9 Store-Bought Sweet Tea Brands, Ranked Worst To Best

Whether you grew up in the South or just enjoy your tea with a side of sugar, there's a good chance that most of us have enjoyed sweet tea at one point or another. American sweet tea is a pretty simple thing to brew up, typically using fresh water, Lipton black tea, and lots of sugar, resulting in a super sweet and satisfying beverage that is best served ice cold. Despite being such a bare-bones concoction, it can be hard to get sweet tea right, and even with the plethora of store-bought options available, not all of them are able to live up to grandma's foolproof sweet tea recipe.

To save you the sugar rush of trying every bottled or canned sweet tea on the market, I've put my own sweet tooth to work by sampling some popular brands to determine which is the best of the best. I made sure to choose options that are purely sweet tea — no added flavors like lemon, raspberry, or peach — to stay true to the beverage we all know and love. My ranking largely comes down to which tea tastes the best, of course, but I also considered balance in flavor and which ones veered perhaps a bit too far (or not far enough) on the sweet side.

Liquid Death is perhaps best known for its water flavors, but the trendy brand also offers a variety of teas. One such tea option is the Grim Leafer sweet tea, which comes in the distinct 19.2-ounce tallboy can that has become such a staple look for Liquid Death. While there's no denying the visual appeal of Liquid Death's products and the popularity of the brand in general, there is plenty of denying the quality of this sweet tea, which left me struggling to take more than a couple of sips.

When the first note that you pick up while drinking sweet tea is sourness, there's a good chance that the beverage as a whole is a complete miss. And I'd argue this is definitely the case with Liquid Death's sweet tea, which tasted quite sour and not really sweet at all. Upon inspecting the nutrition facts, I discovered that one can of this sweet tea has a mere 6 grams of sugar; great for those looking to reduce their sugar intake but a disappointment for those who are looking for a true sweet tea. I had high hopes for Liquid Death's sweet tea since the brand has had quite a few hit products in the past, but it almost feels impossible to even call this a sweet tea because the flavors were more sour than anything else.

My only experience with Joe Tea (prior to trying this sweet tea, of course) was with the brand's fruit-flavored teas, including a peach and raspberry flavor. Having enjoyed both of those fruity flavors, I figured that Joe Tea's sweet tea must also be a hit, but alas, my assumption was dead wrong. This sweet tea is perfect proof that sweet tea can indeed be too sweet, and I'm inclined to think that even those with the biggest sweet tooth would agree.

In one 20-ounce bottle of sweet tea, you'll find 64 grams of sugar, which is the most of all the teas in this ranking. And, hey, I get it — sugar is unavoidable in sweet tea, but Joe Tea seems to have reached new levels of just how much sugar can be incorporated into a beverage. This tea almost didn't taste like tea but more like a heavily concentrated juice, which really took away from the refreshing factor that sweet tea is supposed to have. Maybe, just maybe, someone out there would enjoy the cloying nature of Joe Tea's sweet tea, but for me, this tea relies too heavily on excessive sugar as opposed to being a balanced, appropriately sweetened beverage.

Arizona has a whole lineup of tasty teas, though one that falls on the slightly less tasty end of the spectrum is the sweet tea. I have nothing vehemently against Arizona's sweet tea, which comes in a 22-ounce can, but it tastes notably different than many of the teas on this list, and not in a good way. Arizona's sweet tea has a distinct lack of freshness to it, and as I've discovered from sampling others on this list, fresh flavor is something that's possible, even for canned and bottled teas.

Aside from a lack of freshness, this tea also just doesn't have that classic black tea flavor that's so crucial to good sweet tea. This drink is definitely sweet (58 grams of sugar per can), but like Joe Tea, it's a bit more cloying than smooth and enjoyable. Plus, this tea has a certain aftertaste to it that I'm personally not a big fan of, so all around, Arizona is not my first (or second, or third) choice when it comes to sweet tea. A perk worth noting is that Arizona has been a consistently sweet drink option, with this can costing me only a dollar, so it is, at the very least, the most affordable option on this list.

Anyone who has ever shopped at a Walgreens has perhaps come across the store's Nice! brand, and amidst the sea of Nice! products is a big old gallon of sweet tea. I didn't have any expectations with this one, as I had never tried it in the past (nor have I really tried any Nice! brand items). Once I did try the tea, I found that my ambivalent feelings about it beforehand were pretty spot on, as this sweet tea is neither bad nor particularly amazing ... it's just fine, nothing more and nothing less.

To get into the specifics about Nice! sweet tea, I'd say that it definitely is a step up from something like Liquid Death. This stuff tastes like real-deal sweet tea, but it definitely also had a palpable, sort of bitter aftertaste that I didn't enjoy. It's definitely not uncommon for a shelf-stable drink to have preservative ingredients — Nice! sweet tea contained phosphoric acid and glycolipids — so I can't fault the tea too much, but the bitter aftertaste was a little too strong to rank higher. That said, if Walgreens is the store you frequent the most, and you walk in one day with a huge hankering for sweet tea, you won't be devastated by this one. In fact, you might find it to be perfectly fine, just like I did.

Aldi shoppers may be familiar with Benner, the popular grocery chain's tea brand offered in stores. I had never tried Aldi's brand of sweet tea before (or even heard of it, for that matter), but I am a big Aldi fan, so I had hopes that this one would be an underdog. And, while I can't say that Benner sweet tea is the best on this list, it's definitely far from the worst; if Aldi is your grocery store of choice and you enjoy sweet tea, picking up a bottle of Benner wouldn't be a bad choice.

