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Best Kombucha Starter Kits In 2021

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This product guide was written by GearHungry Staff
Published December 4, 2018
GearHungry Staff
GearHungry Staff posts are a compilation of work by various members of our editorial team. We update old articles regularly to provide you the most current information. You can learn more about our staff here.
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Homebrewing is a massively popular pastime, but while it’s more associated with craft beer and microbrewing, there’s another healthier undercurrent of home brewing running parallel with the basement breweries and experimental flavors. This parallel is home brewed kombucha drink. You may have heard of it, you may not, but there are people who believe kombucha is the future. With an array of health benefits of kombucha prevalent in each batch. While you can buy it in stores, many people opt to make it at home, and if you want to do that properly, you’ll need the best kombucha starter kits, which, luckily for you and the whole family, we’ve selected right here.

Kombucha can contribute to lowered cholesterol, provide a rich source of probiotics, and give you more energy, while also improving your athletic performance. Not bad, hey? So, if you’re sick of spending supermarket premiums for every bottle of that sweet booch, if you’re concerned that you’re makeshift brewing kit isn’t up to the standards required to not make you sick or cause some fermentation disaster, then a kombucha starter kit is certainly for you, so let’s see what’s brewing.

The Best Kombucha Starter Kit

1
GetKombucha Kombucha Starter Kit

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Our pick of the best choice for kombucha starter kits is this from GetKombucha which is a comprehensive set that contains everything you’ll need to get started (except a jar, but we’re sure you have a couple lying around). What is included, though, are black and green tea options, organic sugar, starter liquid, and SCOBY. Giving you the perfect tool to begin your kombucha brewing journey as soon as it’s delivered.

You’ll also receive access to a treasure trove of recipes and lifetime support from GetKombucha to help you through any questions and queries you might have. These answers are supplied personally, so you always know you’re talking to a real person, and not merely an automatic reply which is far too common in the modern world.

It’s both gluten and GMO-free to appeal to everyone and has a super simple set up. At less than $50, it’s a bargain and has the potential to save you hundreds of dollars on store-bought brands. For anybody getting into kombucha home brewing, there’s really only one place to start, and that’s right here. Be sure to also check out our guide to the best flasks, because you’ll want to carry your kombucha with you wherever you go.

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Key Features:

Gluten and GMO free

Easy to set up

Simple, straightforward access to healthy drink

Lifetime support and healthy living guarantee

Specification:
  • BrandGetKombucha
  • Model045635587489
  • Weight2.8 pounds
Pros

Can save you nearly $500 on equipment per month

Fully colored quick-start recipe cards

GIves peace of mind by knowing the ingredients

Cons

Jars or other fermenting containers not included

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

2
The Kombucha Shop Deluxe Kombucha Starter Kit

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Anyone looking for a more complete kombucha brewing kit should look no further than the Deluxe set from The Kombucha Shop. Unlike the GetKombucha set, it contains everything – and we mean everything – you need to both brew and bottle, and even comes with custom supplies to make the post-brew process much easier. This includes a bendable bottle brush that ensures you’ll get those hard-to-reach areas.

But wait, there is so much more. The Kombucha Shop isn’t lying when it says this is a deluxe set. You get 6 bottles crafted with thick glass and a strong, reliable gasket, as well as a stainless steel funnel to make pouring simpler than ever before. The straightforward brewing means you can do it time after time with ease, and the included pH test strips help you find your desired flavor.

While there have been reports of expired SCOBY, these seem few and far between, and The Kombucha Shop are happy to deal with and fix any problems you may encounter.

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Key Features:

Contains everything to brew and bottle

Custom supplies including bendable bottle brush

Stainless steel funnel prevent spillages

Thick glass with strong gasket

Specification:
  • BrandThe Kombucha Shop
  • ModelSYNCHKG074550
  • Weight11 pounds
Pros

Saves money on store-bought kombucha

Deluxe kit provides more comprehensive accessories

Straightforward brewing

Cons

Some quality control issues with SCOBY

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

3
Joshua Tree Kombucha Starter Kit SCOBY

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If you’re searching out a Make Your Own Kombucha Kit, you’re likely thinking about the product with the best value for money. Well, we love to find good value products that still do the job, and The Joshua Tree Kombucha SCOBY with Starter Tea Kit is an excellent choice.

