How to Bottle Homebrew Beer Properly: Step-by-Step Guide and Priming Sugar Chart

The short version: wait until fermentation is completely finished, sanitize everything, stir a measured dose of priming sugar into the beer, fill and cap the bottles, then keep them at room temperature for two to three weeks while the yeast carbonates the beer. Almost every bottling problem, from flat beer to bottles that gush, comes from rushing or skipping one of those steps. Here is each step in detail, with a priming sugar chart for 5 gallons.

Bottling homebrew at a glance

1. Check fermentation is finished: the same gravity reading two or three days apart.
2. Clean and sanitize the bottles, caps, bottling bucket, tubing and wand.
3. Weigh the priming sugar from the chart below, boil it in 2 cups of water and let it cool.
4. Rack the beer onto the sugar in a bottling bucket without splashing.
5. Fill each bottle to the brim with a bottling wand. Pulling the wand out leaves the right headspace.
6. Cap each bottle right away.
7. Condition at 68 to 72°F (20 to 22°C) for 2 to 3 weeks.
8. Chill for at least 2 days, then pour gently and leave the yeast in the bottle.

What you need

Equipment	Why
Bottles	About 50 × 12 oz (355 mL) or 36 × 500 mL for 5 gallons. Brown glass, pry-off style. Twist-off bottles don't seal reliably with standard caps.
Crown caps and a capper	A bench capper is faster and more even than a two-handled one.
Bottling bucket with a spigot	Mixes the priming sugar evenly through the whole batch.
Bottling wand	A spring-loaded tip that fills each bottle from the bottom up, with no splashing.
Siphon or transfer tubing	Moves the beer from the fermenter to the bucket.
Cleaner, no-rinse sanitizer and a bottle brush	Clean first, then sanitize.
Priming sugar and a kitchen scale	Corn sugar (dextrose) or plain table sugar, weighed, not measured by the cup.
Hydrometer	The only reliable way to know fermentation is finished.

Step 1: Make sure fermentation is really finished

This is the step that matters most. Priming sugar is measured to add a specific amount of CO₂. If sugar is still left over from fermentation, the yeast ferment that too, and the bottles over-carbonate. At worst, they burst.

• Take a gravity reading, wait 2 to 3 days, and take another. If it hasn't changed and it's close to your expected final gravity, the beer is ready.
• Don't go by the airlock. CO₂ keeps coming out of solution as the temperature changes, long after fermentation is done. And a slow airlock doesn't mean the yeast are finished.
• Most ales are ready 2 to 3 weeks after brew day. Lagers take longer; see our lagering guide.

Cold crashing for a day or two before bottling drops yeast and haze out of the beer, so each bottle ends up with less sediment. See our guide to cold crashing. Plenty of yeast stays in suspension to carbonate the bottles. If the beer sat cold for more than a couple of weeks, or it's stronger than about 8% ABV, add half a packet of rehydrated neutral dry yeast to the bottling bucket (champagne yeast for very strong beers) so carbonation doesn't stall.

Step 2: Clean, then sanitize

Cleaning removes residue; sanitizing kills whatever is left. You need both, because sanitizer can't work through dried-on gunk.

• Rinse bottles right after you pour them. Three quick rinses with hot water stop yeast drying in the bottom and save a lot of scrubbing later.
• Soak dirty or second-hand bottles in an oxygen-based brewery cleaner, then scrub with a bottle brush. Hold each one up to the light. If you can see a ring or specks, clean it again.
• Sanitize just before bottling: bottles, caps, bucket, spigot, tubing and wand. Drain the bottles upside down. A little sanitizer foam left inside is harmless.
• Replace tubing and wand tips when they get scratched or cloudy. Scratches hide bacteria that sanitizer can't reach.

Step 3: Work out your priming sugar

Beer finishes fermenting with some CO₂ already dissolved in it. How much depends on the warmest temperature it reached near the end of fermentation, because cooler beer holds more CO₂. Priming sugar tops that up to your target carbonation, measured in volumes of CO₂.

