The History Of India Pale Ale

At the forefront of the rediscovery of craft beer has been a style called India Pale Ale, or shortened to I.P.A. India Pale ale is a style defined by the use of various different hops which give the beer its distinct flavor.

The style has grown to massive popularity within the States in the past 10 years, with breweries like Stone, Sierra Nevada, and Lagunitas spearheading the style in California.

The origin of the style comes from the necessity of English merchants to ship barrels of beer over long distances without refrigeration, principally to colonial India in which the style derives its name from.

Beers higher in hop content would keep longer. Thus it was a useful process in supplying ale to the English subjects of the Indian colony.


The use of hops within a beer can yield a variety of different flavors, from bitter to citrus - caramel to herbal notes. There is an international standard of measurement in rating the hop content of a beer, called the International Bittering Units scale, or IBU.

 Below is an image of where some of the subcategories of beer may fall within this grading system, as well as an example of craft beer IBU labeling in the upper right.