Calculator

Beer Color Calculator

Enter the weight and color (EBC) of each malt and it shows you what color your beer will be, in EBC and SRM, and which styles share that color.

Malts

—SRM

— EBC · —

Beer Color Calculator: how to use it

  1. Enter the liters (or gallons) that end up in the fermenter.
  2. Add one line per malt with its weight in kilos (or pounds) and its color in EBC (it's on the sack or the maltster's website).
  3. If the maltster gives the color in °Lovibond, multiply it by 2.6 for an approximate EBC value.

How it works

Each malt adds color depending on how much it has been kilned or roasted: a pilsner malt barely 3–4 EBC (2 SRM), a crystal malt 100–300 EBC (51–152 SRM) and a black malt more than 1,000 EBC (over 500 SRM). The Morey formula adds up what each one contributes and converts it to the color scale of the finished beer. It's an estimate: the boil, fermentation and filtering shift the result a little, but it's more than good enough to nail the style. Europe uses EBC and the United States uses SRM (EBC ≈ SRM × 1.97).

Beer color scale, from 2 to 40 SRM (4 to 79 EBC)
From a very pale lager to a black stout.

Frequently asked questions

How much roasted malt do I need for a stout?

Very little for the color: with 8–10% roasted barley the beer is already black. The calculator shows you instantly.

Why did my beer come out darker than calculated?

A long, vigorous boil darkens the wort, and malt extract tends to give more color than the label says. With all-grain and one-hour boils, it comes out very close.

What's the difference between EBC and SRM?

They're two scales for the same thing: EBC is the European one and SRM the American one. A value in EBC is roughly double the value in SRM (EBC ≈ SRM × 1.97).

Does color change the flavor?

The malts that add color also add flavor (caramel, chocolate, coffee), so the two usually go together. But a pinch of very dark malt can darken the beer quite a bit without changing the flavor much.