Short answer: yes, a little. Kombucha has some caffeine, but not much, and a lot less than the cup of tea or coffee sitting next to it. If you want the actual numbers, here they are.
How much caffeine is in kombucha?
Most kombucha lands around 15mg of caffeine per serving, give or take. For context, a cup of tea is roughly 20 to 47mg, and a coffee is anywhere from 95 to 165mg. So kombucha sits well below both. It is a gentle nudge, not a jolt.
Why is there caffeine in it at all?
Because kombucha is made from tea, and tea has caffeine. There is no way around that, and any kombucha claiming to be brewed from real tea with zero caffeine is telling you a small fib. Ours is brewed from real tea, so there is a little in there. We would rather just say so.
Why kombucha has less caffeine than the tea it came from
This is the interesting bit. During fermentation, the yeast and bacteria in the culture work through the tea, and caffeine is one of the things they nibble at. As a rule of thumb, kombucha ends up with about a third of the caffeine of the tea it was made from. The longer the ferment, the lower it goes, the same slow ferment that also takes the alcohol back out. We ferment ours for a good while, so the cultures have plenty of time to do their thing, which keeps the caffeine modest.
So how much caffeine is in a can of Life Blood?
As a guide, roughly 8 to 11mg a can. That is around a fifth to a quarter of a cup of tea, and about a tenth of a coffee. Low, but not nothing, and we would rather give you the number than pretend it is zero.
Can I drink it in the evening?
For most people, yes. At 8 to 11mg a can, it is unlikely to keep you up. But we are not going to pretend it is caffeine-free, because it isn’t. If you are the sort who feels a square of dark chocolate at 9pm, that is your call to make, and now you have the number to make it with.
So is kombucha a coffee replacement?
Not really, and we would not sell it as one. It is not there to wake you up. It is there because it tastes good, it is made from natural ingredients, it has live cultures, and there are no artificial sweeteners hiding in it. The gentle bit of caffeine is just what comes with brewing a drink from real tea.
The common-sense version
Kombucha is fermented tea. Tea has caffeine, fermentation takes most of it back out, and what is left is a fraction of a coffee. No hidden stimulants, nothing to explain on the back of the can.
Some people call that health and wellness. We call it common sense.
Keep reading
Is kombucha alcoholic? and the top 10 kombucha health claims, put to the test. Or just grab a can of our real kombucha.
