Close Menu
Fit and Healthy Weight

    Subscribe to Updates

    Get the latest creative news from FooBar about art, design and business.

    What's Hot

    These Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies Are So Good It’s Almost Unfair

    August 10, 2025

    8 High-Protein Foods Men Over 50 Should Eat Each Week

    August 10, 2025

    When Blisters Show up Without Burns, a Pemphigus Could Be the Culprit

    August 10, 2025
    Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram
    Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram
    Fit and Healthy Weight
    Sunday, August 10
    • Home
    • Diet
    • Mindset
    • Recipes
    • Reviews
    • Stories
    • Supplements
    • Tips
    • Workouts
    Fit and Healthy Weight
    Home»Recipes»We Taste-Tested Seven Brands of Sweet Tea—Here Are Our Favorites
    Recipes

    We Taste-Tested Seven Brands of Sweet Tea—Here Are Our Favorites

    By July 22, 2025No Comments5 Mins Read
    Share Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Reddit Telegram Email
    We Taste-Tested Seven Brands of Sweet Tea—Here Are Our Favorites

    Serious Eats / Amanda Suarez

    Share
    Facebook Twitter LinkedIn Pinterest Email


    We taste-tested seven brands of sweet tea you’re likely to find at your local supermarket or online. To find the very best one, we sampled each without knowing which was which. Our winner is Milo’s Sweet Tea, but we also crowned two runners-up.

    I will go to bat for sweet tea any day: Just one sip of this amber-hued refresher instantly transports me to roadside diners, backyard barbecues, and late-night meals in the sticky heat. I enjoy brewing my own tea, but for ease and convenience, I’ll grab a bottle for picnics, barbecues, or whenever I’m craving a sweet treat.

    To find the very best bottled sweet tea, our editors sampled seven different brands of nationally available sweet tea that you’re likely to find at your local grocery store or online. We chose plain sweetened teas without any added flavors, such as peach, lemon, or other fruits. We chilled and poured each into cups, then sampled them in random order without knowing which brand was which. After sipping our way through all the sweet teas, we tabulated the results and crowned an overall winner, as well as two other worthy contenders we’d be happy to serve at our get-togethers.

    The Criteria

    Like its unsweetened counterpart, sweet tea should be smooth and balanced. It should taste like tea: There should be some tannic structure and gentle bitterness, but not so much that it overwhelms. At least a touch of sweetness is essential—it is sweet tea after all—but it shouldn’t be cloyingly sweet or taste artificial.

    Serious Eats / Amanda Suarez

    Overall Winner

    Milo’s Famous Sweet Tea

    This sweet tea just eked out a win over the runners-up. Milo’s Famous Sweet Tea contains just three ingredients: filtered water, cane sugar, and tea. Kelli, our senior social media editor, enjoyed the “tannic notes” and “slight viscosity,” and Amanda, our associate visuals director, thought it was “nice and light and not too sweet.” Laila, our food editor, was pleasantly surprised by its fragrance: “I can actually smell the tea. The tea flavor is detectable, which is nice.” Like Laila, our senior editor, Genevieve, tasted the tea—but thought it was just a touch too sweet.

    Runners-Up

    • Gold Peak Sweet Tea
    • Pure Leaf Sweet Tea

    While we didn’t enjoy these teas as much as our winner, our editors found the iced teas from the two brands above to be fine. Our editorial director, Daniel, enjoyed the flavors of Gold Peak Sweet Tea: “No complaints, maybe a little sweet-tea harshness but very minor slash mild.” This tea, however, was a little too sweet for many of our editors, including Genevieve, our visuals editor, Jessie, and our associate editorial director, Megan, who thinks she must have lost her Southern taste for sweet tea after many years in NYC. 

    Both Jessie and Kelli detected a hint of lemon in Pure Leaf Sweet Tea, even though it wasn’t a listed ingredient—this is almost certainly due to the citric acid listed on the label. Genevieve and Amanda both commented that they could taste the tea, but Daniel found it slightly too acidic.” I found it not too sour, not too sweet, and quite balanced compared to the rest of the teas.

