How much caffeine is in black tea?
How much caffeine in black tea depends on certain variables from where it grows to how you make it.
- The varying climatic conditions on the tea garden where the leaf is grown
- Year to year and harvest to harvest there will be variations in caffeine density in the leaves from the same bushes making the same teas.
- How much tea you use
- How long you infuse it for
Does black tea have more caffeine than green tea?
It is a myth that green tea has no caffeine. It is also a myth that green tea has less caffeine than black tea. It might, but it might also be more.
Since all tea comes from Camellia sinensis, the caffeine in green, white, oolong, and black tea is roughly equivalent.
The level of caffeine in an individual leaf and plant will differ based on the time of year and across harvests
- Tender young leaves can have more natural caffeine. Caffeine is made by the plant to deter insects.
- However, higher levels of caffeine have also been found in more mature leaves, having longer time to develop.
It is safer to assume that any tea you drink is equally caffeinated with one exception - matcha.
Does black tea have more caffeine than matcha?
Matcha can contain more caffeine than black tea because it is a suspension of the powdered whole leaf not an infusion of the leaf that is later removed.
- With matcha you drink all the leaf, getting more caffeine in the process.
- Black tea is an infusion; you consume the liquid, not the leaf itself, thus getting less caffeine.
But caffeine levels will always depend on how much tea you use; and how you infuse the leaf tea. So there is no definitive answer for which has more
Is there more caffeine in black tea than coffee?
This will depend on how you make the tea or the coffee. The longer you leave the coffee or the tea in water, the more caffeine extracts. The more coffee or tea you use, the more caffeine there will be. So there is no definitive answer.
There is some help to make an educated guess:
- A 240ml cup of black tea contains roughly 40-75mg of caffeine.
- The USDA puts it at around 47mg.
- The NHS in the UK suggests up to 75mg in a strong mug.
- Coffee is often cited at around 100mg, but can range from 50 to 400mg depending on preparation.
The effects can feel different
Black tea also contains L-theanine, an amino acid not found in coffee, which produces a steadier, more focused alertness than caffeine alone with less of the sharp peak and subsequent slump that coffee can bring.
It is a different quality of lift, and one many people find more agreeable for sustained work.
Buddhist monks have drunk tea for millennia to sustain long hours of mediation.
What affects caffeine levels in your cup?
- Infusion time: longer steeping extracts more caffeine, though multiple short infusions from the same leaf can yield a similar total
- Amount of leaf: more leaf means more caffeine available to dissolve
- Temperature: high heat ruptures cell walls and releases caffeine quickly; but a long 12-hour cold infusion extracts the most caffeine of all
- Leaf grade: broken or finer-cut leaves release caffeine more quickly. However, this will not affect long brewed leaf tea or a cold infusion.
→ Sources
USDA Food Data Central (FDC #173227) - unsweetened brewed black tea, 240ml ≈ 47mg caffeine.
