Pu’er Red Tea

Red Pu’er occupies a distinct place within the Pu’er family. Fully oxidized but not deeply fermented, it delivers metabolic activation and circulation support through warmth. The experience is smooth and grounding, with refined tannins and balanced energy that builds gradually and sustains.

Where Green Pu’er is bright and sharp, and Black Pu’er is deep and heavy, Red Pu’er offers a warm, smooth and rounded profile—supporting post-meal ease, internal flow and steady energy.

”Red” refers to both tradition and processing, not added ingredients or colorants.

In Chinese tea culture, what the West calls “black tea” is called red tea (hongcha)—named for the reddish / amber hue of the brewed tea, not the dry leaf.

Pu’er Red is considered a red tea because it is fully oxidized, which darkens the leaf and deepens the brew color. Oxidation also shifts the flavor from fresh and grassy to warm, rounded and mellow.

Pu’er Red contains naturally occurring tea caffeine and is rated 4 out of 5 on Pique’s caffeine scale, the same as Pu’er Green which contains between 41-61mg of caffeine.

Pu’er tea caffeine levels naturally vary based on leaf, harvest and processing. What’s consistent is the experience: Red delivers balanced, sustained energy rather than sharp stimulation.

Cold water will not affect the polyphenol content or the other healthful compounds found in our teas. If you'd like to enjoy our hot water dissolvable only teas as an iced tea, we recommend first dissolving it in a little bit of hot water (1oz will do) and then adding cold water and ice. That being said, studies have shown that cold beverages are not as beneficial for gut health as warm ones.

We unfortunately do not test for probiotic strains in the Pu’er Teas. Though some have been identified in Chinese literature, few to no commercial labs in the west will be able to identify them. If it helps, one analysis of several types of pu’er found 390 distinct fungal species and 629 bacterial species.(*)

Our Fermented Pu'er Tea is sourced from wild growing tea trees in a primordial forest in Yunnan Province at the foothills of the Himalayan mountain range in China.

Some probiotics in Pu'er tea indeed perish in hot water but many don’t. For example, many fungi actually require hot water to be activated. Pu’er tea has been consumed for centuries in hot water to support gut health and hot water will not damage them. It might also help to know that we recommend using water temperatures no higher than 180°F for our Pu'er Black Tea and 170°F for our Pu'er Green Tea. Any higher, and this could potentially damage their probiotics and organic benefits.

No, we have not added any probiotics to the tea. The probiotics in the tea is a result of the fermentation process. They are a mix of bacteria, fungi and microbes that are understood to be beneficial to health.

Our pu'er teas are a great addition to your health routine if you are looking to support your digestive health. However, if you are currently on any kind of additional supplementation, we would recommend you speak to your doctor. For more information on the benefits of probiotic tea, check out our blog article entitled Probiotic Tea: What Is It And Do You Need It?

They are among the tallest and oldest tea trees on the planet, and the leaves from these old trees contribute to pu’er’s special flavor. More than flavor, the vitality, and vigor of these ancient trees are the reason behind pu’er’s super high polyphenol levels – which far exceed those of green tea.

While everyone is different, we recommend giving these teas 2 weeks of consistent daily use to feel the benefits.

Both kombucha and pu'er are fermented, but in different ways that serve different purposes and have different tastes. Our pu'er teas are naturally fermented by 250 year old tea trees in a symbiotic environment for organic probotics and prebiotic benefits.