    Serious Eats / Amanda Suarez

    The Contenders

    • Arizona Tea Southern-Style Real Brewed Sweet Tea
    • Gold Peak Sweet Tea
    • Milo’s Famous Sweet Tea
    • Pure Leaf Sweet Tea
    • Trader Joe’s Sweet Tea
    • Turkey Hill Sweet Tea
    • Uncle Matt’s Organic Sweet Brewed Black Tea

    Key Takeaways and Conclusion

    While our team didn’t unanimously agree on the ideal level of sweetness, we consistently gravitated toward picks with minimal ingredients and more pronounced tea flavors. Our winner, Milo’s, has just three ingredients and stood out to our testers for its strong flavor of brewed tea, light sweetness, and subtle tannins.

    Our runners-up also only contain three ingredients. Pure Leaf is made with brewed black tea, sugar, and citric acid, while Gold Peak contains brewed tea, cane sugar, and phosphoric acid. Citric acid and phosphoric acid are both common flavor enhancers and preservatives, and can impart a sourness that not everyone likes. While we still prefer to make our own sweet tea so we can control all the variables, such as sweetness level and additions such as fresh lemon juice, but in a pinch, we’d be happy to serve any of these on their own or to use them as a component in other drinks. Add lemonade to make an Arnold Palmer, drop in a few sprigs of mint, or spike it with rum for a backyard cocktail.

    Our Testing Methodology

    All taste tests are conducted with brands completely hidden and without discussion. Tasters taste samples in random order. For example, taster A may taste sample one first, while taster B will taste sample six first. This is to prevent palate fatigue from unfairly giving any one sample an advantage. Tasters are asked to fill out tasting sheets ranking the samples for various criteria. All data is tabulated and results are calculated with no editorial input in order to give us the most impartial representation of actual results possible.

    Brands Favorites Sweet TasteTested TeaHere
    Share. Facebook Twitter Pinterest LinkedIn Tumblr Email
    Previous ArticleWhat Is Parkinson’s Law?
    Next Article Pepsi Just Unveiled a Wild New Prebiotic Cola

      Related Posts

      Recipes

      These Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies Are So Good It’s Almost Unfair

      August 10, 2025
      Recipes

      8 High-Protein Foods Men Over 50 Should Eat Each Week

      August 10, 2025
      Recipes

      Warm Peach Crisp Yogurt Bowl

      August 10, 2025
      Add A Comment
      Leave A Reply Cancel Reply

      Top Posts

      New Research Shows Eggs Don’t Raise Your Cholesterol—But Here’s What Does

      August 1, 20256 Views

      Chat GPT Therapy: Pros And Cons Revealed

      August 9, 20252 Views

      Best Shoes for 2025 HYROX Athletes: Top Picks for Running & Strength Performance

      August 1, 20251 Views
      Stay In Touch
      • Facebook
      • YouTube
      • TikTok
      • WhatsApp
      • Twitter
      • Instagram
      Latest Reviews
      Tips

      When Is the Best Time to Eat Dinner for Your Health?

      adminJuly 1, 2025
      Diet

      This Intermittent Fasting Method Outperformed the Rest—But There’s a Catch

      adminJuly 1, 2025
      Workouts

      ‘Neckzilla’ Rubel Mosquera Qualifies for 2025 Mr. Olympia After Flex Weekend Italy Pro Win

      adminJuly 1, 2025

      Subscribe to Updates

      Get the latest tech news from FooBar about tech, design and biz.

      Most Popular

      When Is the Best Time to Eat Dinner for Your Health?

      July 1, 20250 Views

      This Intermittent Fasting Method Outperformed the Rest—But There’s a Catch

      July 1, 20250 Views

      Signs, Identification, Impact, and More

      July 1, 20250 Views
      Our Picks

      These Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies Are So Good It’s Almost Unfair

      August 10, 2025

      8 High-Protein Foods Men Over 50 Should Eat Each Week

      August 10, 2025

      When Blisters Show up Without Burns, a Pemphigus Could Be the Culprit

      August 10, 2025
      Recent Posts
      • These Chocolate-Peanut Butter Brownies Are So Good It’s Almost Unfair
      • 8 High-Protein Foods Men Over 50 Should Eat Each Week
      • When Blisters Show up Without Burns, a Pemphigus Could Be the Culprit
      • Celebrity Deaths of 2025: Stars We’ve Lost This Year
      • 7 Easy Trader Joe’s Meals Shoppers Say Take Zero Effort
      Facebook X (Twitter) Instagram Pinterest
      • About Us
      • Contact Us
      • Disclaimer
      • Privacy Policy
      • Terms and Conditions
      © 2025 Fit and Healthy Weight. Designed by Pro.

      Type above and press Enter to search. Press Esc to cancel.