Tea steeping chart

How to read this chart

Every cell shows a median and, where the spread matters, the range that the middle half of teas in that category occupies. That is deliberate. A chart that claims "green tea: 80 °C, 3 minutes" is wrong for gyokuro, wrong for a Chinese long jing and wrong for genmaicha, and anyone who follows it will taste the error. The median tells you where to start when you know nothing else about the leaf in front of you; the range tells you how much room the category actually has.

The temperature column carries both Celsius and Fahrenheit on every row, always, because both get quoted and a chart that makes you convert is a chart nobody screenshots. Leaf quantity is given per 250 ml — one large mug — so it scales cleanly: halve it for a small cup, multiply by three for a 750 ml pot.

Temperature is the variable that ruins tea

Of the four numbers on each row, temperature is the one that destroys a cup fastest. Above roughly 82 °C (180 °F), the catechins and caffeine in an unroasted green tea extract far faster than its amino acids, and the balance tips from sweet and marine to flatly bitter within seconds. That is why the delicate end of this chart sits between 60 °C (140 °F) and 82 °C (180 °F) while black tea and most herbal infusions sit at or near boiling — 100 °C (212 °F) — where they need the heat to open fully oxidised or heavily dried material.

The other consequence is directional: you can always add heat, but you cannot take it back. If you are guessing, start at the low end of the range for the type and add five degrees on the next brew. A tea steeped slightly cool tastes thin and forgettable; a tea steeped too hot tastes actively unpleasant, and no amount of shortening the time repairs it.

Time follows leaf size and processing, not tradition

Steep times in this database run from well under a minute to a full 15 min, and the pattern behind that spread is physical rather than cultural. Small, broken or rolled leaf presents enormous surface area to the water and gives up its solubles quickly, so a fine broken-leaf black tea or a Japanese sencha is done in a minute or two. Large, whole, twisted or compressed leaf — silver needle, a rolled oolong, a pressed pu-erh cake — needs longer simply to rehydrate before it can release anything at all.

Herbal infusions sit at the far end for a different reason. Chamomile flowers, rooibos, dried fruit and roots contain no tannins to turn harsh, so nothing bad happens if you leave them in the water. Their times are long because long is what it takes to extract them, and the standard advice to "not over-steep" simply does not apply to a tisane.

Leaf-to-water ratio: the number most charts skip

A steeping chart without a ratio is only two-thirds of an instruction. The default across this database is close to 3 g per 250 ml, but the useful teas are the ones that deviate: the gongfu-oriented oolongs and pu-erhs are dosed heavier, and a few delicate whites lighter. If you have no scale, one level teaspoon holds roughly 2–3 g of a dense rolled or broken leaf and considerably less of a fluffy white or a large-leaf herbal — which is exactly why a scale, even a cheap one, changes more about your tea than any kettle upgrade.

Ratio and time trade against each other. More leaf with a shorter steep gives a thicker, sweeter, more aromatic cup than less leaf with a long steep, even when the total extraction is similar, because the compounds that make tea bitter come out later than the ones that make it taste good. That trade-off, pushed to its limit, is exactly what Gong Fu brewing is.

When to leave this chart behind

These numbers describe Western brewing: one generous vessel, one or two steeps, the ratio above. 90 of the 176 teas here also carry a full Gong Fu schedule — a much heavier dose of leaf in a small vessel, steeped for seconds at a time, five to 20 times in a row. If a tea's page shows a Gong Fu ladder, that ladder will almost always taste better than the Western row, and the Gong Fu chart lays out the ratios and timings side by side.

The other reason to leave a chart behind is the obvious one: your water, your leaf and your palate. Treat the median as the first draft of the brew, adjust one variable at a time, and write down what you changed. That habit is worth more than any table — and it is the reason the Teafinity app logs every steep you run.

Troubleshooting from the table

Bitter or astringent: the water was too hot for the type, the steep ran long, or both. Drop to the bottom of the temperature range first, then shorten by thirty seconds. Thin, watery, no aroma: not enough leaf — increase the dose before you increase the time, because a longer steep on too little leaf extracts the harsh compounds without adding body. Sour or metallic: usually water rather than tea; hard water flattens aroma and very soft water can taste hollow. Filtered water at the temperature on this chart is the single cheapest upgrade available to a tea drinker.