Assam
A hot, low-lying river valley in north-east India and the only major tea region built on native assamica stock rather than introduced sinensis, giving the malty, deep-coloured tea the region is named for.
Elevation
Recorded at 45–120 metres.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it. The Brahmaputra valley floor is close to sea level; figures here are approximate and should carry a sourced range before publication.
Climate
Hot and very wet through a long monsoon, with high humidity — conditions that suit assamica and produce two distinct flushes rather than the many-flush pattern of the hills.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.
When it is picked
A two-flush structure with a very sharp quality peak. The bushes rest through a cool dry winter; the first flush from around March gives a lighter, brisker tea of modest reputation. The second flush in May and June is the crop the valley is known for — the malty, tippy, heavy-bodied orthodox tea that carries the region's name — and the explanation growers give is the combination of rising heat, high humidity and the plant's own growth surge before the monsoon breaks properly. The rains that follow produce volume and little else, and an autumn pick closes the year.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it.
How production is organised
The archetypal plantation district, and the one where the labour history is least possible to leave out. Assam's industry was built on large estates with permanent workforces living on the property, recruited in the colonial period from central and eastern India rather than from the valley itself, and their descendants remain the estate population today. Wages, housing, healthcare and the legal status of that population are subjects of continuing dispute in India rather than closed history. Against that, the fastest-growing part of the crop now comes from small growers with a few acres selling green leaf to bought-leaf factories — a structure with none of the estate's obligations and none of its scrutiny.
How firm this is: Inferred from general knowledge of the district rather than measured or taken from a source that states it. The plantation labour history is documented and contested. TeaHQ describes its structure and records that it is disputed rather than adjudicating any particular account of it, and asserts no dates or proportions.
Production data
| Measure | Year | Value | Basis | Published by |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Production | 2024 | 610,520 t provisional | Tea Board of India's own state- and region-wise return, published in million kilograms of MADE TEA and converted here to tonnes by an exact factor of one thousand. The Board collects these figures from registered manufacturers, so they count tea that left a factory, not leaf that left a field. The Brahmaputra valley proper, excluding Cachar in the Barak valley. The Tea Board marks this table '*Provisional, subject to revision from April 24 onwards'. Read the 2024 figures as liable to revision. | Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata |
| Production (estate) | 2024 | 300,740 t provisional | Tea Board of India's own state- and region-wise return, published in million kilograms of MADE TEA and converted here to tonnes by an exact factor of one thousand. The Board collects these figures from registered manufacturers, so they count tea that left a factory, not leaf that left a field. The Board splits every row into Big Growers — estates with their own factories — and Small Growers, who sell green leaf to a bought-leaf factory. The split is by grower, not by factory: small-grower tonnage is finished tea attributed to the leaf's origin. The Tea Board marks this table '*Provisional, subject to revision from April 24 onwards'. Read the 2024 figures as liable to revision. | Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata |
| Production (smallholder) | 2024 | 309,780 t provisional | Tea Board of India's own state- and region-wise return, published in million kilograms of MADE TEA and converted here to tonnes by an exact factor of one thousand. The Board collects these figures from registered manufacturers, so they count tea that left a factory, not leaf that left a field. The Board splits every row into Big Growers — estates with their own factories — and Small Growers, who sell green leaf to a bought-leaf factory. The split is by grower, not by factory: small-grower tonnage is finished tea attributed to the leaf's origin. The Tea Board marks this table '*Provisional, subject to revision from April 24 onwards'. Read the 2024 figures as liable to revision. | Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata |
| Production | 2023 | 649,150 t | Tea Board of India's own state- and region-wise return, published in million kilograms of MADE TEA and converted here to tonnes by an exact factor of one thousand. The Board collects these figures from registered manufacturers, so they count tea that left a factory, not leaf that left a field. The Tea Board's provisional marking applies from April 2024 onwards; the 2023 calendar-year columns carry no such mark. | Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata |
| Production (estate) | 2023 | 323,970 t | Tea Board of India's own state- and region-wise return, published in million kilograms of MADE TEA and converted here to tonnes by an exact factor of one thousand. The Board collects these figures from registered manufacturers, so they count tea that left a factory, not leaf that left a field. The Board splits every row into Big Growers — estates with their own factories — and Small Growers, who sell green leaf to a bought-leaf factory. The split is by grower, not by factory: small-grower tonnage is finished tea attributed to the leaf's origin. The Tea Board's provisional marking applies from April 2024 onwards; the 2023 calendar-year columns carry no such mark. | Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata |
| Production (smallholder) | 2023 | 325,180 t | Tea Board of India's own state- and region-wise return, published in million kilograms of MADE TEA and converted here to tonnes by an exact factor of one thousand. The Board collects these figures from registered manufacturers, so they count tea that left a factory, not leaf that left a field. The Board splits every row into Big Growers — estates with their own factories — and Small Growers, who sell green leaf to a bought-leaf factory. The split is by grower, not by factory: small-grower tonnage is finished tea attributed to the leaf's origin. The Tea Board's provisional marking applies from April 2024 onwards; the 2023 calendar-year columns carry no such mark. | Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata |
Figures are reproduced as their publisher stated them and are not converted, averaged or ranked. Where two publishers disagree, both rows appear — this comes from Tea Board of India, Ministry of Commerce and Industry, Kolkata. The largest single trap in tea statistics is that FAO’s series counts green leaf as plucked while national tea boards count finished made tea, and the two differ by roughly a factor of four and a half. The basis column says which each row is, and a figure without it is not comparable to one with it.
How the name is written
Also transliterated as assam. Romanisations of a district name vary by system and by vendor, and a packet spelling one way is not describing a different place.
Teas this region is known for
- Assam — Thick and malty with a firm astringent grip. The second flush is the one worth seeking: it carries a rounder, almost stewed-fruit sweetness under the malt that the first flush has not yet developed.
Other teas recorded from here
Other growing regions in India
The neighbouring districts are the useful comparison: they share a country, a grading convention and often a cultivar, so what differs between them is closer to terroir than anything a cross-border comparison can isolate.
Sources
- TeaHQ editorial synthesis — TeaHQ
This page is TeaHQ’s own synthesis throughout. No external document stands behind the elevation band, the climate note or the character described above, which is why each carries its confidence in the open.
Written comparisons
Where TeaHQ has set this region against something it is routinely confused with, and argued the differences out in full.
- Yuchi vs Assam — Taiwan’s black tea basin and the valley its plants came from. Assamica stock was introduced to the Sun Moon Lake area under Japanese administration in the 1920s, and what the two regions did with the same botanical material afterwards could hardly be more different.
- Yunnan vs Assam — The two great homes of large-leaf assamica, on either side of a border, doing entirely different things with the same botanical material. Assam built the world’s black-tea industry on it; Yunnan makes both black tea and the only category designed to be kept for decades.