Leaving a bitter taste: Tourists to Czechia rank the country's worst beers

Beer often springs to mind when one thinks of Czechia, and international foodie and drink guide TasteAtlas has made the most of this association by asking tourists to the country which brand they thought was the worst.

TasteAtlas routinely collects consumer information and aggregates reviews into frequently updated rankings about the quality of food and drink.

Taking the accolade of the third-worst-rated Czech beer is Znojemské beer, produced in several varieties in the South Moravian town of Znojmo. This beverage comes in both light and dark draught beer variations, as well as a lager. It's crafted using just three ingredients in production: barley, water, and hops. Light draughts range from 3.2 to 4 percent, dark draughts from 3.8 to 4 percent, and lagers from 4.5 to 5 percent alcohol content.

The second-worst beer, in the eyes of visitors to Czechia, is Březnický lager. This Czech-style pilsner hails from the Central Bohemian town of Březnice. It has a yellow-golden hue and an alcohol content ranging from 4.7 to 5.5 percent. Its taste is bitter and it features a hoppy aroma.

The award for tourists’ most-disliked beer goes to Starobrno, which is produced in Czechia’s second-largest city. Made in Starobrno Brewery, the beer comes in various forms: it is made in a 10-degree version with a 4-percent alcohol volume and also sold as a pale 12-degree larger with a 5.2-percent alcohol volume. 

Aside from its standard production, the brewery also produces a special batch of green beer, which is produced only once per year and distributed on Maundy Thursday (also known as “Green Thursday” in Czechia).

An online portal, Atlas of Beers, that shows Czechs’ reviews of a multitude of beers puts beverages such as Grešlák modrý (a light beer), Májový larger, and Zlatopramen pale draft beer as among the worst-ranked beers, with average user ratings of less than five out of 10.

When it comes to the country’s best-viewed beers, a separate survey found that Czechs’ favorite beer was – by a wide margin – Pilsner. In a 2023 interview with Expats.cz, general manager of the Pult beer bar Tereza Pospíšilová said that “lager of the Pilsner type defined the Czech nation.”