Article updated on August 5, 2024 at 1:33 AM PDT
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David Watsky Senior Editor / Home and Kitchen
David lives in Brooklyn where he's spent more than a decade covering all things edible, including meal kit services, food subscriptions, kitchen tools and cooking tips. David earned his BA from Northeastern and has toiled in nearly every aspect of the food business, including as a line cook in Rhode Island where he once made a steak sandwich for Lamar Odom. Right now he's likely somewhere stress-testing a blender or tinkering with a toaster. Anything with sesame is his all-time favorite food this week.
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There's nothing like cracking open a cold one in the comfort of your own home, especially when you can sample beer from the best breweries around the world. From rich stouts to hoppy IPAs to microbrewed beer, we found the best beer subscription boxes that all beer enthusiasts can enjoy. We put the top beer clubs to the test, giving you the taste of the rare and craft beer scene without having to step outside. Whether you're a seasoned beer connoisseur or just beginning your journey, these beer clubs provide a great way to explore new flavors and support independent breweries worldwide.
What is the best beer club overall?
After testing five of the most popular beer of the month clubs, we've decided on the budget-friendly and original Craft Beer Club as the best beer subscription box for most people.
There are several dozens of options to consider when looking for a beer subscription box and they all deliver curated collections of unique craft beers to your home to taste. The best beer clubs in 2024 offer access to an ever-expanding beer-brewing universe, with unique picks including rare or limited-release beers. Read on for our picks of the best beer subscriptions for any ale enthusiast or lager lover.
- Best beer club for most people: Craft Beer Club
- Best beer club for IPAs and hoppy beers: The HopHeads Beer Club
- Best beer club if you want to pick the styles: Beer Drop
- Best beer club for rare beers: The Rare Beer Club
- Best beer club to try unusual beers: Brewvana
The Craft Beer Club is arguably the most popular beer subscription box out there for the craft beer enthusiast and for good reason. This club sends out monthly shipments of new and interesting craft beers from around the country. Many of the new beers and craft brews have limited distribution, meaning a subscription to CBC might be your only shot at tasting those specialty offerings. It also puts a premium on fresh beer, with many of its roster of breweries making a fresh batch just before boxes go out.
The Craft Beer Club is also a more affordable beer subscription box at $54 a month plus shipping within the continental US. Each box features 12 beers: three of each beer in four different styles from two different breweries.
Pros:
- One of the more budget-friendly services
- Beers that appeal to a wide range of palates
Cons:
- Not as many rare or niche offerings
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Some of the beer subscription boxes on this list don't leave much of the beer selection up to you, but not so with Beer Drop. This beer delivery box startup offers different plans, but with all of them, you can select your favorite type of beer and specific beer styles that go into your monthly craft beer subscription box shipments. That includes IPAs, fruit-forward beers, Belgian beer and plenty of other varieties.
Monthly drops of microbrewery offerings start at $50 per month, plus $8 for shipping and handling, for five beers and your subscription can be canceled anytime. Also notable: The Beer Drop brews are all canned, so you'll never have to worry about a broken bottle.
Pros:
- Allows you to help curate the deliveries based on your taste
- Some of the more interesting beers I tried came from this club
Cons:
- On the expensive side
- Some beers in my shipment were fairly common
If you're looking for outside-the-box brewing, Brewvana is the beer club you'll want to gain membership to. Brewvana features interesting beers from a single beer-brewing region like Des Moines, Iowa. The company's Brews Less Traveled Beer Club highlights one new "undiscovered" beer city each month. Each shipment includes eight different beers; two beers from four breweries in whatever city is on tap that month. In my shipment highlighting Lexington, Kentucky, I got a smattering of beers ranging from the more familiar to the highly unusual. Think berry cobbler sours and Kentucky bourbon barrel ales.
Brewvana members can enjoy interactive live streams and a drink-along podcast to enhance each month's tasting. The cost is $70 per month for eight beers if you sign up for six months prepaid. For three-month subscriptions, the cost jumps to $75. And if you sign up for one month, that'll cost you $80.
