The craft beer world in the US has exploded over the past decade. But beer drinkers still aren’t shying away from cheap, easy-to-find, grocery store lagers. Sure, beer geeks might go crazy about their local microbrewery’s fruited sour, milkshake IPA, or barrel-aged stout. But walk into any grocery store from Olympia to Orlando and you’ll find the coolers filled with bargain-priced lagers — people drink them and occassionally even like them!
Since the holidays are upon us and gatherings are a pretty sure bet, the time is right to find a few great, easy-drinking lagers to bring to get-togethers. That’s why I decided to blindly nose and taste eight of the most popular, cheap lagers available pretty much anywhere. Keep scrolling to see how everything turned out.
Here’s the lineup:
- Corona Extra
- Coors Light
- Bud Light
- Miller High Life
- Natural Light
- Busch
- Heineken
- Pabst Blue Ribbon
Part 1: The Taste
Taste 1
Tasting Notes:
This beer smells kind of skunky. There are also notes of wet grass and cereal grains. Maybe a little citrus and floral aroma as well. The palate is a mix of skunk and sweetness with more earthy, herbal hops and sweet, caramel malts, and corny sugar. The finish is dry, crisp, and refreshing.
Taste 2
Tasting Notes:
This beer starts with a nose of bready malts, cereal grains, and citrus. That’s it and it’s all fairly muted. I had to try really hard to find anything. The palate is really sweet and sugary with just a little bitterness at the end. It doesn’t really taste like much.
It’s the epitome of barely yellow, fizzy water.
Taste 3
Tasting Notes:
Aromas of sugary sweetness, corn, cereal grains, and wet grass greet you before your first sip. The palate continues this trend. There’s a ton of sugary sweetness right off the bat as well as sweet corn, cereal grains, and herbal, grassy malts. There’s no bitterness whatsoever. This beer is sweet on sweet.
Taste 4
Tasting Notes:
Sweet corn, caramel malts, honey, lemongrass, and slight earthy, grassy hops are prevalent on the nose. The palate is centered on flavors like corn sweetness, bready malts, honey, citrus peels, cereal grains, and slightly bitter, floral hops. It has a nice mix of malt sweetness, corn, and piney hops.
Taste 5
Tasting Notes:
Notable aromas include sweet corn, cereal grains, caramel malts, and floral, herbal hops. Drinking it reveals a mix of sweetness and hops with sweet corn, toffee, citrus peels, and earthy, herbal hops making an appearance.
The finish is dry, sweet, and leaves you wanting more.
Taste 6
Tasting Notes:
The nose is sweet malts, cereal grains, corn, and nothing else discernable. It’s surprisingly fizzy for a beer. It tasted more like a malty, slightly hoppy hard seltzer or flavored sparkling water than an actual beer. It’s borderline flavorless.
Taste 7
Tasting Notes:
Sweet corn, cereal grains, wet grass, caramel, and floral, herbal, earthy hops were the overwhelming aromas on the nose. Sipping it revealed corn syrup sweetness, honey, citrus peels, and more earthy, herbal hops. The finish is crisp, sweet, and thirst-quenching. Not overly exciting, but it does its job.
Taste 8
Tasting Notes:
Sweet corn, sugar, citrus, and slightly bitter hops are found on the nose. Honestly, I couldn’t find anything else to mention. The palate continues this trend with sugary sweetness, sweet corn, cereal grains, and light citrus taking center stage. It’s fairly water and fizzy but refreshing.
Part 2: The Ranking
8) Natural Light (Taste 2)
ABV: 4.2%
Average Price: $12.99 for a 12-pack
The Beer:
It’s safe to assume people don’t drink Natural Light for the overwhelming flavor. They drink it because it’s refreshing, light, and low in alcohol, calories, and carbohydrates. It helps that it’s ridiculously inexpensive.
Bottom Line:
I’m convinced that Natural Light is popular because drinkers are trying to be ironic. It’s more a fizzy, flavorless novelty than an actual beer.