Something I found really interesting about Benner sweet tea was that, unlike so many other sweet teas that boast a mild, general black tea flavor, this sweet tea had a faint Earl Grey taste to it. When I say faint, I mean very faint, like there was just a whisper of Earl Grey. I personally enjoyed that little bit of complexity, but I could see how the taste might be a negative for some since sweet tea is typically known for having a very mild black tea flavor. Tea flavors aside, I found the sweetness level of Benner's to be pretty decent — not too sweet, though there was a distinct aftertaste alongside the flavor of Earl Grey tea. 

Walmart can be a hit-or-miss place to shop, and more specifically, the store's Great Value brand can offer up some good and bad finds. I'd categorize the Great Value sweet tea into the good section because this stuff tasted pretty darn close to what I picture classic, home-brewed sweet tea to taste like. Aside from a slightly bitter aftertaste, I was pleasantly surprised to find that Great Value's sweet tea had a really nice balance of flavor, and even though this stuff is only available by the gallon, it's a gallon I'd seriously consider purchasing again.

Something that makes Walmart's sweet tea so successful is how it's super bare-bones in the best way possible. There's not a lot of complexity to the flavor, but that's exactly what I look for in a sweet tea. I want it to taste only like black tea and sugar, nothing else. Great Value definitely delivered, and though this isn't exactly something you can pick up in a small capacity when a sweet tea craving hits, it is a good option for those who like to keep the beverage stocked at all times.

Gold Peak, a brand of tea found at most gas stations and grocery stores, managed to snag third place in this ranking. This is a brand I've certainly enjoyed in the past, and while it isn't my absolute favorite out there, it's a good example of what bottled sweet tea has the potential to be — simply sweet, refreshing, and when enjoyed cold, incredibly satisfying.

My only real complaint about Gold Peak, and hence why it didn't earn a spot slightly higher, is that it does have a notably bitter aftertaste. Yes, this is something I've complained about with other teas on this list, but Gold Peak's is slightly forgivable because the tea itself has a really nice flavor to it. Sweet tea often gets bogged down by the sheer amount of sugar it has at play, meaning that any flavor of black tea gets lost in translation. Gold Peak's sweet tea managed to balance sweetness and tea flavor quite nicely. However, that bitterness did creep in a little stronger than I'd have liked, but if you're taking a pit stop on a road trip and looking for something sweet, Gold Peak is a good option.

Another gas station staple, Pure Leaf sweet tea is (almost) everything one could want from a bottled sweet tea. It's nice and balanced, sweet but not so sweet that your teeth hurt, and super refreshing when cold. Something I particularly liked about Pure Leaf is that the bitter aftertaste was really minimal, which made for an enjoyable drinking experience from start to finish. Not many of the teas on this list were able to avoid that aftertaste, but Pure Leaf has somehow defied the odds, thus earning the brand a high ranking on this list.

Also, unlike many other teas on this list, I noticed a very slight acidity to this tea, which worked really well in offering a slight edge to the sweetness. The tea is not lemon-flavored by any means, but it did have a little nuance that complemented the sweetness nicely. Readily available at just about any gas station or grocery store, Pure Leaf is a great option for avid sweet tea lovers and those who enjoy the occasional sweet tea alike.

When I imagine the perfect glass of sweet tea — one that's freshly brewed and has the perfect balance of sweetness and black tea flavor — it sure looks (well, tastes) a whole lot like Milo's sweet tea. Considering how Milo's managed to capture the essence of freshly brewed tea into a store-bought, gallon-sized jug, it only makes sense that the brand earned the top spot on this list. Unlike other teas on this list, many of which contain some sort of preservative to keep them shelf-stable, Milo's tea has a simple three ingredients: brewed tea, filtered water, and cane sugar. (As a result of such a minimal ingredient list, this tea is kept refrigerated at the store and should remain the same once you take it home.)

Milo's sweet tea success ultimately comes down to its simplicity. There's no bitter aftertaste, there's no cloying sweetness, there's no burdensome or harsh tea flavor; it's smooth sipping through and through. I was also impressed by how Milo's managed to taste so fresh despite being, well, not freshly brewed, but I'm fine with not knowing the secret as long as I can keep enjoying the tea nonetheless. I love that Milo's tastes like true Southern sweet tea, and though there were some close competitors on this list, it was no real contest that Milo's is the best store-bought sweet tea. 

When it came to ranking these sweet teas, I actually relied more on the simplicity of flavor than I did on complexity. Sweet tea is meant to be pretty simple, so I mostly favored those brands that kept it sweet and simple, as opposed to those that employed strange aftertastes that just didn't work. The only exception was Pure Leaf, which has slight complexity thanks to a touch of acidity, but it wasn't a flavor that I felt was overpowering, and the balance that it created in the tea was a winning feature, not a losing one.

Another factor I considered was sweetness, but only if the sweetness was perhaps just a bit too much. I appreciate the sweetness of sweet tea; I understand that it's just the nature of the drink, but I still think there is some room for balance, and even something like sweet tea can teeter into cloying territory. For the most part, I didn't find the sweetness level of any of these teas to be offensive, but for the couple that were both not sweet enough (Liquid Death) and too sweet (Joe Tea), I did ultimately rank them lower for messing up a sacred rule of sweet tea: Get the sweetness level right.