Pilsner vs Lager: What's the Difference? (And Where Ale Fits In)

The short answer: all pilsners are lagers, but not all lagers are pilsners. Lager is a family of beers made with bottom-fermenting yeast at cold temperatures, then conditioned cold for weeks. Pilsner is one style inside that family: very pale, crisp, and noticeably hoppier than most other lagers. It was first brewed in the Czech city of Plzeň (Pilsen) in 1842.

Brew one: our Czech-style pilsner recipe, or a Märzen for an amber lager.

So asking "pilsner or lager?" is a bit like asking "espresso or coffee?" A pilsner is a lager. The useful question is how a pilsner differs from the other lagers, and from ales. That is what this guide covers.

Pilsner vs lager vs ale at a glance

	Pilsner	Lager (the whole family)	Ale
What it is	One style of lager	A category: pilsner, helles, märzen, bock, dunkel and more	The other big category: pale ale, IPA, stout, wheat beer and more
Yeast	Lager yeast	Lager yeast (Saccharomyces pastorianus), bottom-fermenting	Ale yeast (Saccharomyces cerevisiae), top-fermenting
Fermentation temperature	48 to 55°F (9 to 13°C)	48 to 55°F (9 to 13°C)	60 to 72°F (16 to 22°C)
Cold conditioning	3 to 5 weeks near freezing	3 to 8+ weeks near freezing	Usually days, not weeks
Colour	Straw to pale gold	Straw to nearly black	Straw to black
Bitterness	Medium to firm, about 25 to 45 IBU	Mostly low to medium, about 8 to 30 IBU	Anything from 10 to 100+ IBU
Typical strength	4.2 to 5.5% ABV	4 to 10% ABV depending on style	3 to 12% ABV depending on style
Taste	Crisp, bready malt, floral or spicy hop bite, dry finish	Clean and smooth; malt-forward in most styles	Fruitier, rounder; yeast adds esters

What makes a lager a lager

Two things: the yeast and the cold.

The yeast. Lager yeast is a different species from ale yeast. It works slowly at cool temperatures and settles to the bottom of the fermenter, which is why lagers are called bottom-fermented. At those temperatures it makes very few of the fruity esters that give ales their character, so the malt and hops come through clean.

The cold. Lagers ferment at 48 to 55°F, get a short warm diacetyl rest, then sit near freezing for weeks. That cold storage is lagering, from the German lagern, to store. It is when sulphur fades, haze drops out and the beer turns bright and smooth. Our lagering guide covers the temperatures and timings stage by stage.

Everything else, from colour to strength to bitterness, varies by style. A pale helles and a nearly black schwarzbier are both lagers.

What makes a pilsner a pilsner

Pilsner is a lager defined by four things:

• Very pale malt. Pilsner malt is the lightest-kilned base malt there is. It gives a straw-to-gold colour and a clean, bready, slightly honeyed flavour.
• A real hop presence. This is the biggest difference from other pale lagers. Pilsners are bittered firmly and finished with aromatic European hops: Saaz in the Czech versions, German varieties such as Hallertau, Tettnang or Spalt in German pils.
• Soft water. Plzeň's water is famously low in minerals, which lets a lot of hop bitterness taste clean rather than harsh. Brewing a pilsner with hard water gives a coarse, lingering bitterness. See our water chemistry guide for how to build soft water from RO.
• A long, cold finish. Pilsner has nowhere to hide. Any fruitiness, diacetyl or sulphur shows, so it gets a careful ferment and a full lagering period.

The three kinds of pilsner

Type	Colour	Bitterness	ABV	How it tastes
Czech (Bohemian) pilsner	Deep gold	About 30 to 45 IBU	4.2 to 5.8%	Fuller, rounder malt, soft spicy Saaz finish. Often decoction mashed. The original, first brewed in Plzeň in 1842.
German pils	Pale straw	About 22 to 40 IBU	4.4 to 5.2%	Drier, lighter-bodied and crisper, with a sharper bitter finish.
American / international pilsner	Very pale	About 8 to 18 IBU	4.2 to 5.3%	Light body, low hop character, often brewed with rice or corn. Most mass-market "pilsners" are this style.

"Pils", "pilsener" and "pilsner" all mean the same thing. Pils is the short German form.

