Brewing water plays a very important role in the flavor of your homebrewed beer. Knowing the character of your local water source as well as how to adjust it to improve your beer is a critical skill, particularly for more advanced brewers.
Water impacts beer in three ways. Water ions are critical in the mashing process for all grain brewers, where the character of the water determines the efficiency and flavor of the extracted wort. Water also affects the perceived bitterness and hop utilization of finished beer. Finally, water adds flavor directly to the beer itself – as water is the largest single component in finished beer.
The effect of brewing water on beer can be characterized by six main water ions: Carbonate, Sodium, Chloride, Sulfate, Calcium and Magnesium.
You can get a water report from your local municipality that will contain the mineral content of your water supply. On a water report you will often see these listed as parts per million (ppm) which is equivalent to one milligram per liter (mg/l). Each of the critical ions is described below:
Carbonate and Bicarbonate (CO3 and HCO3)
Carbonate is considered the most important ion for all grain brewing. Carbonate (or bicarbonate), expressed as “total alkalinity” on many water reports, is the ion that determines the acidity of the mash. It also is the primary determinant in the level of “temporary hardness” of the water. If carbonate levels are too low, the mash will be too acidic, especially when using darker malts (which have higher acidity). If carbonate is too high, mash efficiency will suffer. Recommended levels are 25-50 mg/l for pale beers and 100-300 mg/l for darker beers. Note that bicarbonates and temporary hardness can be reduced by pre-boiling the water – the precipitate that falls out after boiling is primarily bicarbonate.
Sodium (Na)
Sodium contributes body and mouthfeel to the beer, but if used in excess will result in salty seawater flavors. High sodium water often comes from household water softeners, which is why most brewers recommend against mashing with softened water. Sodium levels in the 10-70 mg/l range are normal, and levels of up to 150 mg/l can enhance malty body and fullness, but levels above 200 mg/l are undesirable.
Chloride (Cl)
Chloride, like sodium, also enhances the mouthfeel and complexity of the beer in low concentrations. Chlorine is often used in city water supplies to sanitize, and can also reach high concentrations from use of bleach as a brewing sanitizer. Heavily chlorinated water will result in mediciny or chlorine-like flavors that are undesirable in finished beer. Normal brewing levels should be below 150 mg/l and never exceed 200 mg/l. If you have heavily chlorinated city water you can reduce it using a carbon filter or by pre-boiling the water for 20-30 minutes before use.
Sulfate (SO4)
Sulfate plays a major role in bringing out hop bitterness and adds a dry, sharp, hoppy profile to well hopped beers. It also plays a secondary role to lowering Ph of the mash, but the effect is much less than with carbonates as sulfate is only weakly alkaline. High levels of sulfate will create an astringent profile that is not desirable. Normal levels are 10-50 mg/l for pilsners and light beers and 30-70mg for most ales. Levels from 100-130 mg/l are used in Vienna and Dortmunder styles to enhance bitterness, and Burton on Trent pale ales use concentrations as high as 500 mg/l.
Calcium (Ca)
Calcium is the primary ion determining the “permanent hardness” of the water. Calcium plays multiple roles in the brewing process including lowering the Ph during mashing, aiding in precipitation of proteins during the boil, enhancing beer stability and also acting as an important yeast nutrient. Calcium levels in the 100 mg/l range are highly desirable, and additives should be considered if your water profile has calcium levels below 50 mg/l. The range 50mg/l to 150 mg/l is preferred for brewing.
Magnesium (Mg)
Magnesium is a critical yeast nutrient if used in small amounts. It also behaves as calcium in contributing to water hardness, but this is a secondary role. Levels in the 10-30 mg/l range are desirable, primarily to aid yeast. Levels above 30 mg/l will give a dry, astringent or sour bitter taste to the beer.
You can get a profile of your local water supply from your city or water company. Also, often the local brewing club has already collected local water profiles for you to examine. In the water report, look for the 6 critical items listed above. Also, be aware that many local water suppliers will frequently flush their system periodically (often in the Spring) with highly chlorinated water, which can give you some very strange brewing results if you are unaware of their schedule.
Adjusting your Water
Different styles of beer require different water profiles. Often a particular beer is associated with the water profile of the city in which the beer originated. For a listing of water profiles for popular brewing cities of the world, you can visit our water profile listing. If you have a target profile in mind, you can adjust your water to match that profile.
