Haze Is Not a Crime: Clear Beer Without the Fuss

Cloudy beer is not bad beer. But there is something deeply satisfying about holding up a glass you can read a newspaper through, and it is easier to get than most people think. This guide covers why beer goes cloudy, the free way to clear it, and the helpers that do it faster.

• DifficultyEasy
• Extra time2–3 days before bottling
• CostFree (cold crashing) or a sachet of finings
• Works withAny beer, cider or ginger beer

Why Is My Beer Cloudy? #

Three things make beer hazy, and none of them will hurt you:

Cause	What it is
Yeast	Millions of yeast cells still floating about after fermentation. The most common cause, and the easiest to fix
Proteins	Tiny bits of protein from the malt that drift around and scatter the light
Chill haze	Proteins that clump together only when the beer is cold, so a beer that looked clear at room temperature turns hazy in the fridge

Some styles are meant to be cloudy, such as wheat beers and hazy pale ales. If that is what you are brewing, skip this guide, pour proudly, and tell everyone it is deliberate.

The Free Method: Time and Cold #

Yeast sinks when it gets cold and runs out of food. Giving it both is called cold crashing, and it is the single best thing you can do for clear beer.

1. Wait until fermentation has finished: the same gravity reading two days in a row.
2. Chill the whole fermenter to about 0–4°C, in a fridge or a fermenting fridge, for 2–3 days.
3. Bottle or keg it cold, without stirring up the layer of yeast that has settled at the bottom. Kegging? Our kegging guide and pressure fermenting guide cover crashing in a keg.

As the beer cools, the air in the fermenter shrinks and can suck the liquid out of the airlock and into your beer. Fill the airlock with sanitiser rather than water, or swap it for a piece of sanitised foil while it chills.

No room in the fridge? Simply leaving the beer in the fermenter for an extra week after fermentation finishes also lets a lot of yeast settle out. It is slower, but it costs nothing and requires only patience, which is free but in short supply.

Finings: The Shortcut #

Finings are clearing agents that grab the floating yeast and haze and drag it to the bottom. They work by attraction: the yeast carries a tiny negative electrical charge and the finings carry a positive one, so they cling together into clumps heavy enough to sink. It is chemistry doing the job that gravity would get round to eventually.

Product	When to use it	Good to know
Mangrove Jacks Beer Finings	Added to the fermenter near the end of fermentation. Bottle 24–48 hours later	Made with isinglass, which comes from fish, so not suitable for vegetarians or vegans. Follow the packet to prepare it
Mangrove Jacks – Whirlfloc Tablets x 10	Only if you boil your wort: one tablet in the last 5–10 minutes of the boil for about 20 litres	Made from seaweed. Clears proteins in the boil, so it does nothing if you do not boil

Finings and cold crashing work even better together. Add the finings, let them work for a day, then cold crash. The result is often clear enough to make your friends suspicious.

Which Should I Use? #

You brew	Best approach
Kits, with no boil	Cold crash, and add Beer Finings if you want it clearer still
Extract or all-grain, with a boil	Whirlfloc in the boil, then cold crash, then finings if needed
Vegetarian or vegan beer	Cold crashing and time only. Skip the isinglass finings
Light beers such as lagers and low carb beers	All of the above. Pale beers show every bit of haze

In the Bottle #

Bottle-conditioned beer always ends up with a thin layer of yeast at the bottom of each bottle. That is the yeast that made the fizz, and it is completely normal.

• Keep bottles upright in the fridge for a day or two before drinking, so the sediment settles firmly.
• Pour in one smooth motion into a tilted glass, and stop when you reach the last centimetre or so.
• If chill haze appears, it usually fades the longer the beer sits cold. It does not affect the taste at all.

Very light beers, such as the ones in our low carb and gluten free guide, are where clear beer really shows. Worth the extra couple of days.

Happy brewing, and may you always be able to see the other side of the glass.