Are you a coffee drinker and want to try green tea for caffeine refill alternatives? Or vice versa? Despite different plant types, both make great beverages.
Over 85% of adults drink both tea and coffee in the United States as daily drinks. They both contain similar stimulants, both have caffeine content, and other important compounds.
Coffee and green tea come from different backgrounds, also have distinct tastes of each other despite both contain bitter flavors in them.
If you have visited or read our content here you probably have learned a lot more about coffee than green tea, yet here we will bring several points of comparison between the two drinks for our audiences.
Contents
Coffee preparation
To begin with, we should catch a glimpse of how coffee is made and what process it goes through to become a tasty drink. There are many types of coffee, but there are 2 big types of coffee used to make beverages worldwide, such as Arabica and Robusta; and for more facts about coffee types, you can read on our website about the type of coffee (normal coffee and decaf coffee).
Coffee beans must be roasted, and there are a lot of roasting processes, as well as types of roast. Unroasted coffee can be served as a drink too, but it is not very common among drinkers because they taste different from normal roasted coffee, but rather served like herbal tea. There are also loads of recipes to make coffee as well, and you can look it up here on different coffee recipes you can make at home.
Caffeine content in various type of coffee
The caffeine content in coffee varies according to many factors such as coffee type, decaf coffee or non-decaf, type of roasts, type of beans, and beverage types. For instance, decaf may have less caffeine than non-decaf.
If you want to have coffee at home and are looking for a good coffee for a caffeine boost, here are a few coffee recommendations.
Coffee Products To Have
- DEATH WISH COFFEE Dark Roast Ground Coffee
- Starbucks Medium Roast Ground Coffee
- Green Mountain Coffee Roasters Nantucket Blend Medium Roast Coffee
- Folgers Classic Roast Coffee (Medium Roast)
- Solimo Kona Coffee Blend (Medium Roast)
- Death Wish Coffee VALHALLA JAVA Whole Bean Coffee
Green tea preparation
Having consumed tea, you perhaps can tell the difference in taste and its texture as well. To prepare, you just simply need to steep the unfermented leaves of the Camellia sinensis plant (Tea plants) with hot water.
There are varieties of tea on the market, black tea, green tea, regular tea, etc. Black tea consumption is not as mainstream as green tea these days with all the tea-related beverages. Green tea may gain more popularity than any other type.
The most popular green tea beverage in today’s pop culture is matcha latte, and there are many other relative green tea beverages and food served in regular coffee shops. A hot green tea drink is also included in many people’s daily routine as it can prevent many health issues like heart disease in the long term.
Caffeine content in green tea
There is less caffeine in green tea, which means the same cup of tea contains a smaller amount of caffeine than brewed coffee.
Green tea is not a hard-making beverage, and you can always make it with a simpler method than coffee, not including instant coffee. If you are in team green tea and are looking for a nice tea bag to warm up at home, here are some of the recommended products you can choose.
Green Tea Products To Have
- VAHDAM Organic Himalayan Green Tea bag
- FGO Organic Green Tea bags
- Twinings of London Green Tea
- Bigelow Classic Green Tea bags
- Tazo China Green Tips Green Tea bags
- Jade Leaf Matcha Green Tea Powder
People may look for different benefits and try to weigh which one they should choose to suit their preference. Thus, this article will discuss mainly similarities of benefits between the two beverages, and the downsides of them in different uses.
10 Important Things You Do Not Want To Miss Between Coffee And Green tea
Both coffee and green tea are perfect drinks for any occasion, specifically for daily consumption, in order to freshen up your day. It is common that everyone knows how beneficial these drinks are when taken from internal consumption, yet there are so many other interesting facts that we do not always get to know from comparing the two.
Each of the two popular drinks has such dedicated followers that might as well persuade their favorite to be better than the other. The two drinks are distinctively different, but many people have insisted and taken their drinks seriously, especially on which one is more beneficial and better.
We are going to take a look at a few similarities and differences that might be important for you to note down when it comes to green tea and coffee facts.
1. Green tea has higher antioxidants
Even among the same species of tea, green tea contains higher antioxidant properties than the rest, namely Japanese green tea, which is pretty popular in pop culture.
Green tea, compared to coffee, has all the nutrients contained in the leaves. These nutrients found in green tea include catechins; catechins are a type of antioxidant that protects the human body from cancer long-term.
