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Japanese green tea, explained for people who have only had the teabag version
Nearly all Japanese tea comes from the same plant as English breakfast — Camellia sinensis. What separates the six teas below is not the plant. It is whether the leaf was grown in sun or shade, how it was stopped from oxidising, and what was done to it afterwards. Once those three variables make sense, the whole category stops being intimidating.
The one difference that explains everything
Chinese green teas are pan-fired. Japanese green teas are steamed. That single divergence, settled centuries ago, is why Japanese tea tastes marine, vegetal and sweet where Chinese green tea tastes nutty and toasted. Steaming halts oxidation within seconds of picking and preserves chlorophyll, which is why Japanese tea brews an emphatic green rather than a pale yellow.
The second variable is shade. Covering tea bushes for two to four weeks before harvest starves them of light, which drives up L-theanine — the amino acid responsible for umami and sweetness — and suppresses the catechins responsible for bitterness. Shade-grown leaf is the basis of both gyokuro and matcha, and it is the reason those two cost what they do.
The six teas, from everyday to ceremonial
Sencha (煎茶) — the default
Roughly sixty per cent of all Japanese tea production. Grown in full sun, steamed, rolled into needles, dried. Grassy, brisk, faintly marine, with real astringency behind the sweetness. This is what a Japanese household drinks daily and what arrives in a restaurant without being ordered.
Brew: 70–80°C, 60–90 seconds, 5 g per 200 ml. Boiling water will ruin it, and this is the single most common mistake Western drinkers make.
Expect to pay: £8–£25 per 100 g for something genuinely good.
Gyokuro (玉露) — the expensive one
Shaded for around three weeks before harvest. Intensely sweet, thick, almost broth-like, with an umami character closer to seaweed stock than to anything in the Western tea vocabulary. Brewed at a startlingly low temperature in a small volume of water.
Brew: 50–60°C, 2 minutes, 10 g per 100 ml. Yes, that is twice the leaf in half the water.
Expect to pay: £30–£120 per 100 g. The ceiling is much higher.
Matcha (抹茶) — the powdered one
Shade-grown leaf, de-veined and de-stemmed to produce tencha, then stone-ground into powder so fine it behaves like a pigment. Because you consume the whole leaf rather than an infusion, matcha delivers substantially more caffeine and L-theanine per serving than any other tea on this list.
Two grades matter. Ceremonial grade is first-harvest, drunk with water alone, and vividly green with no bitterness. Culinary grade is later-harvest, more astringent, and designed to hold its own against milk and sugar in a latte or a cake. Buying ceremonial grade for a latte is a waste of money; buying culinary grade to drink neat is an unpleasant surprise.
Brew: 70–80°C, 2 g whisked into 60 ml with a bamboo chasen until a fine foam forms.
Expect to pay: £20–£45 per 30 g ceremonial; £10–£20 per 100 g culinary.
Hojicha (ほうじ茶) — the roasted one
Sencha or bancha roasted over charcoal until it turns reddish brown. Roasting destroys most of the caffeine and all of the astringency, leaving something warm, toasty and caramel-adjacent. Served to children and to guests in the evening in Japan, and by a distance the easiest Japanese tea for a Western palate to like immediately.
Brew: 90–100°C, 30–60 seconds. Almost impossible to over-brew.
Expect to pay: £6–£15 per 100 g.
Genmaicha (玄米茶) — the one with rice in it
Sencha or bancha blended with roasted brown rice, some of which pops like tiny popcorn. Originally a way to stretch expensive leaf; now popular in its own right. Savoury, nutty, low in caffeine, and extremely forgiving. Often sold as matcha-iri genmaicha with matcha powder added for colour and body.
Brew: 80–90°C, 60 seconds.
Expect to pay: £6–£14 per 100 g.
Bancha (番茶) — the everyday one
Later harvests and larger, coarser leaves from the same bushes that produce sencha. Lower in caffeine, plainer, more rustic. Cheap, unpretentious, and the base material for most hojicha. Worth knowing about mainly because a great deal of what is sold in the West as "Japanese green tea" is in fact bancha.
