Their principal crops are millet, maize, groundnuts, and guinea corn. Awak also engage in hunting, fishing, and trading. When compared to many other peoples in the region, the Awak are somewhat modernized. Primary schools are located in Awak and other villages, but there is no secondary school in the area. The Awak are divided into clans and live in compact villages surrounded by walls or hedges.
Huts are usually round with cone-shaped thatched roofs and mud walls.
Arranged marriages are typical in other African groups of this region, but the Awak allow a man to choose a wife for himself. On the wedding day, the bride takes her household utensils with her to the groom's house where the groom awaits to offer her the food he has prepared. The village then gathers for two days of festivities to finalize the marriage. Seven days after the birth of a child, the child's father prepares food and takes it as an offering to the Lole who is the personification of an occult power. The priest or the parents of the child then name the infant.