What follows is an updated version of the list of how many brewing brands (Updated July 11, 2025; re-edited July 15 based on reader feedback).
I started out in 2022 asking the question: How often have you seen the “fact” that New Zealand has around 220 breweries?
It’s been an oft-touted number and I’ve always wondered where it comes from. It’s popped up in various places over the years — including in this EECA report on decarbonization of the brewing industry. Though at least they had it as “over 200”. I think much of this erroneous data comes from an NZIER report in 2019 that had the 218 number, which was unsourced.
Beer writer Phil Cook took a typically hard-lined approach to his analysis in 2019 ago when he focused on physical breweries and came up with 161.
Statistics New Zealand had a count of 174 in 2022 based on how businesses categorise themselves. Their peak was 180 in 2020, which represented a trebling in breweries from 60 in the preceding decade: rapid growth by anyone’s standards.
What I’m not sure of from Stats NZ’s data is whether, for example, Lion’s various “brands” — notably Panhead and Emerson’s and to a lesser extent Mac’s and Harrington’s are rolled into one enterprise. Ditto DB with Monteith’s and Tuatara, and Asahi with Boundary Road and Founders. It feels like they probably are.
So what I decided to do was count the breweries using the resources from Phil Cook’s original effort; Jules van Costello’s book Brewed; the regional powerhouse of SOBA (now defunct), which used to have people on the ground throughout New Zealand who knew what’s happening in their local area; the Companies Office, Untappd, and — somewhat usefully, Google Maps. And now readers and brewers themselves have come to me adding in some and taking out others.
Unlike Phil I did count contract breweries, because you can’t have a list of New Zealand breweries without Bach Brewing, for example.
I omitted brands that are under one corporate umbrella but which do not have a physical brewery. So no to Mac’s, Harrington’s (Lion); Founders and Boundary Road (Asahi); Monteith’s (DB), and Southern Alps (Moa). But, yes to Speight’s, Emerson’s, Panhead and Tuatara as they all have physical breweries. You could argue that Boundary Road is in a grey area. Yes, it’s an invented brand and brewed by Asahi but for a long time it was the main brand associated with the old Independent, but I’m trying to be as clear-cut as possible, so they’re not counted.
Initially, I left out large contract breweries such as Steam, B Studio and Craft Brewing Co (the brewing arm of Crafty Canners) as this count was more focused on brew brands that sell to the public, whether on- or off-premise. But in reconsidering this, I’ve added them back in because if they didn’t exist then many contract brands would not exist either. And they employ people, so from a wider industry perspective they are super-relevant.
At first, I was going to omit secondary breweries such as Garage Project Wild Workshop and DB Timaru, but then I started thinking about Tui (when it had a operating brewery) and Speight’s (and how they have their own identity even though they are “secondary” to Lion’s and DB’s main operation) so I’ve now included these.
There may be some brew brands or breweries I’ve missed, which is to be expected when there is no real register of these things! So, if you know of one I’ve omitted, or one I’ve “closed” by mistake, let me know at michael@hoppiness.co.nz and also if there’s someone on the list who has since closed. In cases where I’m unsure I’ve given the benefit of the doubt.
In total, I now get 190 breweries or brew brands, down from 208 at the last count in 2023. There are 116 (down from 125) in the North Island and 74 (down from 83) in the South Island.
So nowhere near the 220 so often quoted but still — a lot! And honestly, I’m surprised. It’s possibly more than I expected, although some are very small. And it’s thousands of percent more than 40 years ago when we had just two major breweries (Lion and DB) and half-a-dozen brew-sites (Lion and DB in Auckland, Lion in Christchurch, DB in Timaru, Monteith’s and Speight’s).
