Eighty-three beer styles explained: how each one tastes, how strong and bitter it is, where it comes from and who brews the classics.
About BeerCorp
A beer list can read like a foreign language. Gose, Kölsch, Dubbel, Wee Heavy: each name stands for a way of brewing that a town, an abbey or a family worked out over decades, sometimes centuries. BeerCorp explains them, one style at a time.
Each style page gives you the numbers that define a beer, its strength, bitterness and colour, then how it tastes, where it comes from, how to pour it and which beers show it best. You can browse by family, colour, country or brewery, so a pilsner you already know leads you to its relatives. The history, stories and guides cover the rest, from the Bavarian beer law of 1516 to the myths around India pale ale.
The numbers follow the style guidelines of the Beer Judge Certification Program and the Brewers Association. The history comes from the breweries’ own records and the Oxford Companion to Beer, and every page lists its sources at the end. lordtime writes and edits the site. Start with a style you already like, or with the glossary if a label puzzles you.
American IPA: a strong, bitter pale ale built around American hops, from citrus and pine to tropical fruit. Strength, bitterness, glass and classic examples.
Czech Pilsner: a gold lager with bready malt and a soft, spicy hop bitterness, first brewed in Plzeň in 1842. Strength, bitterness, glass and classic examples.
Irish dry stout: a black, roasty, bitter ale with a coffee note and a creamy head on draught, the style of Guinness. Strength, bitterness, glass and classic examples.
German Pils: a pale, dry, bitter lager with a bright hop aroma, adapted from the Czech original in the 1870s. Strength, bitterness, glass and classic examples.
Belgian Tripel: a strong, pale, dry abbey ale with spicy yeast and fruity notes, made famous by Westmalle. Strength, bitterness, glass and classic examples.
Hazy IPA, or New England IPA: a soft, juicy, hazy IPA bursting with tropical fruit from late hops, with low bitterness. Strength, glass and how it is made.
Märzen: an amber German lager with rich, toasty malt and a dry finish, brewed in March and served at Oktoberfest until 1990. Strength, bitterness, glass and examples.
Munich Helles: a gold Bavarian lager, soft and malty with a dry finish, created in Munich in 1894. Strength, bitterness, glass and classic examples.
Ales: beers fermented warm by top-fermenting yeast, fruity and full.
Lagers: beers fermented cool by bottom-fermenting yeast and matured cold.
Hybrid beers: ale yeast treated like lager, or lager yeast brewed warm.
Wild and sour beers: fermented with wild yeasts and bacteria for tart, complex flavours.
Pale beers: straw to light yellow, about 2–4 SRM.
Golden beers: deep yellow to gold, about 5–7 SRM.
Amber beers: amber to copper, about 8–15 SRM.
Brown beers: brown to dark brown, about 16–25 SRM.
Black beers: very dark to opaque black, from about 26 SRM.
Every style with its strength, bitterness, colour, glass and classic examples.
The breweries behind the classic examples, A to Z.
Beer country by country, with its styles and breweries.
How beer was brewed and drunk through the ages.
The people, places and myths behind the beers.
Glassware, serving temperature, tasting and reading a label.
Brewing words from ABV to yeast.
American beer from Budweiser and Yuengling to Sierra Nevada, Heady Topper and Pliny the Elder: German immigrant lager, Prohibition, the home brewers who started craft beer, and the closures and sales of 2023–2026.
Beer from Peru, Colombia and Bolivia to Guatemala, Jamaica and Trinidad: Cristal, Águila, Paceña, Gallo, Red Stripe and Carib, who owns the national brewers, Heineken's 2026 deal in Central America, and the Caribbean's tropical stout.
Brazilian beer from Brahma, Skol and Itaipava to Colorado, Dádiva and Big Jack: the three groups that brew most of it, German immigrant brewing in the South, Amazonian ingredients, and Catharina Sour, the first Brazilian style.
Canadian beer from Molson's 1786 brewery and Labatt Blue to Unibroue, Dieu du Ciel! and Steam Whistle: provincial prohibition, the ice beer wars, cream ale and spruce beer, the craft revival and Ontario's 2024 beer-sales shake-up.
