Beer Brewing Timeline: An Overview of Beer From Wort to Pint (2024)

FAQs

What are the 7 steps of the beer brewing process? ›

What are the steps in making beer? The beer brewing process involves malting, milling, mashing, extract separation, hop addition and boiling, removal of hops and precipitates, cooling and aeration, fermentation, separation of yeast from young beer, aging, and maturing.

The short answer is that, on average, it takes about four hours to brew beer, one to two weeks to ferment and condition, two hours to package in bottles, and one to two weeks to naturally carbonate in bottles. So, trom start to finish, on average, it takes anywhere from two to four weeks to make beer.

At this stage, brewers yeast is added to the wort, and the fermentation process begins. The amount of time needed for fermentation from here is based on the yeast/beer style. The typical fermentation takes two weeks when making ale and four to eight weeks when making lager.

Steps in the brewing process include malting, milling, mashing, lautering, boiling, fermenting, conditioning, filtering, and packaging.

Maturation is the process that rounds out the flavors, resulting in the beverage we love to drink! This process can be called by several names, such as lagering, cold storage, conditioning, and flavor maturation, but the concept is always the same: keep beer in low temperatures.

Fermentation is usually divided into four phases: lag phase, active phase, stationary phase, and conditioning phase. Fermentation is the process by which yeast produces all the alcohol, aroma, and flavor compounds found in beer.

Below, we give you an indication of how long low-strength beer stays in your system: One pint of beer remains in your system for 2 hours. Four pints of beer remains in your system for 8 hours. Eight pints of beer remains in your system for 16 hours.

What happens if you brew beer too long? ›

Beer, we always recommend that you bottle your beer no later than 24 days in the fermenter. You can go longer but the longer your beer sits the more chance you have to get an infection and get off-flavors in your beer.

When Do I Get to Drink My Beer? After you bottle the beer, give it at least two weeks before drinking it. The yeast needs a few days to actually consume the sugar, and then a little more time is needed for the beer to absorb the carbon dioxide. (Read this post to learn about the science behind carbonation.)

How long after fermentation do you keg? You should hold off kegging your beer until it has fully fermented, is nice and clear and all of the yeast and sediment has settled at the bottom.

The three most common brewing techniques, ranked by complexity, are Extract Brewing, Partial Mash Brewing, and All-Grain Brewing.