TeaHQ

Longjing

China’s best-known green tea and the reference case for pan-firing, pressed flat against a hot wok into distinctive smooth blades. The character is chestnut-sweet and toasty rather than marine, which is most of what separates Chinese green tea from Japanese.

Green teaModerate intensityAccessible to appreciateForgiving to brew龍井
Brew at 75–85 °CUse 1.5–2.5 g per 100 mlFirst steep 120sWestern brewing (teapot or mug)Full schedule and equipment →

Character

Nutty and sweet with a soft body and very little grip. Where Japanese greens go marine and savoury, Longjing goes toasted and sweet — the clearest single illustration of what pan-firing does that steaming does not.

Flavour
Nutty, Sweet, Vegetal
Aroma
Toasted, Orchid
Mouthfeel
Light, Smooth
Complexity
Moderate
Notes
roasted chestnut, toasted rice, orchid, fresh beans
Aftertaste
Sweet, nutty and notably clean.

Moderate intensity: noticeable weight or grip, but neither dominates the cup.

Provenance and production

Origin
China
Oxidation
Unoxidised
Harvest
First flush
Processing
Withering → Kill-green (fixation) → Drying

Authenticity: Far more tea is sold as West Lake Longjing than that small protected area could produce. Longjing made elsewhere in Zhejiang is legitimate tea under a broader name, and is frequently very good; the price difference between it and the protected designation is very large.

History

Associated with the Qianlong emperor, who is said to have designated eighteen bushes at Hugong Temple as imperial tribute in the eighteenth century. The bushes are a tourist site and the story is traditional; what is verifiable is that Longjing has been a named tribute tea for several centuries.

Brewing

No caffeine estimate is authored for this tea. TeaHQ does not infer one from its category, because category predicts caffeine poorly — matcha and gyokuro carry more than many black teas.

Common mistakes

  • Boiling water, which turns the sweetness sharp
  • Buying on the West Lake name at a price that could not be genuine

If you like this

Grouped by why they were suggested, strongest reason first. Nothing here is a blended score — a suggestion appears under the best reason that exists for it, and never under a weaker one as well.

Editorially linked

Someone wrote down why these two belong together. The note below is theirs.

  • Korean green tea

    Both are pan-fired rather than steamed, giving the chestnut-and-toast profile that separates them from Japanese green tea.

  • Ujeon

    Pan-fired, chestnut-sweet and delicate. The Korean tea is the closer analogue to Longjing than any Japanese green.

  • Bi Luo Chun

    Both pan-fired Chinese greens. Bi Luo Chun is more fragile and more fruity, and wants leaf dropped onto poured water rather than the reverse.

  • Duyun Mao Jian

    If West Lake Longjing is out of budget, a Guizhou green gives comparable pan-fired character without the protected-origin premium.

  • Kamairicha

    Japan’s pan-fired exception, then China’s benchmark for the same technique. The resemblance is the point and it surprises most people.

  • Wu Niu Zao

    The imitation, then the tea. Both are flat-shaped Zhejiang greens; only one has the chestnut aroma, and knowing that is worth money each spring.

Similar sensory profile

Shares controlled flavour, aroma and mouthfeel descriptors. A looser match — two teas can share descriptors and still taste nothing alike.

  • Bai Ji Guan

    Shares 5 descriptors with Longjing: sweet, nutty, light, smooth and orchid.

  • Hojicha

    Shares 5 descriptors with Longjing: nutty, sweet, light, smooth and toasted.

Compare this tea with another

Written comparisons

Where TeaHQ has set this tea against another in full, rather than deriving the comparison.

  • Green tea styles compared — Five green teas spanning steamed and pan-fired, shaded and unshaded, roasted and fresh. The fixation method splits this category more than any origin does.
  • Chinese vs Japanese green tea — The largest single split inside green tea, and it is not about country. It is about whether the leaf was fixed with steam or with a hot pan.
  • Longjing vs Anji Bai Cha — Two flat-leaf Zhejiang green teas that look similar and taste quite different. One difference is shaping; the other is a cultivar mutation that changes the chemistry of the leaf.
  • Sencha vs Longjing — The benchmark green tea of Japan against the benchmark green tea of China. One processing decision in the first hours after picking accounts for nearly everything that separates them.
  • Longjing vs Bi Luo Chun — The two most famous Chinese green teas, both from the lower Yangtze, both hand-shaped, and shaped in opposite directions.
  • Longjing vs gunpowder — Two pan-fired Chinese green teas at opposite ends of the market, and a useful demonstration that shaping is a decision about purpose rather than quality.
  • Jasmine tea vs green tea — Jasmine tea is green tea with an extra process, and the process is more involved than most people assume. Good scenting takes days of layering with fresh blossom, and the flowers are removed afterwards.
  • Longjing vs sencha: choosing between them — The two benchmark green teas, and the choice comes down to which fixing method you prefer rather than to quality. People who dislike one of them frequently like the other, and the difference is a single step.
  • Silver Needle vs green tea — Both are pale and delicate and they are made by opposite philosophies — one adds a decisive step, the other omits every step it can.

Journeys featuring this tea

Guides covering this tea