Moreover, the highest antioxidant content can be found in Japanese green tea. Another type of catechin called epigallocatechin gallate (EGCG) is a crucial type of antioxidant in improving overall health.
Because green tea contains essential ingredients that are profitable for both health and beauty, their extract is often added to several cosmetic or skincare lines including anti-aging facial cream, toner, and other skincare products. On top of that, the antioxidant in green tea helps reduce blood pressure, as well as the death risks in people with type 2 diabetes.
2. Lower death risk in people with diabetes
A Lot of studies have demonstrated a number of health benefits from consuming coffee and tea. For more health benefits obtained from drinking coffee, you can read our related article on benefits of coffee on our health.
Here we are talking about one of the significant benefits of coffee on people’s health, and how drinking coffee and green tea can lower fatality risk in people with diabetes.
Both coffee and tea uses for diabetic people
Diabetes is a disease that can occur on anyone, and people who are diabetic should be very cautious in terms of dietary intake to manage their blood glucose or blood sugar.
Moreover, there are a few types of diabetes too, and type 2 diabetes is the most common type among others. By drinking green tea and coffee it can offer potential health benefits, especially help with fatality rate reduction by reducing cardiovascular disease risk.
Reduce the cardiovascular diseases risk
Regarding recent research by the American Heart Association journal “Circulation: Heart Failure”, a cup or two of caffeine intake can reduce the problem of heart failure. However, this effect does not work on people who drink decaf.
Moreover, the study did not specify either the preparation, type of beans, or type of roast that helps cut down risk better. Therefore, we can generally tell that there are components in coffee that are beneficial for health.
Type 2 diabetes dietary aids
It has been studied that drinking coffee and green tea can reduce the death risk from diabetes, namely type 2 diabetes. Consuming coffee and green tea can decrease death risk in people with type 2 diabetes according to a published online journal by BMJ Open Diabetes Research & Care.
People with type 2 diabetes are prone to more health problems, thus demanding lifestyle modifications in which exercise and diet are considered the most important treatment.
Green tea and coffee contain bioactive compounds that are beneficial for health, namely, they contain substances that improve blood circulation. Drinking them daily, up to 3 cups can reduce the death risk caused by cardiac arrest or cardiovascular disease by over 50%.
According to observational research, coffee and tea contain anti-inflammatory properties and antioxidants such as phenols, theanine, and caffeine that have effects on the circulatory system.
3. Energy boost: coffee takes the lead in giving you energy
Most people are addicted to coffee, not because of their great taste, but also the amount of energy given. Though both green tea and coffee contain caffeine, coffee has a higher content than tea and gives you a good quick kick for freshening up.
Tea contains caffeine as well, but it is not sufficient in boosting our energy in a short period of time. Different types of coffee contain different amounts of caffeine as well; thus you can take a look at the level of caffeine content in a variety of coffee by reading our published article on caffeine content in coffee.
Coffee gives a quick boost to your energy than green tea because there are about 95 milligrams of caffeine found in a cup of coffee, which is higher than tea. Green tea has milder, sometimes no effect in boosting your energy the same way coffee does. Caffeine in coffee is an important stimulant working on increasing metabolism and has effects on our nervous system.
Drinking coffee can benefit memories and cognitive abilities due to the quicker reaction of stimulants that helps increase concentration. Therefore, coffee drinkers regularly experience energy enhancement, mood improvement, as well as better work performance than non-coffee drinkers.
In addition to this, choosing the right time to drink coffee is also important in maximizing the advantage of energy boost. For when and how much coffee you need to consume for daily intake, you can skim through our published articles about when is the best time of the day to drink coffee. Along with how much caffeine we need to consume to best give us maximum energy.
4. Green tea supplies long-term productivity
Coffee might be a fast way to boost up your productivity; it is a fast-acting solution to fatigue, but it is not as sustainable as green tea.
For a more steady way to boost up your energy, green tea helps to energize you, and improve physical performance throughout the day. The rich antioxidant in green tea helps slow down the absorption rate of caffeine, therefore it keeps improving brain function gradually.
Because of the slow absorption, it allows you to maintain productivity for the long term, and you can experience a gradual and balanced energy boost while staying calm and stress relieved. The substance in green tea directly targets the brain alpha wave called L-theanine in order to reduce anxiety and improves mental health.
