How much caffeine does your coffee have?
Up to 95% of the US citizens consume some type of caffeine, either in coffee, foods or soda.
Coffee is the most common resource where you can get caffeine. But, how much caffeine does a cup of coffee have? The short answer can be around 100 mg, but that is very incomplete.
There are several factors that can change the amount of caffeine, and that's why we can find some types of coffee with just 80 mg of caffeine per cup and others with 200 mg or higher.
In this article we will analyze the factors that affect caffeine in coffee beans, we will see a practical example to understand them and have a list of the amount of caffeine in the most popular brew methods.
Index:
The factors that affects caffeine
Bean type
Bean roast
Grind size
Brewing method
Serving sizes
Practical example
Caffeine in coffee list
Final thoughts
Your turn
The factors that affects caffeine
Bean type
We can name 4 bean types: Arabica, Robusta, Liberica and Excelsa. Each of them have some variations in color, aroma, texture, flavor and also in caffeine.
From those varieties, Robusta is the one that naturally most caffeine contains, having almost twice the amount Arabica beans have. Some roasters who want to have a high caffeinated beverage use Robusta beans.
If you want to know more about these bean varieties, you can read this article.
Bean roast
There are several levels of bean roasting. In this website you can find a previous article where we talked about six of them, explaining the differences you can find in each one.
Roasting also affects the amount of caffeine the bean has.
When you roast a coffee bean its size expands and its water evaporates, so in a bigger space you will have less amount of caffeine.
Probably we imagined that darker coffees have more caffeine, but the stronger aroma and taste is confusing us. The roast the coffee is, the less caffeine you will find on it. That's why white roast coffee is the variation with more caffeine.
Grind size
You select your coffee bean, you roast it as you want and now you have to grind it. Caffeine will also be affected in this process.
We can find six main coffee grind sizes: extra coarse, coarse, medium, medium fine, fine and extra fine. All of them are used in certain brewing systems, and all of them affect caffeine in our coffee.
If you want to know more about the differences in size of each grind and in which coffee machine you should use it and the risk of over and under extraction, here is an article that specifies all that.
The grind size determinantes how much caffeine will be able to be extracted by the water, so in general terms, finer grind will give us more caffeine than a coarser one. But this will also be determined by the time of the extraction.
Brewing method
As we mentioned before, the time of extraction also affects the amount of caffeine in a cup of coffee. Different brewing methods require different amounts of contact between coffee beans and water. That's why we will find some brewing methods that make coffee with more caffeine than others.
In some brewing methods, such as Turkish coffee, water is in contact with a fine grind coffee bean for several minutes, so we will have lots of caffeine in that beverage. In other ones, such as Chemex, we have a short extraction time of coarse grind coffee, so we will have much less caffeine.
If you want to know more about different brewing methods, you can read part one and part two of an article about different coffee machines.
Serving sizes
Of course serving sizes will affect the amount of caffeine we consume. It is not the same to drink a whole cup filled from espresso shots than one filled from a Chemex.
Also, it is important to have in mind that many coffee beverages also use milk or other ingredients that dilutes the amount of caffeine per cup.
Practical example
With all the knowledge we got from this article, let's try to deduce which type of coffee will have more caffeine from these two different brewing methods.
Turkish coffee: for this coffee you need an extra fine grind (0.1mm) of the beans, and you will boil it with water for several minutes.
French press: you use a coarse grind (1 mm) of the coffee beans, and let it in contact with hot water for more or less 5 minutes.
In these examples, by far, Turkish coffee will have more caffeine. Both have a similar time of extraction but the first one is grinded 10 times smaller than the French press. That will allow a bigger caffeine extraction.
Caffeine in coffee list
In this list you will find the approximate amount of caffeine per one cup of some popular brewing systems. Remember that there are no exact numbers because there are many factors that can influence.
- French press: 80 - 135 mg
- Drip coffee: 165 mg
- Pour over: 175 mg
- Espresso: 63 mg (per 1 oz. shot)
- Turkish coffee: 200 mg
Final thoughts
We saw that there are many causes that can affect the amount of caffeine in our coffee. From the bean type up to the brewing method and all the steps in the middle will affect the final result
It is very difficult to know exactly how much caffeine or coffee has. What we can do is learn how this process affects the final result and next time we want to know about the amount of caffeine we can ask about the bean type, its roast, the grind size and the brewing system.
Your turn
Now is your turn to understand how much caffeine you drink with your coffee. Ask your bean seller what's behind the bag and dare to try new alternatives so you can decide which one you like more.