They develop the kombucha culture using trustworthy and hygienic methods and the best ingredients for a fully organic product, while the brewing instructions are easy to follow, if a little basic, especially for beginners. However, it shouldn’t take long before you’re a kombucha brewing master, especially with all the additional resources and information available online. For the price, it’s a perfectly acceptable first kit for those just getting into the game, and will give them the confidence to graduate to larger sets.

Unfortunately, the good value comes at a slight price (ha!), and you must buy additional ingredients like sugar and the tea itself. This isn’t too much of a problem, and you still get the jar, SCOBY, and starter liquid, which can ease the sting of needing to purchase what are also essential ingredients. Be sure to also check out our list of the best tea makers for more great items like this.

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Key Features:

Includes starter liquid, cover, and jar

Simple brewing guide included

Uses wholly organic ingredients

Reliable lid for excellent fermentation

Specification:
  • BrandJoshua Tree Kombucha
  • ModelB077JJLV8B
  • Weight3.3 pounds
Pros

Easy brewing in just five steps

Ideal for beginners and experts

Great value price

Cons

You will need to buy sugar, pH testers and similar additional ingredients

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

4
Northern Brewer Everbru Kombucha Starter Kit

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Moving swiftly from the best value to the premium choice of kombucha kits, the Northern Brewer Everbru Continuous Brewing Starter Kit is the perfect big-budget set to quench your kombucha cravings whenever you need. With a huge 1.75 gallon container, you’ll have kombucha for days, weeks, months, and years to come and keep the family well-stocked.

Unlike smaller kits, this gives you versatility in your brewing process you’ve never seen before. You can make single batches or continuous ones, so you’ll never have to wonder if you’ve made enough or not. The set comes full of high-quality ingredients, making it ideal for beginners but also excellent for more experienced brewers looking to make that next step in their kombucha-loving life.

Included is a stainless steel carafe, SCOBY, thermometer, clear instructions, tea, rubber bands, and everything else you could need. With a kit as complete as this, we can even forgive the price. Whatever you do spend on this you will save much more than you would by buying in-store.

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Key Features:

Includes 1.75 gallon container

Make either single batches or continuous brew

SCOBY included

Stainless steel carafe included for storing and pouring

Specification:
  • BrandNorthern Brewer
  • ModelB075FV27J9
  • Weight17 pounds
Pros

Also has sugar, black tea, rubber band and extras

Instructions for different kinds of kombucha

Large size gives you greater volume for the whole family (or just more for you)

Cons

Slightly pricey compared to over kits

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

5
Urban Kitchen Kombucha Starter Kit

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Although at first glance this looks like a set that is nothing more than a jar, the Urban Kitchen Kombucha Home Brew Kit contains the essential high-quality pieces of your health-drink puzzle at a reasonable price. It discards the fancy, sometimes over-the-top accessories of larger kits, and instead gives you what you need. This makes it a great re-up choice for more experienced brewers, but also isn’t too overwhelming for novices to get going.

With this kitchen gadget, you get organic and top-quality SCOBY and the starter liquid all while providing a complete and refined look once brewing and fermentation is complete. The large jar allows for continuous brewing, so you’ll never be without your precious kombucha, and comes with guidelines to get started that are easy to understand.

Keeping things simple is sometimes more beneficial than finding something that has everything. Despite it being more bare-bones than other sets, you won’t feel you’re missing out, and it brews great tasting booch which is all the really matters, isn’t it?

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Key Features:

High quality ingredients at a lesser cost

Contains only the essentials for successful brewing

Organic SCOBY and Start Liquid

Provides refined look when completed

Specification:
  • BrandUrban Kitchen
  • ModelB07GPZXX5G
  • Weight3.93 pounds
Pros

Brews one gallon of kombucha

Option to choose single or continuous batch

Easy for novices and first-timers

Cons

Extra ingredients would give broader brewing options

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

6
Standing Stone Farms Kombucha Starter Kit

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A simple set at first glance, the Standing Stone Farms Kombucha Tea Home Brew Starter Kit has (almost) everything you need to get going. Including both live SCOBY and starter liquid, it’s easier than ever to embrace a healthier lifestyle without the fuss of trying different flavors and brands – and spending your hard-earned cash – on store-bought products.

