Wine & Cider · Beginner

How to Make Hard Cider at Home: Apple Juice to Cider

Make hard cider from fresh or store-bought apple juice: choosing juice and yeast, gravity and ABV, fermenting at 15–20°C, racking, carbonating in the bottle, and making a sweet cider. Quantities for a 1 gallon or 5 litre batch.

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Hard cider beside an apple-juice ferment and fresh apples

Updated October 2026 · 11 min read

Hard cider is the simplest alcoholic drink to make at home. The apple juice already has all the sugar, acid and flavour it needs; you add yeast, keep air out, and wait. With good juice and a clean, cool fermentation, a gallon of supermarket juice becomes a crisp, dry cider in about a month. If you are unsure which “cider” is which, see apple juice vs apple cider.

What you need

3.8 L apple juice, no preservatives (1 US gallon)
1 sachet cider, wine or ale yeast
15–20°C fermentation temperature
Juice fresh-pressed cider or 100% apple juice. Cloudy juice gives more body; a blend of sweet and sharp apples gives the best balance.
Equipment a glass jug or carboy with an airlock and bung, a hydrometer, a siphon, sanitiser, and swing-top or crown-capped bottles.
Optional yeast nutrient (prevents sulfur smells), pectic enzyme (for clear cider), and one Campden tablet per gallon if using fresh unpasteurized juice.

How to make hard cider

  1. 1
    Sanitise Sanitise everything that touches the juice: jug, funnel, airlock, hydrometer.
  2. 2
    Prepare the juice Pour the juice into the jug, leaving 5–8 cm of headspace. For fresh unpasteurized juice, add a crushed Campden tablet and wait 24 hours before adding yeast, or skip it to ferment on the wild yeast. Stir in yeast nutrient and pectic enzyme if using.
  3. 3
    Take a gravity reading Float the hydrometer in a sample and note the original gravity. Most apple juice reads 1.045–1.055.
  4. 4
    Pitch the yeast Sprinkle the yeast on top, or rehydrate it first in a little warm water. Fit the airlock.
  5. 5
    Ferment Keep at 15–20°C, out of the light. Bubbling starts within a day or two and slows over 1–3 weeks. Cooler temperatures keep more apple aroma.
  6. 6
    Check it is finished When the gravity is at or just below 1.000 and stays the same for three days, fermentation is done.
  7. 7
    Rack and clear Siphon the cider off the yeast sediment into a clean jug, top up to limit air space, refit the airlock, and leave 2–4 weeks to clear.
  8. 8
    Bottle For sparkling cider, add priming sugar (about 6–7 g of sugar per litre for a medium fizz), bottle, and leave at room temperature for 2 weeks before chilling. For still cider, bottle without sugar.
Hydrometers comparing wort and finished beer samples

Related calculator

ABV Calculator (Beer, Wine & Cider)

Estimate alcohol by volume from original and final gravity for beer, wine, and cider. Works with specific gravity or Brix, with attenuation and calories.

Open calculator

Choosing a yeast

Lalvin EC-1118 Clean, fast, very dry and tolerant of cool temperatures. The reliable default. See Lalvin EC-1118.
Lalvin 71B Fruitier and softer; it metabolises some malic acid, taking the edge off sharp apples. See Lalvin 71B.
Ale yeast Fermentis US-05 or S-04 leave a rounder cider that tastes less dry. See Fermentis US-05.

All the options side by side are in the yeast strain chart.

Carbonation and sweetness

Sparkling dry prime with sugar and bottle-condition. Use the carbonation priming calculator for exact amounts.
Sparkling sweet sweeten with a non-fermentable sweetener, then prime and bottle-condition as usual.
Still sweet stabilise with potassium sorbate and metabisulfite, wait a day, then sweeten to taste and bottle without priming.

Watch for

  • Never add ordinary sugar or juice to unstabilised cider and seal it. The yeast restarts and bottles can burst.
  • Rotten-egg smell during fermentation is usually temporary. Use yeast nutrient next time.
  • A vinegar smell means air and acetic acid bacteria got in. Keep jugs topped up and airlocks filled.

A cider that has turned to vinegar is not wasted: carry on and make apple cider vinegar. For a stronger apple drink made with honey, see the cyser recipe.

FAQ

Frequently asked questions

Can I make hard cider from store-bought apple juice?
Yes, as long as the label lists only apple juice, optionally with vitamin C (ascorbic acid). Potassium sorbate and sodium benzoate stop yeast from working. Pasteurized juice is fine; cloudy juice gives a fuller cider.
How strong is homemade hard cider?
Apple juice usually starts at a specific gravity of 1.045–1.055 and ferments dry to about 1.000, giving roughly 5.5–7% ABV. Each 17 g of sugar added per litre raises the potential alcohol by about 1%.
What yeast is best for cider?
Lalvin EC-1118 ferments clean, dry and reliably; Lalvin 71B gives a softer, fruitier cider and reduces sharp malic acid; ale yeasts like Fermentis US-05 or S-04 make a rounder, slightly sweeter-tasting cider. Fresh unpasteurized juice can also ferment on its wild yeast.
How long does hard cider take?
Primary fermentation takes 1–3 weeks. Allow another 2–4 weeks to clear, then 2 weeks in the bottle to carbonate. It improves with a few more months of ageing.
How do I make sweet hard cider?
Ferment it dry, then sweeten with something yeast cannot ferment (such as xylitol or erythritol) and bottle-carbonate, or stabilise it with potassium sorbate and metabisulfite and sweeten it as a still cider. Adding sugar to unstabilised cider in sealed bottles restarts fermentation and can burst them.
Why does my cider smell like rotten eggs?
Hydrogen sulfide from stressed yeast, usually short of nutrients. It normally fades by the end of fermentation. Add yeast nutrient at the start next time.
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