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

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.

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.

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.