Pros:
- Highlights a single beer-producing region
- Lots of good information included
Cons:
- Expensive
- Some of the beers were too experimental for my taste
If hops make you happy, this is the monthly club for you (or another hoppy beer lover you'd like to treat). The HopHeads Beer Club sends three different hops-centric beers -- four of each -- every month so you can get your fill of this beer style.
While this is, unsurprisingly, heavy on IPAs of various styles, it also makes room for hoppy pale ale and red ales. These aren't just super-bitter hop-you-over-the-head beers, though; the club also spotlights "the many hop flavors and aromas available to today's brewers amidst the ever-expanding supply of new hop varieties," and includes imports as well as American selections. If this is your favorite beer style, the Hop Heads Beer Club is the one. Pricing starts at $42, plus $16 shipping, per month.
Pros:
- Great for hoppy beer drinkers
- Starts at $42 per month
Cons:
- Only three types of beer in each delivery
- Extra $16 for shipping
The Rare Beer Club is the most selective of them all, featuring only two 750ml bottles of beer a month. It sends two separate styles of craft beer per month and no two months will see the same bottle picks at your door (unless you request or reorder). Don't be discouraged by the limited choices; it's quality you're here for, and these beers are carefully chosen.
You have three buying options: two 750ml bottles per month ($44 plus $15 for shipping), four 750ml bottles per month ($66 plus $19 for shipping) or six 750ml bottles per month ($88 plus $24 for shipping). Often these beers use rare production techniques and ingredients, making them exceptional craft beer, like aging through blending or in bourbon and cedar barrels. Plus, you'll get super-rare brews from all over the world, including from up-and-coming breweries in Brazil, Japan and Scandinavia.
Pros:
- Good for rare, high-end beers
- Lots of international selections
Cons:
- Expensive
- Extra $15 for shipping
Types of beer
Before you sign up for a beer club, you'll want to decide which types of beer you want delivered in your monthly shipment. Perhaps you only care to try hoppy ales or Belgian-style beers. Certain clubs specialize in niche offerings, while others send a wider mix of beers brewed in every style.
Number of beers
Some beer clubs have a fixed number of beers in each send while others allow you to choose more or fewer beers per month. Decide how many beers make sense for you and pick a plan accordingly. Most services will allow you to change the plan later on if you're receiving too few or too many than you care to.
Cost
Beer clubs are typically a bit more expensive than going to the local store to buy beer, but some are far more affordable than others. Decide how much you have in your monthly budget for tasting new beers and select a club or subscription that fits.
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Testing monthly beer subscriptions is a dirty job but somebody's got to do it. In order to evaluate the best beer clubs, we ordered as many as three months of beer deliveries from each to gauge the types of beers offered, the variety from month to month and how the beer shipments were packaged including what information about the beers was included.
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Is a beer club worth it?
Beer clubs and subscriptions are a great way to try rare and small-bath beers you might not have access to otherwise. If you long to try specialty ales and lagers that go beyond what's available in your package store, a good beer subscription will help you do it.
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Are beer clubs expensive?
Beer clubs typically charge a few dollars more per beer than you would pay if you bought a six-pack of the same brew. That's to cover the cost of curating the selections, along with all the information that comes along with most beer club deliveries.
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Are beer clubs hard to cancel?
All the beer clubs on our list make it easy to cancel or pause your subscription if you need to. If there is a lengthy commitment of monthly payments, it is clearly stated before signing up.
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How do beer clubs work?
Each beer club operates differently, with some specializing in a hyperlocal showcase of a single region's beer every month, while others pluck their favorite brews from various locales to give you a cross-section of the best upstart beer-makers in 2024. Several clubs curate a monthly send of interesting or seasonal beers from small-batch breweries. Others focus on a particular style of beer to highlight in that month's collection. Most beer clubs send plenty of information on the beer and brewery. Many also send bits of free swag from the breweries with each shipment.
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