(* indicates brew brands without physical breweries)
North of Auckland (11)
8 Wired
Bay of Islands Brewing Co
Colab
Kainui
Heavens Brewery (NEW)
McLeod’s
Pacific Coast Drinks
Phat House
Puhoi*
QBrew
Sawmill
Three Mountains
North Shore (5)
Browns Bay
Deep Creek
Isthmus*
Laughing Bones
Mythica
Paraoa
West Auckland (6)
Basement
Black Sands
Craft Brewing Co
Hallertau
Liberty
Little Creatures
Mandrake
Central & South Auckland (24)
Aka Aka
Asahi
Bach*
Badass
Batsmen
Bean Bag (NEW)
Behemoth
Brewport
Brothers
Citizen*
Cowabunga
DB Breweries
Dr Rudis
Epic
Free Flow (NEW)
Hideaway (was Brewport)
Galbraith’s
Lion
Manaia
Shakespeare
Small Gods*
State of Play*
Steam
St Leonards
Sweat Shop Brew Kitchen
Twofold (NEW)
Urbanaut
Yeastie Boys*
Gulf Islands (4)
Alibi
Aotea
Waiheke Island Brewing
Heke
Coromandel (3)
Blue Fridge
Boilerhouse
Coromandel (aka The Pour House)
Coromandel Town Supply (NEW)
Hot Water*
Waikato-BOP (17)
Alchemy Street (NEW)
Bootleg
Brewaucracy
Croucher
Fitzpatrick’s
Good George
Hopnotic
Karamu Barrelworks
Lumberjack
Mata
Mount Brewing
Neck of the Woods (NEW)
Patron’s
Raglan
Rocky Knob*
Slab
The Island
Three Fat Pigs
Workshop
Central & Lower North Island (9)
Brew Union
Brews on Drews
Crafty Trout
King Country
Lads
Lakeman
Mothership
Roots
Ruapehu
Taranaki (4)
Forgotten 43
Mikes*
Shining Peak
Theoretical Brewer
Three Sisters
Lower East Coast North Island (12)
Abbey (formerly Fat Monk)
bStudio
Brave
Giant
GodsOwn
Hangar
Hawkes Bay
Martinborough
Napier
Ninebarnyardowls
Roosters
Sneaky Brewing
Sunshine
Tui (non-operational)
Zeelandt
Kapiti (2)
Duncan’s
North End
Porirua / Hutt Valley (8)
Abandoned
Baylands
Beer Engine
Boneface
Brewtopia
Kereru
Panhead
Te Aro
Tuatara (relocated from Kapiti)
Central Wellington (11)
Bassline
Choice Bros
Double Vision
Fork
Fortune Favours
Garage Project
Garage Project Wild Workshop
Heyday
Mean Doses
Occasional Brewer
Parrotdog
Waitoa
Whistling Sisters
Nelson / Tasman (13)
Acoustic (NEW)
Aliment (NEW)
Brood Fermentation
Eddyline
Flavourtorium
Golden Bear
Hop Farm
Hop Federation
Mussel Inn
Sprig + Fern
McCashins (name of brewery) / Stoke (name of brand)
Townshend*
Wakachangi*
Marlborough-KAIKOURA (4)
Boom Town
DNA
Emporium
Moa
Canterbury (23)
Beers by Bacon Bros
Beer Baroness / Pomeroys
Bodgie (formerly Twisted Hop)
Brew Moon
Cassels
Chinchiller
Concept
Derelict
Eruption
Five Peaks
Gambit (NEW)
Ghost
Kaiser Bros
Laboratory
Lighthouse
Moon Unit
Renaissance / Funk Estate / Level Up (relocated from Blenheim)
Renegade (NEW)
Southpaw
Test Lab
Thief (NEW)
Three Boys
Two Thumb
Volstead
Wigram
Wilderness
West Coast (2)
Short Jaw
Woodstock
Central South Island (7)
Bonnie Day (NEW)
Burkes
Craftwork
DB Timaru
House of Hop (for sale)
Scotts
Ship Hop
Dunedin (9)
Arc
Cell Division
Dog Star
Emersons
Green Man
Noisy
Saddle Hill
Speight’s
Steamer Basin
Toitu
Lower South Island (16)
4 Mates
Altitude
Alpine Ale Works
Arrowtown
B Effect
Bannockburn
Canyon
Cargo
Catlins
Double Cone
Ferris Road
Gadoochi
Glenorchy
Ground Up
Lake & Wood
Manuherikia
Queenstown Brewers
Rhyme X Reason
Richmond Bros
Rough Rock (Otago Brew School)
Searchlight
The Factory
There Be Dragons
Victoria Store
Wanaka Beerworks
Whakatipu