At the same time, it helps reduce drowsiness and soothes both the body and mind. L-theanine or alpha wave is considered one of the beneficial nutrients in reducing mental strain, enhancing your cognitive skill, and helping you to maintain effective problem-solving skills.
5. Flexibility in drinking coffee
Flexible recipe for coffee drinks
With a wide range of recipes, you can make loads of coffee drinks. People can choose varieties of coffee from Arabica to Robusta, and different types of roast such as light roast, medium, or dark roast. There are also varieties of coffee beans from various regions.
Coffee shops always offer customers varieties of drinks, specifically coffee-based drinks. Normally, the differences between drinks depend on the special ingredients café use as their signature recipes, namely flavored syrups that are distinct and unique to make their signature drinks.
The flexibility of coffee allows people, even the non-coffee drinkers, to select the most suitable flavor for what they desire. Since the coffee flavor is adaptable, café often are creative. There are always coffee drinks that you have never tried yet.
Green tea traditional recipe
When we hear of green tea, we think of Japanese traditional ways of serving tea that reflect the ritualistic importance of Japanese culture. However, there are a lot of recipes for those who love green tea.
For tea recipe, there are several ways to make at home such as:
Citrus Mint Iced tea: slice orange and green tea into boiling water, then put the mint in. You can serve with ice and garnish with lime slices.
Green Ginger Mint tea: Green tea leaves are rolled into small balls in the hot water with spearmint. Let it stay in the boiled water a bit for it to release its bitter smoky flavor, then sweeten it with honey.
Mango tea: just serve it by sweetening it with mango and ginger.
Chamomile mint tea: you can use Jasmine tea in this as well. Add chamomile or lavender to create a pretty pattern.
Rose petal tea: add rose petal or another aroma to the tea
Peach white iced tea: This recipe used white tea which has a milder flavor, but it is picked from the same green tea plant. Except, they pick them when they are still covered in hair.
Puffed wild rice green tea: add puffed wild rice and cranberry-like rose hips for fruit variation.
Raspberry iced tea: fruity tea with a raspberry iced cube.
Honeydew mint iced tea: aside from adding honey, serve it with fresh mint or mint iced cubes.
6. Availability
The availability of green tea vs coffee is quite different in size.
Biggest coffee producer
Coffee is the most consumed commodity in the world with over 50 countries farming around the world. There are top 10 countries that produce the most coffee in the world such as. The commercial success of coffee showed in more than 9 million tons of coffee made annually.
Biggest green tea producer
Green tea farms are more limited by region due to the requirement of specific weather and conditions, and the biggest green tea producer in Japan. Japan produces more than 80,000 tons of tea each year, and about half the amount becomes the famous Japanese matcha green tea.
7. Comparing the weight loss effects
The most interesting tea vs coffee debate often relates to beauty beneficial effects. One of the most concerning is the weight loss effects of green tea vs coffee.
Coffee and weight loss
The caffeine content in coffee can effectively boost metabolism, and this energy boost allows to increase the activity level by burning more calories. There are so many ways to make coffee for your dietary plan, different types of coffee to choose from based on nutrients needed, and recipes.
Coffee increases the speed of calorie burning and is a good method for maintaining your weight. According to a study, coffee increases the fat-burning process up to 13%.
Green tea and weight loss
Tea consumption is also playing a part in the weight loss process as well. For instance, green tea drinkers, namely Japanese green tea, can assist in losing bodyweight.
However, coffee has more stimulants and has stronger thermogenesis effects that turn fat cells into energy which means coffee consumption can burn fat faster and more efficiently. It has less caffeine concentration, thus green tea may work slower at metabolism boosting.
8. Benefits of green tea vs coffee on dental hygiene
Green tea can protect us from cavities, bad breath, gum diseases, and reduce oral bacteria.
Meanwhile, coffee can cause more damages such as reining the protective layer and creates stains.
9. Skin care advantages
The high chlorogenic acid and Epigallocatechin gallate in coffee and green tea are good for skincare usage.
First, Epigallocatechin gallate or EGCG helps to maintain the firmness of the skin, make your skin more elastic, and keep the skin’s youthfulness.