You can dilute your local tap water with distilled water if some ion counts are too high for your target water profile. Similarly you can use additives to increase the level of key ions. Popular additives include table salt (NaCl), Gypsum (CaSO4), Calcium Chloride (CaCl), Epsom Salts (MgSO4), Baking Soda (NaHCO3), and Chalk (CaCO3).
Unfortunately the additives do not add a straightforward amount of ions to the water profile, so its best to use some kind of water profile tool to adjust your local water supply to reach a target profile. Usually only a few grams of additives is required to achieve your target profile. BeerSmith has a water profile tool available to perform this very function. Other water profile tools are also available online.
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Thanks for the info in your article. I talked to our towns water dept this morning and I could only get a few of the towns water specs as it concerns all grain brewing. The ones that they test for are Calcium/9ppm, Magnesium/1ppm and Sodium/98ppm Hard water is 27. I live in Wyoming, so I,m thinking I may need to use some additives. I haven’t noticed any water problems with extract brewing but I’m not sure I could tell if there was a problem, anything short of a really bad taste or smell which we don’t have. Our water tastes great. If one would use distilled water would you have to add anything to it? From the water profile on Beersmith it shows distilled water void of all the ctitical ions.
Hi – Distilled water does not contain any minerals – it is essentially a blank slate and you do need to add some minerals to it. If you are brewing extract and not having any problems with your local water, I would minimize the additives unless you are brewing a special style that needs water additions. Once you move over to all grain, balancing the water and Ph becomes more important. Also if you are brewing styles that need very soft or hard water the additions again become important. Take a look at the style guides and water profiles for their home cities and you will get an idea of what is needed.
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After using the water profile tool which asks for the brew batch size, the recipe brewsheet adjusts the quantity of salts to be added according to the recipe size. The brewsheet then lists the total quantity of brewing water to be prepared, and the batch size, but calls for the salts to be added to the mash. Is there any need to adjust sparge water ?
Nick,
I would say if you add them to the mash water it will be infused into the sparge water as you go. However, I know some brewers who treat the whole batch of water up front and then use that throughout. I’m not sure it makes a huge difference, though treating the mash water itself can result in a better pH in many cases.
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is soft water usable for mash water
In many cases soft water is quite usable – you need to look at the overall water profile for your local area. I have another article listed here that lists recommended water profile ranges.
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what about medium-hard water, my (ppm) is about 110 straight from the sink ?
I live in the country, so I use water from my water, I don’t have any chemicals added by the local municipality at all, which I am thinking is a good thing. So far I been doing beer from extracts and it is coming out very good and very tasty, but soon I am going to dive into all grain brews.
Thanks!
Ray,
What minerals are in the water is often as important as overall hardness. If possible, get a water report from your local water provider to find out how much of the 6 major ions are in the water.
Brad
I usually run all my water through a carbon filter first. Isn’t that going to affect the numbers I get from the city water report? If so, how can I know what my water “looks” like after it’s gone through the filter?
Brian,
It will likely affect your water – though how much and how it affects it depends on your filter. Unfortunately I can’t tell you exactly which ions are likely to be trapped by the filter, but perhaps you could ask on the forum where someone with a better chemistry background could help.
Brad
I wish to know mineral calculation for mashing and brewing. My water which I am using is quite soft water and I am using calcium sulphate and is going good. Now i am thinking to reduce the additive for which i need to calculate ions contents. Kindly suggest.
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I use softened water for everything I brew and never had a problem. This may or may not work for everyone else but I find if I use ph stabilizer, I have no problem. I did get the off flavors when I did not use it and also had major extraction issues. If I don’t use it then I average 60% eff. When I do, I get upwards of 80%.
I have been thinking of switching to the potassium chloride pellets but they are way pricier than the sodium equivalent. Even if I do I will stick with the stabilizer. It at least works in my case.
Brad,
I contacted my water department and they forwarded the profile to me, which included some of the items you described but others i’m unsure of. The profile is as follows(the values are averages) PH=8.5, P-Alkalinity=4, Total Alk=55, Total hardenss=54, Calcium=46, Magnesium=8, Iron=.018, Chlorides=75. The water plant that serves my area blends RO with Lime Softened water. I’m not sure what I should do for entering values for sodium and sulfate, should I leave blank or assume a value. thanks
Brad,
When using the water profile tool, next to the base profile there is a space for water volume in gals. Should the value be set to the batch size or the total volume of water used in the mash and sparge additions?
Thanks!
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Heya this is kinda of off topic but I was wondering if blogs use WYSIWYG editors or if you have to manually code with HTML.
