact that it has between 31% and 55% of alcohol (and the possible lack of clinical studies supporting Tequila as a stimulant), it is enough to disprove that myth. At very low doses, and for certain people, it can appear as a stimulant since it suppresses certain inhibitions, but it's not, like all alcohols, it depresses the central nervous system..