Expect to pay: £4–£10 per 100 g.
Quick comparison
| Tea | Grown | Water temp | Caffeine | Per 100 g |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Gyokuro | Shaded 3 weeks | 50–60°C | High | £30–£120 |
| Matcha (ceremonial) | Shaded, ground | 70–80°C | Highest | £65–£150 |
| Sencha | Full sun | 70–80°C | Medium | £8–£25 |
| Genmaicha | Full sun + rice | 80–90°C | Low | £6–£14 |
| Hojicha | Roasted | 90–100°C | Very low | £6–£15 |
| Bancha | Late harvest | 80–90°C | Low | £4–£10 |
Four mistakes almost every newcomer makes
- Boiling water. The single biggest cause of bitter Japanese tea. If your kettle has no temperature control, boil it and let it stand for three to four minutes, or pour it between two cups to drop roughly 10°C each time.
- Steeping too long. Sencha is done in ninety seconds. Leaving the leaf in "to get more out of it" extracts precisely the compounds you do not want.
- Throwing the leaf away after one cup. Good Japanese leaf gives two or three infusions, and the second is frequently the best. Increase temperature slightly and shorten the time with each round.
- Storing it in the light. Japanese green tea oxidises fast. Airtight, opaque, cool, away from anything aromatic, and used within a few months of opening. A clear glass jar on a sunny shelf will flatten a £40 tea in weeks.
Where to start
Begin with hojicha or genmaicha. Both are forgiving, both are inexpensive, and both taste like something rather than like an absence of something — which is the trap of starting with a delicate sencha brewed badly. Once temperature control has become second nature, move to a mid-priced sencha from a named region (Uji, Shizuoka, Kagoshima and Yame are the ones worth knowing). Gyokuro and ceremonial matcha are worth reaching eventually, but they reward a palate that already has references.
We run tasting studies on Japanese tea and coffee. Participants receive a sampler across several of the types above and complete a structured tasting response — no prior experience needed, and "I could not tell these apart" is a legitimate and useful finding.
A note for Japanese producers
The recurring finding across our tea work is that Western consumers do not lack interest — they lack a brewing reference. A tea sold into Britain with a European-style "add boiling water" instruction is being actively sabotaged by its own packaging. Temperature guidance in plain English on the front of the pack does more for repeat purchase than any amount of provenance storytelling, and it costs nothing.
Questions people ask
Short, direct answers to the questions this topic reliably raises.
What is the difference between sencha and matcha?
Sencha is a loose-leaf tea grown in full sunlight, steamed, rolled and then infused in water — you drink the liquid and discard the leaf. Matcha is made from shade-grown leaf that is de-veined, stone-ground into powder, and whisked into water so you consume the entire leaf. That is why matcha is far higher in caffeine and L-theanine per cup, and considerably more expensive per gram.
Why is my Japanese green tea bitter?
Almost always water temperature. Japanese green tea should be brewed well below boiling — around 70 to 80°C for sencha and as low as 50 to 60°C for gyokuro. Boiling water extracts catechins too aggressively and produces astringency. Steeping time matters too: sencha needs only 60 to 90 seconds.
Which Japanese green tea should a beginner start with?
Hojicha or genmaicha. Both are roasted or blended, forgiving of brewing mistakes, low in caffeine and closer to flavours a Western drinker already recognises. Move to sencha once you are comfortable controlling water temperature, and treat gyokuro and ceremonial matcha as the destination rather than the starting point.
What is the difference between ceremonial and culinary grade matcha?
Ceremonial grade is first-harvest leaf, vividly green, intended to be drunk with water alone and largely free of bitterness. Culinary grade is later-harvest, more astringent, and formulated to hold its own against milk and sugar. Buying ceremonial grade for a latte wastes money; drinking culinary grade neat is an unpleasant surprise.
How should Japanese green tea be stored?
Airtight, opaque, cool, and away from anything aromatic. Japanese green tea oxidises quickly and is best used within a few months of opening. A clear glass jar on a sunny shelf will flatten an expensive tea within weeks, which is the most common storage mistake.