I’m starting a blog soon but have no coding skills so I wanted to get guidance from someone with experience. Any help would be greatly appreciated! Thanks!
A little bit of misinformation in the Chloride section. Chlorine (a molecule) and Chloride (an ion) are very different. Chloride is naturally occuring in water and does accentuate certain properties in beer. Chlorine is also naturally occuring, but as a gas and not in water. It is quite toxic but used in small quantities to sanitize water. It can (and for brewing purposes, should always be) removed fairly easily with an activated charcoal filter. .
Hello, the water specification sheet (URL below) from our water company shows the content in MG/L but the profiles are in ppm how can I translate mg/l to ppm?
(https://www.dunea.nl/documents/10156/13625/Katwijk+2e+kw+Waterkwaliteit.pdf/851cfbda-0ad5-451d-a434-e55ea870d7a6?version=1.0)
1 mg/l is the same as 1 ppm (they are equivalent!)
In Beersmith in the water profile section I see you offer profiles for cities. Do you have a tool that has suggested profiles for brewing specific styles? For example, if I am going to brew an IPA or session IPA, how would I determine the best water profile and then adjust my water to it?
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I have the same question as Gusty. If you get a few minutes can you help with this one by suggesting a city profile to follow for at least the major American beer types – pale ale and IPA, as well as stouts and porters?
Hi,
I have the same question as Brian Q above.
When using the water profile tool, next to the base profile there is a space for water volume in gals. Should the value be set to the batch size or the total volume of water used in the mash and sparge additions?
Thanks!
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Thanks for your details and explanations..I want more information from your side..I Am working in Aquafina Mineral Water In Chennai.
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Great article Brad!
I’ve been listening to your podcasts and reading your articles for quite some time now and am just blown away from the knowledge and helpfulness that you and your guests provide. Between John Palmer and you, I have learned so much about water and the water chemistry for brewing that I created a company revolving around it. I have made all the water calculations and added minerals together for the public, making treating water for specific beer styles simplified and easy. What I do is use a water treatment calculator such as, EZ Water Calculator and Brewers Friend, and add the corresponding minerals for the style of beer I want to brew. I package these minerals up for each style of beer and sell them to homebrewers. It’s really that easy, and because of your podcasts and articles, it has allowed me to help many homebrewers make it simple to create the water profile they want without having to learn how to calculate the minerals. If you want to check out my website and make adding minerals to water easier, I would love for any advice/knowledge you can instill on me in helping my product. You can find me at http://www.watersbrewer.com or email me at [email protected].
Thanks for everything you do Brad and I hope YOU have a great brewing week!
Cheers,
Ty Stevenson
Greg, gusty, did you manage to find water profiles by type of beer. I too am searching for something like that.
Greg, gusty, did you manage to find water profiles by type of beer. I too am searching for something like that.
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I read your blog. it is very useful for everyone. brewing the water plays the important role in flavor beer. I totally agree. I know the USA trusted the brand to provide the high-quality flavor beer, anyone knows please tell us.
The Topic Chloride (Cl) starts to talk about Chloride, then goes on to talk about chlorine. These are two different things.
Chloride could be beneficial to brewing water under 150ppm. Chlorine is never beneficial, especially at 100ppm. City water has up to 4ppm (chloramines) and this is always desired to be removed.
I found it interested when you said brewing water has a key role in the process of homebrewing beer. Lately, I’ve become interested in brewing my own beer. A friend of mine does it, and I’ve tried the beer he makes, and it’s really tasty. That’s why I’m researching all about brewing my own beer, and I think your article will help me. I appreciate you helping me learn how sodium helps the body of the beer.
My water has very high levels of hydrogencarbonate (bicarbonate) and it is necessary to reduce this to reduce the pH. Boiling the water will remove both hydrogencarbonate and calcium ions as solid calcium carbonate (limescale), giving an unacceptably low calcium ion concentration. The answer is to add sulfuric acid and/or hydrochloric acid, releasing the hydrogencarbonate as carbon dioxide, whilst leaving the calcium ions in solution. This problem and its solution is hardly ever mentioned in discussions about adapting tap water for use in brewing. Why?
This informative article on brewing water profiles delves into the fascinating debate of using hard or soft water in brewing. The discussion of the impact on beer flavors and characteristics adds depth to the brewing process understanding. It’s intriguing to see how water composition plays a pivotal role in crafting unique brews. The insights shared here offer valuable knowledge for both novice and experienced brewers seeking to elevate their creations.