The minimum
Yellow tea is a bud tea, and the set that suits it is the same small set that suits green tea.
A 100 ml porcelain gaiwan is the safest choice, since it takes up nothing from one session to the next.
A tall glass of 250 ml is the other good answer, and it is the one to pick first.
A good Junshan Yinzhen（君山银针）rises and falls in the glass three times before it settles.
You cannot see that in porcelain, and it is why glass belongs in a yellow tea set.
Water at 85 °C suits every tea in the category, and boiling water turns a bud grade flat.
A thermometer settles the matter for very little money, and it is the first thing to buy after the glass.
A strainer is barely needed here, since a bud grade comes out whole.
One tall glass, one kettle and a way to check the temperature will make a correct cup.
Skip the gongfu tray, because the leaf gives out in three or four infusions and a formal setup adds nothing.
Buy in small amounts, since yellow tea loses its sweetness faster than green tea does.
A set sized for 3 grams at a time is more honest than one sized for a table.
Add as you go
A porcelain gaiwan（盖碗）is the first thing to add, for the days when you want control rather than a view.
It brews the same leaf tighter, and it lets you pour every infusion at a chosen moment.
A scale is the second addition, and with a bud tea it matters more than usual.
Buds are light, and 5 grams of them fills a gaiwan to the rim while weighing almost nothing.
A scale reading to 0.1 g stops you guessing, and guessing is how a delicate tea gets ruined.
A fairness pitcher helps once you are brewing for two, and not before.
One of 200 ml will take a full gaiwan and hold the liquor while you pour.
A second glass lets you run the same leaf two ways and see which you prefer.
A tray and a cloth follow only if you take up warming the ware before brewing.
A small thermos is useful for travel, and it holds temperature better than any mug.
Leave unglazed clay out of a yellow tea set altogether, and there is a reason for that.
Clay holds heat and scent, and both of them work against a tea this quiet.
Where to spend
Yellow tea is the smallest and dearest of the six categories, so the money belongs in the leaf.
The category is a tiny fraction of Chinese output, which is why it costs what it costs.
A vessel is the last place to put a premium, since it cannot make a stale yellow tea taste fresh.
Buy a thermometer before you buy anything else, and buy a good one rather than a pretty one.
Glass is the cheapest honest vessel in the category, and tall glass is what the leaf wants.
Look for a wall thin enough to drink from comfortably, and thick enough not to crack when filled.
A porcelain gaiwan at 100 ml costs very little, and a hand painted one costs more without brewing better.
Boxed sets make no sense here, since half the pieces are for a ceremony you are not performing.
Check that any lid sits flat, because a tilted lid spills boiling water onto the hand holding it.
Avoid anything sold as zisha（紫砂）for under 20 dollars, which will be slip cast and coloured.
Yellow tea is not a category that benefits from a seasoned pot in any case.
Fresh leaf, correct temperature and a plain glass, in that order of spending.
One set, many teas
One glass and one gaiwan will serve yellow, green and white equally well.
All three are low temperature teas, and none of them needs a vessel that has been seasoned.
Rinse porcelain with hot water and dry it, and no trace of yesterday’s leaf survives.
Glass is easier still, since a glass vessel has no pores to hold anything at all.
Keep anything that needs boiling water away from these three, to save yourself the confusion.
Dark tea and compressed pu-erh can share a second pot if you drink them at all.
That second pot should stay porcelain or glass, because clay would take up the fermentation smell.
A clay pot used on ripe pu-erh carries that note into every yellow tea brewed afterwards.
The measurement stays simple: 5 grams in 100 ml, at 85 °C, and a short first steep.
Hold the first infusion to 30 seconds and taste before extending the later ones.
Sweet corn in the aroma means the yellowing was done properly, and grassiness means it was cut short.
One glass, one gaiwan and a thermometer, and the whole category is within reach.