7) Bud Light (Taste 6)
ABV: 4.2%
Average Price: $6.99 for a six-pack
The Beer:
Bud Light is America’s favorite light beer. It’s a favorite of people who see that it’s the cheapest beer at the bar and think, “Sure, why not? It’s still technically beer, right?”
It’s low in alcohol and equally low in flavor.
Bottom Line:
Bud Light is a real head-scratcher of a beer. It’s almost flavorless, but it’s tremendously popular. You can thank over-the-top advertising for that.
6) Busch (Taste 8)
ABV: 4.3%
Average Price: $6.99 for a six-pack
The Beer:
Sure. I could have picked Busch Light instead of regular Busch, but I wanted to mix it up. This adjunct lager is brewed with (according to the official website) premium hops, barley malt, grains, and water, it’s known for its crisp, easy-drinking, no-frill flavor profile.
Bottom Line:
This is definitely not an exciting beer. It’s muted, watery, and boring. It does have a little more depth than some of the light beers on the market though.
5) Corona Extra (Taste 3)
ABV: 4.6%
Average Price: $8.50 for a six-pack
The Beer:
The most popular Mexican beer, this beach-centric lager is brewed with simple ingredients like water, barley, non-malted cereal grains, and hops. It’s known for its sweet, light, refreshing flavor without a ton of substance.
Bottom Line:
Corona Extra is always shown with a lime wedge sitting snuggly in the neck of the bottle and for good reason. Without this added citrus, it’s an overly sweet, sugary mess.
4) Heineken (Taste 1)
ABV: 5%
Average Price: $8.50 for a six-pack
The Beer:
One of the easiest-to-find, most popular imported lagers in the world, Heineken is the kind of beer that’s always there. This European pale lager from The Netherlands is known for its earthy, fruity, hoppy flavor.
Bottom Line:
Heineken has a rather unique aroma and flavor. Even the freshest bottle or can has a little dank, skunk flavor to it. If you can get past that, it’s a refreshing, malty, floral sipper.
3) Coors Light (Taste 5)
ABV: 4.2%
Average Price: $6.99 for a six-pack
The Beer:
As light beers go, Coors Light has a little more going for it than most of its counterparts. This 4.2% ABV light lager is brewed with 2-row lager malt, hop extract, lager yeast, and corn syrup. It’s cold lagered, cold-filtered, and even cold-packaged. Everything about this beer is cold.
Bottom Line:
Coors Light doesn’t mess around. It lists corn syrup in its ingredients. It’s not concerned with what you think as long as you crack open one of its ice-cold bottles or cans. And, truth be told, they’re pretty okay.
2) Miller High Life (Taste 7)
ABV: 4.6%
Average Price: $6.50 for a six-pack
The Beer:
Miller High Life is one of those beers that you’re just as likely to find at a college party as you are at a retirement party. It’s a throwback in a glass bottle that never seems to go out of style. Plus, the beer inside is crisp, refreshing, and hits the spot every time.
Bottom Line:
Miller High Life is well-known for its crisp, refreshing, easy-drinking nature. It might not be the most complex beer in this world of over-the-top beers, but it serves its purpose and it does it well.
1) Pabst Blue Ribbon (Taste 4)
ABV: 4.7%
Average Price: $5.99 for a six-pack
The Beer:
This classic bowling alley beer has been brewed the same way since its inception way back in 1844. Its popularity rose a decade or more ago when hipsters and young people began drinking it ironically. There’s nothing ironic though about this smooth, crisp, Noble hop-driven lager.
Bottom Line:
PBR deserves all of the attention it gets. It’s a classic, crisp, no-frills throwback beer. It tastes exactly the way you expect it to taste when you see its iconic label.
Part 3: Final Thoughts
It’s not easy to blindly taste cheap, grocery store lagers. They’re either crisp, refreshing, and memorable or watery, bland, and highly forgettable. It feels like there is no in-between.
You’ll find the first part of the list is filled with forgettable, bland beer and the second half is populated by bargain bangers.