Along with the vital SCOBY and starter, you’ll also receive organic black tea and cane sugar, as well as all the little extras that newbies don’t always realize, are necessary for the perfect brew. This includes covers, pH tester strips, and charts to make for a simple understanding of when your concoction is ready to pour. Most useful, though, is the recipe book and a library of online resources meaning you can experiment all day and all night, only pausing to take a swig of that sweet booch in between.

Overall, It’s a comprehensive and wonderfully priced kombucha home brew kit, but make sure you purchase a jar before it arrives, otherwise, you’ll be waiting around to begin on your kombucha odyssey. Our handy guide to the best growlers features more great products like this.

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Key Features:

Live SCOBY with starter included

Recipe book and online resources to expand your kombucha horizons

Organic black tea and cane sugar

Covers, pH tester strips and chart, reusable rubber bands included

Specification:
  • BrandStanding Stone Farms
  • ModelB071GPMPN5
  • Weight1.2 pounds
Pros

Contains all the tools and ingredients to get started

Easy to use

Simple and clear directions

Cons

Jar not included

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

7
Fermentaholics The Complete Jun Kombucha Starter Kit

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Many consider Fermentaholics’ Jun Tea product to be ‘the champagne of kombucha’, and its Complete Jun Kombucha Brewing Start Kit might just be the X that marks the spot in your hunt for crisp tasting, high-quality kombucha. Inside, you’ll get live Jun starter culture, pH testing strips, a reusable tea bag, and that ever-essential storage jar after brewing and fermenting.

All of these accessories make it ideal for beginners (as well as anyone looking to expand their kombucha horizons), and any questions you may have are answered efficiently thanks to Fermentaholics’ comprehensive chest of blog posts for effective troubleshooting. The SCOBY is also healthy, and it isn’t out of the realm of possibility you might grow a little attached to it. Some customers have reported christening it (him? Her?) like it’s part of the family.

This kombucha making kit stands proudly between great value and premium ingredients; making it an excellent choice for anybody looking for more sophisticated, elegant tasting kombucha to start their day. Or, you know, drink whenever you feel like it, we aren’t the boss of you.

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Key Features:

Crisp flavored and high quality tea

Kit fully tested and approved by FDA

High quality brewing tools included

Storage jar included after brewing and fermenting

Specification:
  • BrandFermentaholics
  • ModelB06XVYWXJW
  • Weight4.3 pounds
Pros

Complete kit for beginners to get them started

Healthy SCOBY

Thorough instructions for simple brewing

Cons

Starter kit only provides enough ingredients for one batch

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

8
Craft-A-Brew Starter Complete Kombucha Making Kit

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If you’re giving a Kombucha starter kit as a gift, you want it to look appealing. The Craft-A-Brew Starter Complete Kombucha Making Kit is probably the best-looking kit on this list, so it’s the perfect gift to give your health-conscious friends. The multicolored patterns and attractive cartoons give it the feel of a premium product. Of course, the kit gives you everything you need to make your first batch of Kombucha. 

It contains a one-gallon glass jar, a step-by-step guide, cane sugar, black tea, a weaved cloth, a rubber band, and a SCOBY (symbiotic culture of bacteria & yeast). The step-by-step instructions are easy to follow and the first batch will be ready within two weeks. 

Key Features:

High-quality ingredients 

Gift-ready box 

SCOBY included 

One-gallon glass jar included 

Specification:
  • BrandCraft-A-Brew
  • Weight3.79 pounds
Pros

Comes with everything you need 

Large and attractive glass jar 

Attractive gift box set

Cons

Some customers have had problems with the cloth 

CHECK PRICE ON AMAZON

Kombucha Starter Kit FAQs

Q: How Do I Make Kombucha?

A: Making kombucha tea isn’t as arduous and complicated as it is to brew your own beer. There are very few things that can go wrong when making your own kombucha at home, and it won’t just save you running to the store every day (or having to carry armfuls of bottles at a time), but also save you cash you could spend on cool gear, especially with the holidays coming up, so why not treat yourself, hey?

