What Does Non-Alcoholic Craft Beer Taste Like?

Many people want to know what non-alcoholic craft beer tastes like. It is a fair question, and this post answers it style by style. It also explains the ways in which a non-alcoholic beer is different from a regular one.

What alcohol does in a beer (and what happens without it)

Alcohol adds three things to the flavour of a beer: a little sweetness, a warming feeling and body, which is the roundness that makes a sip feel full. Without them, a carelessly made non-alcoholic beer tastes thin and watery. Every good non-alcoholic beer has to solve that problem.

Our approach is to ferment SOMA with a maltose-negative yeast. This yeast cannot eat maltose, which is the main sugar in wort (the sweet liquid that becomes beer). It still makes the esters, or fruity flavour compounds, that a regular beer has, and the alcohol stays under 0.5% ABV. Nothing is done afterwards to lower the alcohol, so the aroma stays in the beer. For the IPA, we also add extra hops twice for aroma, which brewers call dry hopping.

The result is not identical to a 5% ABV beer. In our view, it gets about 90% of the way there, and the finish is slightly less full.

Sundowner (crisp lager): the closest to regular beer

Pale lagers have the least alcohol flavour to begin with, so a well-made non-alcoholic lager is very hard to tell apart from a regular one. Sundowner pours pale gold with a white head. It has a gentle malt sweetness, a crisp bite from noble hops and a dry finish. A 500ml can has an indicative 63 calories. It suits anyone who usually drinks a mass-market lager or a helles, and anyone tasting non-alcoholic beer for the first time. If you are not yet sure about non-alcoholic beer, start here.

Juice Riot (hazy IPA): the one for craft beer fans who doubt non-alcoholic beer

Hazy IPAs suit a non-alcoholic recipe very well, because their character comes from hop aroma and a soft oat-and-wheat body, not from alcohol. Juice Riot is brewed with Citra and Mosaic hops and dry-hopped twice, and it smells of mango and passionfruit. The proteins that make it hazy also give it the body that alcohol would usually provide. A 500ml can has an indicative 92 calories. It suits people who love hoppy beer, and anyone who says that non-alcoholic beer cannot be good.

Sunday Wit (Belgian wit): a style that keeps its flavour without alcohol

A Belgian wit is a soft, hazy wheat beer with little bitterness, spiced with orange peel and coriander. These flavours come through almost unchanged at under 0.5% ABV. Sunday Wit pours a hazy pale straw colour. It feels silky and has a bright citrus finish. A 500ml can has an indicative 98 calories. It suits brunch, people who usually order a wheat beer, and drinkers who find lagers too plain and IPAs too hoppy.

Dark Arts (stout): the biggest surprise

Many people expect a non-alcoholic stout to disappoint, but roast is the easiest flavour to keep. Roasted barley and chocolate malt give espresso and cocoa flavours whatever the alcohol level. The dark colour also tells you what to expect, and the taste matches it. Dark Arts pours almost black with a tan head. It has a smooth, velvety texture and a coffee and cocoa finish. A 500ml can has an indicative 99 calories. It suits coffee drinkers, dessert lovers and slow evenings.

Dark Arts Espresso (caffeinated coffee stout): the stout made with real coffee

This is the Dark Arts recipe brewed with cold-brew coffee, so the espresso aroma comes from real coffee rather than from roasted malt alone. It has the same almost-black pour and velvety body as Dark Arts, with a longer and drier coffee finish. It is also the only SOMA that contains caffeine, so choose it late at night only if you want to stay awake. A 500ml can has an indicative 99 calories. It suits early starts, and anyone who has wanted a beer at a time of day when coffee made more sense.

What is different about non-alcoholic beer

There are four differences. First, the finish is less full, and a non-alcoholic beer will not feel as heavy as a strong ale. Second, there is no warming feeling from alcohol, which you notice most in the stout. Third, non-alcoholic beer is best fresh and cold. It does not have enough alcohol to act as a preservative, so its hop aroma fades faster. Fourth, you can have a second one at lunch and then go back to work, which we think is a good thing.

How to taste it fairly

Pour it into a glass, because half the enjoyment of beer is its aroma, and drinking from the can hides it. Serve it at 4 to 6°C. Taste it for what it is, which is a brewed and fermented beer that stays under 0.5% ABV. It is not an imitation of another beer.

All five SOMA beers cost ₹149 for a 500ml can or ₹99 for a 250ml can at launch. They are all under 0.5% ABV, and every batch is lab-tested. SOMA is taking pre-orders now. Production starts after December 2026, and nothing ships before then.