A matcha shot is a measured dose of matcha pulled with a little water, the strong base a cafe builds milk, ice or sparkling water on. Our preparation guide makes it from 2 to 4 g of sifted powder in about 40 to 60 ml of water. For cafe service, One with Tea's house shot is 3 g of matcha pulled with 45 ml (about 1.5 fl oz) of water, a 1:15 ratio. By Japan's national food composition table, 3 g of matcha has about 96 mg of caffeine. Make it the base of every matcha drink, offer an extra shot as an add-on, or serve it straight as a small menu item.
This guide is for cafe and boba operators, not home brewers. Making one cup at home? Our guide to how much matcha powder goes in a cup covers the home version. I'm Christian. Here I'll cover what a shot is, how to pull one and how big to make each size. Then I'll cover pulling to order versus batching, the menu, the caffeine question and which grade to buy. The recipe is my own starting point, not a lab-tested standard.
Key Takeaways
- A matcha shot is your house dose pulled with water at 1:15. Mine is 3 g in 45 ml, and one kilogram makes about 333 of them. A richer house dose is 4 g in 60 ml (250 per kilogram), and a double is twice the dose.
- Pull it in water first, then add the shot to the drink. Hot: a handheld frother in an open pitcher, with water at 150 to 160°F (65 to 71°C). Iced: cool water in a shaker.
- Pull to order when the matcha flavor is the point of the drink or the line is short. When a rush puts a line at the matcha station, batch the same dose as a concentrate.
- Put it on the menu three ways: as the unit behind every matcha drink, as an "add a shot" modifier, and as a straight shot where the tea leads.
- By Japan's national food table, a 3 g matcha shot has about 96 mg of caffeine, and published figures for 3 g reach about 102 mg. Two recent lab studies measured far less, so give guests a range and print the higher figure if you print one. USDA lists 1 fl oz of espresso at about 63 mg.
What is a matcha shot?
In a cafe, a matcha shot is a fixed dose of matcha, 3 g in my recipe, pulled with a little water (45 ml) before it meets milk, ice or sparkling water. It does the job a shot of espresso does: one measured unit that every drink is built from, so a barista adds shots instead of eyeballing powder. Matcha concentrate is the same idea made ahead in a batch. A shot is the one you pull to order.
What the name covers
The name gets used for packaged products too, and this guide covers only the shot you pull behind the bar. At home, our preparation guide has you make a concentrated shot first: 2 to 4 g of sifted matcha in a splash of hot water, about 40 to 60 ml, then the milk. The cafe shot is one fixed point inside that range, 3 g in 45 ml.
Where a 1:15 shot sits
It helps to see where that sits on the traditional scale. In our guide, usucha (thin tea) is 2 g in 60 to 80 ml of water, and koicha (thick tea) is 4 g in 30 to 45 ml. A 1:15 shot lands between them: thicker than a bowl of usucha, thinner than koicha. That's strong enough to carry through milk and loose enough to pour.
Why it settles
A shot is a suspension of ground leaf, not a solution. Matcha starts as tencha leaf that is destemmed, deveined and milled into an ultrafine powder. Unlike regular green tea, it isn't filtered, so the entire leaf is consumed (Onder et al., “Beyond Composition: Processing-Driven Transformations and Functional Trade-Offs of Matcha Tea in Foods,” Foods, 2026).
A 2003 study reported that normal matcha particles range from 1 to 100 micrometres. It also found that finer matcha settles more slowly in water than normal matcha (Haraguchi, Imada and Sawamura, Journal of the Japanese Society for Food Science and Technology, 2003). Particles that can settle will settle. I haven't timed how long a pulled shot holds before it separates, so I won't give you a number. Pull the shot for the drink in front of you, and don't leave one standing on the bar.
How do you pull a matcha shot?
To pull a matcha shot, weigh 3 g of matcha, sift it, add 45 ml of water, agitate until smooth, then add the shot to the drink. Use water at 150 to 160°F (65 to 71°C) and a frother for hot drinks, and cool water in a shaker for iced ones. Here's the recipe card I'd put on the wall.