Your home kombucha kit will come with easy-to-follow instructions on how to make it, but if you want to have a good idea before it arrives at your door - so you can get right down to it, no matter what you were doing beforehand - we’ve put together a useful little guide for making kombucha ad reaping the benefits.

Equipment

Much of the beauty of making your own kombucha is its simplicity, and you’ll only need a few pieces of equipment to get started.

  • Glass jar
  • Stirring utensil (wooden or plastic)
  • A cover (cloth or coffee filter)
  • Something to hold the cover in place (rubber band)

Kombucha starter kits should provide you with some of these (and all of them, if you’re lucky) but if they don’t, you must find your own.

kombucha equipment

Ingredients

It’s not just putting tea in water and waiting, you’ll need other ingredients to have a successful first batch and beyond.

  • Water
  • White sugar
  • Tea bags or loose tea leaves
  • Starter tea or distilled white vinegar
  • Active SCOBY (Symbiotic Culture Of Bacteria and Yeast)

These ingredients are just to give you a general idea. You don’t need to use a specific tea and there are different kinds of water that can make the batch more successful. The best kombucha starter kits will come with enough ingredients to get you started and try out of different flavors for your first few batches.

Ratios

You probably know enough about brewing or making anything at home to understand that you can’t just throw everything in and hope for the best (well, you can but try it and let us know how successful that was). Instead, you need to work out the correct ratios for the corresponding batch size.

One Quarter Gallon Batch

  • 2 tea bags (or 1½ teaspoons of loose tea)
  • ¼ cup of sugar
  • 2 - 3 cups of water
  • ½ cup of distilled vinegar or starter tea (whichever you have)

One Half Gallon Batch

  • 4 tea bags (or 1 tablespoon of loose tea)
  • ½ cup of sugar
  • 6 - 7 cups of water
  • 1 cup of distilled vinegar or starter tea (whichever you have)

One Gallon Batch

  • 8 tea bags (or 2 tablespoons of loose tea)
  • 1 cup of sugar
  • 13 - 14 cups of water
  • 2 cups of distilled vinegar or starter tea (whichever you have)

It’s unlikely that you’ll want (or be able) to make a batch larger than 1 gallon, but if you have a jar big enough to do that, you’ll need to scale the ingredients, around double the amount of one gallon should suffice.

However, we should warn you that attempting large batches of kombucha - while tempting for saving money and time - can cause uneven fermentation, which will ruin the batch and all your hopes and dreams of being the King of Kombucha, the Booch Baron, the Duke of Distilled Vinegar. Okay, that last one sounds lame, but you get the idea.

For now, it’s best to stick to smaller batches for consistent success and also to prevent your home becoming more kombucha than anything else. The wife and kids may not be as thrilled about it as you are.

process of making kombucha

Process

  1. Heat your water (enough to steep the tea in) and pour it into a jar, add sugar and stir until it creates a solution.
  2. Add the tea bags or tea leaves.
  3. Cool the mixture down to room temperature (between 68 - 85ºF or 20 - 29°C for our European friends). You can leave the tea in for as long as you like, but the longer you leave it the stronger it will be.
  4. Take the tea bags or strain and remove tea leaves from the mixture
  5. Add distilled vinegar (you can replace the vinegar with starter tea from older batches, but because this is your first time, vinegar is a fine substitute).
  6. Add your active SCOBY.
  7. Cover the jar with a cloth or coffee filter and secure with a rubber band.
  8. Place the mixture somewhere room temperature and out of direct sunlight. Leave for 7 to 30 days. The longer you leave it, the more vinegary it will taste.
  9. Remove your kombucha and pour. Keep the SCOBY and some liquid from the bottom of the jar to use in the next batch.
  10. Enjoy your kombucha, or if you want to do more to it, you can add flavors, bottle it, and show it off to your buddies.

Remember, brewing kombucha is supposed to be fun, so don’t get too stressed over batches not coming out how you hoped they would the first time. It’s true that is isn’t too hard, but it may take a couple of tries to get your kombucha just how you like it.

Sources

  1. The Rise in Popularity of High Grade Home Brewing in the USA - Brewing Culture
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