Priming sugar chart for 5 gallons (19 L)

For beer that finished fermenting at about 68°F (20°C):

Target carbonation	Corn sugar (dextrose)	Table sugar	Good for
2.0 volumes	95 g (3.4 oz)	86 g (3.1 oz)	British ales, stouts
2.2 volumes	112 g (3.9 oz)	102 g (3.6 oz)	Porters, brown ales
2.4 volumes	128 g (4.5 oz)	117 g (4.1 oz)	Most pale ales and IPAs
2.6 volumes	145 g (5.1 oz)	132 g (4.7 oz)	Lagers, pilsners, American wheat
2.8 volumes	162 g (5.7 oz)	147 g (5.2 oz)	Belgian ales, saisons

• Other batch sizes: scale in proportion. The rule of thumb is about 4.4 g of corn sugar (4.0 g of table sugar) per litre for each volume of CO₂ you add.
• Beer that fermented cooler already holds more CO₂, so it needs less sugar. Beer holds about 0.86 volumes at 68°F, 1.0 at 60°F and 1.2 at 50°F. For every 0.1 volume more already in the beer, use about 8 g (0.3 oz) less corn sugar for 5 gallons.
• Above about 3 volumes, as in German wheat beers and some Belgian styles, use heavier bottles made for high carbonation. Standard bottles aren't built for that pressure.
• Weigh it. Sugar packs differently in a measuring cup, and a 20% error is the difference between lively and gushing.

Corn sugar and table sugar both ferment completely and taste the same at this dose. Carbonation drops are handy for a few bottles, but they're less precise than priming the whole batch.

Step 4: Mix the sugar into the beer

1. Bring about 2 cups (500 mL) of water to a boil, stir in the sugar, and boil for 5 minutes. Cover it and let it cool.
2. Pour the cooled sugar solution into the sanitized bottling bucket.
3. Rack the beer onto it with the end of the tube lying on the bottom of the bucket, so the beer swirls in and mixes without splashing. Leave the yeast cake behind in the fermenter.
4. Give it one or two slow stirs with a sanitized spoon. Don't whip air into it. Oxygen picked up now turns into stale, cardboard flavours within weeks; see why oxygen hurts finished beer.

Step 5: Fill the bottles

• Connect the bottling wand to the bucket spigot with a short piece of tubing and open the spigot.
• Press the wand tip against the bottom of the bottle to start the flow. The beer fills from the bottom up without splashing.
• Fill right to the top, then lift the wand out. The space the wand took up leaves about 1 inch (2.5 cm) of headspace, which is what you want.
• Keep the headspace the same in every bottle so they carbonate evenly.
• Tip the bucket at the end to fill the last bottles. They may be a little cloudier.

Step 6: Cap

Put a sanitized cap on each bottle as you fill it, so nothing falls in, then crimp them with the capper. Press firmly until the cap's edge is crimped evenly all round. If a cap is crooked or spins, pry it off and use a new one.

Oxygen-absorbing caps are worth it for IPAs and for beers you plan to age. Sanitize them, but don't leave them soaking: they start absorbing oxygen once they're wet.

Step 7: Condition at room temperature

• Store the bottles upright at 68 to 72°F (20 to 22°C), away from light, for 2 weeks. Below about 65°F the yeast work slowly and carbonation can take a month or more.
• Strong beers (over about 8% ABV) and lagers take 3 to 4 weeks.
• Keep them in a closed box or tote for the first few weeks. If a bottle over-carbonates, the box contains it.
• Chill one bottle after a week to check progress. When a chilled bottle hisses on opening and pours with a good head, the batch is ready.

Step 8: Chill and pour

Refrigerate the bottles for at least 2 days before drinking. The yeast settles into a firm layer, and cold beer holds the CO₂ for a better head. Pour in one smooth motion and stop when the yeast reaches the neck, leaving the last quarter inch in the bottle.

Once carbonated, bottles keep best cold. Hoppy beers are at their best within 1 to 2 months; most other beers keep for 3 to 6 months, and strong beers can age for a year or more.