Secondly, there is an amino acid in both green tea and coffee. Thus, the amino acid helps moisturize skin and boost hydration.
10. Comparing health benefits
People drink coffee and tea not because they enjoy time at the coffee shop nor face caffeine withdrawal, but they consider more about health benefits. Both beverages help reduce the risk of cancer and heart disease.
Coffee
Compared to tea, coffee contains higher antioxidants that work to reduce bad cholesterol. There is 3 times more caffeine found in coffee than tea, and you can search our site for more caffeine content as well. Coffee provides loads of health benefits as it contains a high amount of antioxidants.
The reduced risk of such cardiovascular disorder and heart disease can be controlled under the process of fat breakdown by caffeine. Because it has higher caffeine content than tea, coffee can effectively burn fat and turn it into energy quicker.
Moreover, other health benefits of coffee include the protection of brain health, lower risk of dementia, and other degenerative diseases. Antioxidants such as polyphenol antioxidants can prevent us from many other health conditions.
In addition, there is also another report on the association between intestinal flora and coffee. A type of polyphenol abundant in coffee, the chlorogenic acid, is found to improve the balance of gut flora.
In addition, the study found arabinogalactan content that has an effect of growing specific bifidobacteria which normally grow in the large intestine. Bifidobacteria have the function of activating immune cells. Therefore, these components have the effect of reducing the risk of pneumonia in the elderly age.
Tea
Though coffee has more antioxidants doesn’t mean the tea is any worse. Instead, it reduces health conditions like oxidative stress from excessive free radicals intake over time, and cuts down cholesterol gradually. Antioxidants content in it is also as beneficial as the one in coffee.
According to a study, green tea may be associated with the reduction of death risk from pneumonia as well, specifically women. It was stated that it reduces hazard ratio (HR) which is respiratory disease-related mortality.
Green tea consumption is one of the good alternatives if you think there is too much caffeine in coffee. It also has the capacity to boost brain function gradually and is efficient in helping lower the risk of cold turkey.
Overall health benefits
In addition to distinct health advantages of each beverage. A study conducted in Japan on the health benefits between green tea vs coffee. Thus, it has investigated the association between green tea and coffee intake and pneumonia among the elderly through a control-case study.
The study has shown that there is a reduction in OR for pneumonia in the elderly, namely those who drank more than 2 cups a day compared to non-drinkers. Moreover, the study explains that both drinks can lower the risk of facing the severity of respiratory diseases such as asthma.
On top of that, the Federal dietary guidelines in the U.S. have mentioned that 3 to 5 cups of 8 ounces of plain black coffee can lower the risk of different diseases. For example like chronic inflammation, boost brain functions, and lower the risk of having high cholesterol.
Nonetheless, coffee-based drinks such as lattes, macchiatos, and other popular drinks may not contain the same effects as plain black. These drinks contain loads of sugar which can be high in calories. Additionally, it may cause a lot of fat due to sugar content.
When To Drink Or What Time To Drink?
Green tea drinkers
Normally, people consume green tea in the morning to freshen up their day. Yet, is there really a proper time to drink tea? It is suggested that you should consume tea between meals for freshening up.
Coffee lovers
Coffee drinkers love to have their cuppa every morning or early afternoon when they feel drowsy after lunch. Nonetheless, a study shows that there are times best to have caffeine intake during the day. By knowing when to drink, you can maximize the energy boost and get the most out of it.
Takeaway
In conclusion, coffee and tea inhibit many advantages that a lot of people have misperceived. Despite all of the benefits, people must not over-consume these drinks. Because too much may contain risk factors, face cold turkey, and negatively affect overall health.
If so, you should go for specialists or doctors that can provide medical advice. Lastly, it is significant for people to consume both beverages more intuitively without damaging their health.
References
- Drinking green tea and coffee daily linked to lower death risk in people with diabetes | Science Daily
- Green tea vs. Coffee: Which is better for your health? | Healthline
- Green with coffee: Why are people mixing these two drink | Bella all natural
- Association between coffee and green tea intake and pneumonia among the Japanese elderly: a case-control study | Kyoko Kondo et al. | Nature
- Japanese Green Tea vs. Coffee – 10 battles you don’t want to miss | Japanese Green Tea Co
Coffee vs Matcha Green Tea | Matcha Benefits By Zekko Matcha