In China, the tea the English-speaking world calls black tea is called 红茶, hong cha — “red tea” — because the Chinese name describes the colour of the tea in the cup, a clear copper-red, while the English name describes the dark, dry leaf. It is the same tea; the two languages are simply looking at it at different moments.
That small difference causes real confusion. Ask for “black tea” in Chinese and you may be handed something else entirely, and in some countries “red tea” on a café menu means rooibos, which isn’t tea at all. Here is how the names fit together, where China’s best-known red teas come from, and how to brew them.
Red in the cup, black in the chest
Hong cha is fully oxidised. After picking, the leaf is withered, rolled to break its cells, and left so that its own enzymes react with the air, turning the catechins of the fresh leaf into compounds called theaflavins and thearubigins. Theaflavins lean orange-red, thearubigins red-brown, and together they give the liquor the colour that earned the Chinese name.
You will often see black tea described as “fermented”. Strictly, it isn’t. No microbes are involved, only the leaf’s own chemistry. The distinction matters because China does have a genuinely fermented tea, and that is the one Chinese calls black.
The English name is usually explained by the leaf. European merchants bought tea dry, by the chest, and a fully oxidised leaf is very dark. It is a plausible explanation rather than a documented one, and the history is messier than it sounds. The early English word for dark Wuyi tea was “bohea”, taken from the local pronunciation of Wuyi, and it was a catch-all that may have included partly oxidised teas closer to what we would now call oolong.
So what is Chinese “black tea”?
China’s national tea classification sorts tea into six basic categories by how it is processed: green, yellow, white, oolong, red and dark. The dark category, 黑茶 hei cha, is the one whose name literally means black tea. Dark teas are heaped so that microbes, with Aspergillus moulds prominent among them, work on the leaf, and Liu Bao is one well-known example. That is real fermentation, and a quite different process from making red tea. Our guide to Liu Bao covers that family in more detail.
Rooibos, sometimes sold as “red tea” or “red bush”, is another plant altogether: a South African legume, Aspalathus linearis, rather than the tea plant, Camellia sinensis.
Three red teas and the stories told about them
Lapsang Souchong comes from the Wuyi Mountains of Fujian. China’s standard reserves the name Zhengshan Xiaozhong for tea from around Tongmu village and the surrounding nature reserve, and counts the aroma of pine smoke as part of its character. That smoky note comes from compounds such as guaiacol, released by burning pinewood during processing. You may have heard that the tea was invented when soldiers camped on a farmer’s harvest and he dried the damp leaf over pine fires. It is a good story, but it exists in versions set centuries apart, and nothing written at the time records it. The same caution applies to the claim that it was the world’s first black tea, which depends entirely on how you define black tea.
Keemun, from Qimen county in Anhui, is younger. The area made green tea until around 1875, when red tea production began there using methods borrowed from established black-tea regions. Two men are credited with starting it, Yu Ganchen and Hu Yuanlong, and accounts still disagree over which came first. Its gentle, floral aroma has been studied closely, and researchers link it to compounds including geraniol and linalool. Tales of royal favourites are best left aside; none of them traces back to a record.
Dian Hong, Yunnan red tea, has the best-documented beginning of the three. In late 1938, with war cutting off supplies from eastern China, the tea specialist Feng Shaoqiu was sent to Shunning, now Fengqing, in Yunnan. His trial samples were well received in Hong Kong, and by 1939 the tea had its name. It is made from Yunnan’s large-leaf tea plants, and the finest grades are full of golden, downy buds.
What links all three is trade. In 1879 China supplied over 70 per cent of the tea sold in London; by 1900 it supplied just 10 per cent, as Indian and Ceylon tea took over. Each of these teas was made, or remade, with buyers in mind, and each gathered its legends once it became valuable. The real history needs no embroidery.
How to brew Chinese red tea
Red teas are forgiving, which makes them a good place to start. For an everyday mug, about 2–3 g of leaf in 250 ml of water just off the boil, steeped for three to four minutes, suits Keemun and Lapsang well. An infuser cup makes this easy at a desk: lift the basket out when the colour looks right and the leaf stops steeping.
Gongfu style draws out more. Use around 5 g of leaf in a small pot or gaiwan of about 100 ml, and pour off after short steeps, lengthening each one a little. Bud-rich Dian Hong is happier slightly cooler, at around 85–90°C, as fully boiling water can flatten its sweetness. Pour each steep into a white justice cup before serving and you will see at a glance why the Chinese call this tea red.
These are starting points rather than rules. Taste as you go, and adjust the leaf and the timing to suit yourself.
Frequently asked questions
Is red tea the same as black tea?
Yes. Chinese red tea, hong cha, is the tea known in English as black tea. The Chinese name describes the red liquor; the English one describes the dark leaf.
What do Chinese people call black tea?
Hei cha, which literally means black tea, refers to dark teas such as Liu Bao that are fermented by microbes. It is a different category from red tea.
Is rooibos a red tea?
Not in the Chinese sense. Rooibos comes from a South African plant, Aspalathus linearis, and contains no leaf from the tea plant.
Is black tea fermented?
Not strictly. Its colour and flavour come from oxidation by the leaf’s own enzymes. True microbial fermentation belongs to dark teas such as Liu Bao.