Green Tea Buying Guide

Where to buy green tea: specialty shops, online sellers, tea markets and buying direct, compared on freshness and on what each channel can actually show you.

Green tea on a budget: where the value sits, which premiums are not worth paying, and why freshness should take the money before grade does.

Daily tea and collected tea are two different purchases, and the same shop will happily sell you the wrong one for the other purpose.

Recipients who do not know tea notice three things instead: the smell when they open it, the colour in the cup, and whether the box looks expensive.

The common green buying traps are avoidable. Here is how not to overpay or get faked.

Green tea is the only category where the buying decision is mostly about a date rather than a grade, and knowing that before you walk in changes what you ask.