Matcha vs sencha
Both are Japanese green tea and only one of them is drunk as an infusion. The difference is not grind — it runs back to how the bushes were grown.
tea
What is being compared
Why these get confused
The idea that matcha is simply powdered green tea is very widely repeated. Powdered sencha exists and is a different product; the shading, the de-stemming and the stone milling are what make tencha into matcha.
Point by point
| Aspect | Matcha | Sencha |
|---|---|---|
| Cultivation | Shaded for three weeks or more before picking, which deepens the leaf and raises its savoury character. | Grown in full sun. No shading. |
| Processing | Steamed, dried unrolled, de-stemmed and de-veined into tencha, then stone-milled to powder. | Steamed, rolled into needles, dried. The leaf stays whole. |
| Preparation | Whisked into suspension in a wide bowl. Nothing is strained out — the leaf is consumed. | Steeped and strained. The leaf is discarded, and gives two or three infusions. |
| What reaches the cup | Everything in the leaf, which is why material quality shows so brutally and why lower grades taste flatly bitter. | Only what dissolves in the time allowed. Poor leaf gives a thin cup rather than a harsh one. |
| Cost per cup | High. Shading reduces yield, and de-veining and stone milling are slow. | Modest. The most everyday tea in Japan. |
| Equipment | A bowl and a bamboo whisk; nothing else works properly. | A kyusu, or any small pot with a strainer. |
The short answer
They answer different questions. Sencha is a daily drink; matcha is a concentrated preparation where grade matters more than technique. Ground sencha is not matcha and does not behave like it — the shading and the de-veining are most of the difference.
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