Bottling problems and how to fix them

Problem	Likely cause	Fix
Flat after 2 weeks	Too cold, not enough time, or tired yeast	Move the bottles to 70°F, turn each one upside down once to stir up the yeast, and give it 1 to 2 more weeks.
Some bottles flat, others fizzy	Sugar not mixed evenly	Rack onto the sugar so it swirls in, and stir gently before filling.
Gushing or over-carbonated	Bottled before fermentation finished, too much sugar, or an infection	Refrigerate every bottle right away to stop the yeast, and drink them soon. Confirm final gravity and weigh the sugar next time.
Bottles bursting	Severe over-carbonation	Wear eye protection and gloves, cover the box and move it somewhere cold. Chill every bottle before opening.
Cardboard or sherry flavours	Oxygen picked up during bottling	Rack without splashing, keep the tube on the bottom of the bucket, and use oxygen-absorbing caps.
Sour or medicinal, often gushing	Infection	Clean and sanitize more thoroughly; replace scratched tubing and wand tips.
Skunky aroma	Light reacting with hop compounds	Use brown bottles and store them in the dark. Clear and green glass let the light through.
Thick layer of sediment	Too much yeast carried over	Cold crash before bottling and leave the yeast cake behind. A thin layer is normal.

For problems that start before bottling day, see our guide to troubleshooting fermentation problems.

Bottling from a conical fermenter or Unitank

A conical fermenter makes bottling day cleaner, because you can get the yeast out of the way before the beer goes anywhere near a bottle.

• Dump the yeast first. Drain the settled yeast and trub from the bottom valve, so you're not siphoning around a yeast cake.
• Draw clear beer from above the sediment. A rotating racking arm picks up beer just above the yeast, and you can turn it down as the level drops.
• Cold crash in the tank. With a glycol chiller, drop the beer to about 35°F for a day or two before bottling for brighter beer and less sediment in each bottle.
• Push the beer instead of siphoning. A couple of psi of CO₂ through a gas-in post pushes the beer out through the racking arm into the bottling bucket. There's no siphon to start and no air drawn into the tank.

Or skip bottle conditioning

If your fermenter holds pressure, like a Unitank, you can carbonate the beer in the tank and bottle it already carbonated. Let the spunding valve capture the CO₂ from fermentation, or use a carbonation stone to carbonate in a day or two. Then fill with a counter-pressure bottle filler, which keeps the beer under CO₂ while it fills so it doesn't foam out. Keep the beer cold, around 34°F, while you fill, because cold beer foams far less.

The beer is ready to drink the day you bottle it, and there's no yeast sediment. It's how breweries do it, and it's the method to choose for competitions or bottles you give away. Weighing up bottles against kegs? See bottling vs kegging.

Frequently asked questions

How long should homebrew sit in bottles before drinking?

Two to three weeks at 68 to 72°F for most ales, then at least 2 days in the fridge. Strong beers and lagers need 3 to 4 weeks.

How much priming sugar do I need for 5 gallons?

For 2.4 volumes of CO₂, typical of pale ales and IPAs, use about 128 g (4.5 oz) of corn sugar or 117 g (4.1 oz) of table sugar. See the chart above for other styles.

Can I bottle straight from the fermenter?

Yes, if you prime each bottle with carbonation drops or a measured dose of sugar. It saves a transfer, but carbonation is less consistent, and it's harder to leave the yeast behind unless your fermenter has a racking arm.

How full should I fill beer bottles?

Leave about 1 inch (2.5 cm) of headspace. Filling to the brim with a bottling wand and then removing the wand gives you exactly that.

Can I reuse beer bottles?

Yes. Reuse pry-off bottles, not twist-offs, and check each one for chips and cracks. Rinse them right after pouring, and clean and sanitize them again before every use.

Why is my bottled beer flat?

Usually because it's too cold or it hasn't had long enough. Keep the bottles at 68 to 72°F for at least two weeks. If they're still flat after three, check the caps are sealing and that you added the priming sugar.

Do I need to refrigerate homebrew after it's carbonated?

It isn't required, but it helps. Beer stored cold stays fresh much longer, while beer stored warm goes stale faster, especially hoppy beer.