How to Clear Beer Properly: a Guide to Gelatin + Beer Clarifier
Clear beer is rarely one “secret ingredient.”
It is the sum of small, boring decisions that stack in your favour.
Good hot break. Good cold break. Calm fermentation. Cold time. Careful transfers.
Then, when you want the quick polish, you use gelatin beer clarifier correctly.
This guide is built for the brewer with a real problem: haze that will not drop, a deadline to package, and a fear of stripping hop aroma or ending up with bottles that never carbonate.
If you want a focused gelatin walk-through, keep this open too: how to use gelatin for clearing homebrew.
For a wider look at finings in general (and when to use other agents), see finings and how to use them.
.jpg "Clearing home brew beer - a guide to removing sediment and unwanted haze")
Before you fine: identify the haze you are fighting
Gelatin is brilliant on yeast haze and can help with chill haze. It is not a universal haze cure. If you throw gelatin at the wrong haze, you waste time and you still pour cloudy beer.
| Haze type | Typical cause | Will gelatin help? | Best real fix |
|---|---|---|---|
| Yeast haze | Suspended yeast, rushed packaging, poor flocculation | Yes, usually excellent | Finish fermentation, cold crash, then gelatin |
| Chill haze | Protein and polyphenol complexes that show up cold | Often yes, if the beer is very cold | Better break formation, cold crash, gelatin polish |
| Dry hop haze | Hop polyphenols, hop debris, and protein binding | Yes, but can pull character | Minimum dose, short contact time, oxygen-tight handling |
| Starch haze | Mash conversion issues, high mash temp swings, poor lautering | No | Fix mash process next time, this haze is “baked in” |
| Pectin haze | Fruit handled warm, pectin set in the beer | Usually no | Use pectic enzyme in future fruit batches |
A quick test that saves you from guessing: chill a small sample hard in the fridge for an hour.
If it gets hazy only when cold, you are dealing with chill haze. That tells you the beer needs cold time and possibly gelatin added when the beer is cold enough for the complexes to form and drop.
The clarity ladder: master brewers fix haze upstream first
If you want consistently clear beer, do not rely on gelatin alone.
Use it as the final polish. Here is the process ladder that experienced brewers lean on.
- Boil management: a strong rolling boil and kettle finings help proteins coagulate and drop. This reduces chill haze later. Your finings overview is a good hub for this: finings and how to use them.
- Fast chill: quicker chilling usually means better cold break formation and fewer haze issues later.
- Fermentation discipline: the beer needs time to finish and settle. Rushing to package is the number one reason people fight yeast haze.
- Cold crash: this is the setup move that makes gelatin work properly. Cold crashing is its own skill, especially if you want to avoid oxygen suck-back. Use this guide: how to cold crash home brew beer.
- Gelatin beer clarifier: the finishing move that drops fine haze fast, when you do it cold and clean.
What gelatin does in beer, and why temperature matters
Gelatin is a positively-charged fining in beer.
Many haze particles and yeast carry a negative charge. Gelatin attracts them, binds them into larger clumps, and those clumps become heavy enough to fall out fast. That is the win. The catch is temperature.
Gelatin works best when the beer is cold. Not “cool.” Cold. The colder the beer, the more eager haze particles are to form, bind, and fall out. If you fine warm beer, you are asking gelatin to fight physics.
Gelatin dosage: use the minimum that gets the job done
For most homebrew batches, the effective range is small. Over-fining is real and it can increase sediment fluff, mute hop punch in some styles, and make transfers messy.
| Batch size | Conservative starting dose | If haze is still stubborn after 48 hours cold |
|---|---|---|
| 10 L | 1/4 tsp unflavoured gelatin | Increase slightly, not double |
| 19 L (5 gal) | 1/2 tsp | Up to 3/4 tsp only if needed |
| 23 L | 1/2 to 3/4 tsp | Keep contact time short |
| 30 L | 3/4 tsp | Only increase if you know it is yeast haze |
If you want a default that rarely disappoints: 1/2 teaspoon for 5 gallons. Then let cold time do the heavy lifting.
.jpg "Clearing home brew beer - a guide to removing sediment and unwanted haze")
The correct gelatin method: bloom, dissolve, add cold, wait
This is where most brewers go wrong. They either skip blooming, they boil the gelatin, or they add it to warm beer and blame the gelatin. Do it like this.
- Confirm fermentation is finished. Stable gravity over a couple of days is your sign. Do not fine an active ferment unless you are deliberately trying to drop yeast early for a specific reason.
- Cold crash first. Give the beer at least 24 hours cold. Near 0°C is ideal if your setup allows. If you want the safest cold-crash workflow, use: how to cold crash home brew beer.
- Sanitize everything that touches the solution. Cup, spoon, funnel, lid, whatever. You are on the cold side now, so sanitation matters.
- Bloom the gelatin. Heat about 150 ml (roughly half a cup) of water. Let it cool so it is hot but not boiling. Sprinkle the gelatin onto the surface and leave it for 5 minutes. This step prevents clumps.
- Dissolve gently. Stir until smooth. The solution should be warm enough to dissolve. Do not boil it. Boiling damages gelatin’s fining ability and can create a useless jelly layer.
- Add to cold beer with minimal oxygen pickup. Open the fermenter, pour gently, reseal immediately. If you must mix, a very gentle swirl is enough. No splashing.
- Hold cold and wait. Most beers show big improvement in 24 to 48 hours. Some go from cloudy to brilliant overnight. When the sediment compacts, rack off the top.
For your site’s gelatin-specific how-to (and extra detail around timing), link this as the “official method” reference: how to use gelatin for clearing homebrew.
Kegging vs bottling: the smartest way to use gelatin for each
If you bottle: fine in the fermenter, not in the bottling bucket. Give it time to drop and compact, then rack carefully. If you stir gelatin into the bottling bucket, you risk dragging fine sediment into every bottle and making every pour hazy again.
If you keg: fine in the fermenter or fine in the keg. Adding gelatin to an empty sanitized keg and racking onto it can work very well, but expect the first pour to be sludge. After that, many kegs run brilliantly clear. If your goal is clear pours in bottles, this guide is worth linking in the “serving and presentation” section: removing sediment from beer bottles.
How to avoid stripping hop character
This is where brewers get nervous, and sometimes rightly.
Gelatin can reduce some of the compounds and particles that contribute to perceived hop “punch,” especially in heavily dry-hopped beer where haze and aroma are linked.
Your goal is to fine for clarity without turning a bright IPA into a quieter beer.
- Use the minimum effective dose. Start conservative. If the beer clears fast, package it. Do not treat gelatin like a “more is better” additive.
- Short contact time is your friend. If your beer is bright after 24 to 36 hours, rack it. Leaving it for days longer than needed increases the chance of pulling more out than you intended.
- Reduce oxygen exposure more than you worry about gelatin. A lot of “my hops got muted” complaints are oxidation. Minimize splashing, keep transfers calm, and keep lids on.
- Be honest about style. If you want a haze-forward IPA where haze supports mouthfeel and aroma, do not fight the haze with gelatin. If you want a bright West Coast-style beer, gelatin is a better fit.
Will gelatin slow bottle conditioning?
It can, sometimes.
Gelatin drops yeast.
Most beers still carbonate because there is enough yeast left in suspension, but it may take longer, especially if you cold crashed hard and then fined. The practical fix is simple: keep bottles warm enough to carbonate and give them time.
For very high ABV beer or beer that has been cold for a long time, adding a tiny dose of fresh yeast at bottling can help, but that is an edge-case move, not a default step.