Lagers that are not pilsners

If a pilsner is one lager style, these are the others you are most likely to meet:

Lager style	Colour	Bitterness	ABV	How it differs from pilsner
Helles	Pale gold	About 16 to 22 IBU	4.7 to 5.4%	Same pale colour, but softer and more malt-forward, with far less hop bite
American light lager	Very pale	About 8 to 12 IBU	2.8 to 4.2%	Thinner, lower in alcohol, barely any hop flavour
Vienna lager	Amber	About 18 to 30 IBU	4.7 to 5.5%	Toasty malt, amber colour, gentler hops
Märzen (Oktoberfest)	Amber to copper	About 18 to 24 IBU	5.6 to 6.3%	Rich, bready malt; the hops are in the background
Dunkel	Brown	About 18 to 28 IBU	4.5 to 5.6%	Bready, lightly chocolatey Munich malt
Schwarzbier	Nearly black	About 20 to 35 IBU	4.4 to 5.4%	Roasty but smooth, lighter-bodied than it looks
Bock and doppelbock	Gold to dark brown	About 16 to 30 IBU	6.3 to 10%	Strong, malty and sweet-leaning

Pilsner vs helles

These two are the easiest to mix up because they look almost identical in the glass. The difference is balance. A helles leans on the malt: soft, bready, lightly sweet, with just enough hops to stop it being cloying. A pilsner leans on the hops: the same pale malt base, but a clear bitter snap and a floral or spicy aroma. If you like the finish dry and bitter, you want a pilsner. If you like it soft and round, you want a helles.

Where ale fits in

Every beer is either an ale or a lager, depending on the yeast. (Wild and mixed-fermentation beers are the exception.) Ales ferment warm, 60 to 72°F, with top-fermenting yeast that produces fruity esters and sometimes spicy phenols. That is where the banana in a hefeweizen or the stone fruit in an English bitter comes from. Ales are also ready sooner, usually in two to three weeks, because they skip the long cold conditioning.

So a pilsner and a pale ale can be the same colour and strength and still taste completely different. The pilsner is clean and crisp; the pale ale is rounder and fruitier. Our ale vs lager guide goes deeper on the yeast and fermentation side.

Brewing a pilsner at home

The recipe is simple: pilsner malt, a noble hop, soft water and a clean lager yeast. What makes it hard is temperature. A pilsner needs:

1. A steady 48 to 52°F ferment for 10 to 14 days. Warmer and you get fruitiness; swings of a few degrees stress the yeast and leave off-flavours.
2. A diacetyl rest at 60 to 65°F for two or three days near the end of fermentation. Skip it and you risk a buttery note that pilsner cannot hide. See our diacetyl rest guide.
3. Three to five weeks at 32 to 34°F to lager.

Holding a tank at 33°F for a month, in a house that is 70°F, is the real challenge. A fermentation fridge works for a single 5 gallon batch. For anything bigger, or if you want the fridge back, a jacketed conical fermenter with a glycol chiller is how breweries do it. The glycol runs through the jacket and a controller holds the beer within a degree at any stage, from the cool ferment to the warm rest to near freezing.

The faster way: pressure fermentation

Many small breweries now ferment lagers warmer, around 60 to 65°F, under 10 to 15 psi of pressure. The pressure keeps the yeast from producing the esters that warmth would normally bring, so you get a clean lager in about half the time, and the beer carbonates in the tank as it finishes. It needs a pressure-rated fermenter; the Unitank is rated to 30 psi working pressure and ships with a 15 psi relief valve. Our pressure fermentation guide has the temperatures and PSI settings.

For a full recipe and brew day, see how to brew a classic pilsner.

Frequently asked questions

Is pilsner a lager?

Yes. Pilsner is a style of lager. It is made with lager yeast, fermented cold and conditioned cold like every other lager. What sets it apart is its very pale colour and stronger hop character.

Is a pilsner stronger than a lager?

Not really. Pilsners are usually 4.2 to 5.5% ABV, the same range as most everyday lagers. Some lagers, such as bocks and doppelbocks, are much stronger than any pilsner.

Does pilsner have more hops than lager?

Than most lagers, yes. A Czech or German pilsner is noticeably more bitter and aromatic than a helles, a märzen or an American light lager. That hop character is what defines the style.

Are mainstream American lagers pilsners?

Some are labelled that way, but most are closer to the American lager style: very pale and light, with little hop character, and often brewed with corn or rice. A Czech or German pilsner has far more malt flavour and hop bite.

What is the difference between pils and pilsner?

Nothing. Pils is the German short form, often used for German-style pilsners. Pilsener is an older spelling.

Why is it called pilsner?

It is named after Plzeň (Pilsen in German), the city in Bohemia, now the Czech Republic, where the style was first brewed in 1842. Brewers there combined pale malt, local Saaz hops, very soft water and bottom-fermenting lager yeast, and the result was the first golden lager.