- Weigh 3 g on a gram scale. Scoops pack differently from barista to barista. A scale doesn't.
- Sift it into the pitcher or shaker. Matcha clumps in the bag, and lumps that go in come out in the cup. As our preparation guide puts it, you can't whisk your way out of unsifted matcha.
- Add 45 ml of water. For a hot shot, use 150 to 160°F (65 to 71°C), the matcha-base range in our best temperature for matcha guide. For an iced shot, use cool or room-temperature water. Our no-whisk guide shakes the same 3 g with 60 ml. If your shaker needs more liquid to move, use 60 ml as a shaker variant at 1:20, and keep the dose at 3 g. Never use boiling water.
- Agitate until no dry pockets are left and the surface is foamy. Use a handheld frother in an open pitcher for a hot shot, or a lidded shaker for a cool one. I keep hot water out of sealed shakers, because a shaker tin has no vent for the steam.
- Add the shot to the drink, not the powder to the milk. A dry pocket is easy to spot in a small green shot and easy to miss in a full cup of milk.
- Rinse the tool before the next shot. Food Code cleaning rules for bar tools are in our guide to making matcha without a whisk at cafe volume, which also covers which tool fits which drink.
Why 3 g?
It's the low end of the 3 to 4 g latte dose in the quick answer of our preparation guide, and it's the dose I plan around. It also keeps the math clean: 1 kg makes about 333 shots. If your recipe runs richer, pull 4 g in 60 ml. The 1:15 ratio stays the same, so the water scales with the powder.
How big should each matcha shot be?
Pick one house dose, then size every drink in whole shots of it. I use 3 g in 45 ml, so a double is 6 g in 90 ml. If your recipe runs richer, make the house dose 4 g in 60 ml, and a double becomes 8 g in 120 ml. The ratio holds at 1:15, so the water is 15 times the powder, and the bar never has to eyeball a dose. The one exception is a shaker build, which may need 60 ml for 3 g (1:20).
| Shot | Matcha | Water | Caffeine | Shots per 1 kg |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Single | 3 g | 45 ml (1.5 fl oz) | About 96 mg | 333 |
| Single, richer house dose | 4 g | 60 ml (2 fl oz) | About 128 mg | 250 |
| Double of a 3 g shot | 6 g | 90 ml (3 fl oz) | About 192 mg | 167 |
- Single: a standard hot or iced latte. It's the dose I plan around.
- Single, richer house dose: a house dose at the 4 g end of our 3 to 4 g latte dose. Its double is 8 g in 120 ml.
- Double of a 3 g shot: a large iced drink or a boba cup, which often runs bigger than a latte.
At 3 g, 1 kg makes about 333 single shots. If you pull 50, 100 or 200 single shots a day over 28 open days, that's 4.2, 8.4 and 16.8 kg of matcha.
The order calculator lets you set your own grams per drink, drinks a day and open days, then gives you kilograms per month and a 4-week order size.
Should you pull matcha shots to order or batch them?
Pull each shot to order when the tea leads or the line is short. Batch the same dose into a concentrate when a rush puts a line at the matcha station. The two aren't rivals, because they carry the same 3 g.
| Situation | Pull to order | Batch |
|---|---|---|
| Straight shots and signature drinks | Yes. Nothing sits and settles, and the tea tastes like itself | No |
| A steady trickle of matcha lattes | Yes, with a frother or a shaker | Optional |
| A morning rush with a line at the matcha station | Every drink needs its own pull | Yes. One measured pour per drink |
The numbers line up. Our matcha concentrate guide mixes 3 g per 30 ml (1:10), or 3 g per 45 ml (1:15) if the batch clings to the jigger. Either way, one pour carries 3 g, and the 1:15 pour is the same 3 g dose as the shot in this guide.
The batch has its own rules. Stir before every pour, hold it cold and plan for it to be gone within one rush. Those are in the concentrate guide, so I won't repeat them here.
How do you put a matcha shot on the menu?
Make the shot the unit behind every matcha drink first, then offer it as an add-on, and give it its own line only where the tea leads. Here's how each works.
The unit behind every matcha drink
Write each recipe in shots: "1 shot, 3 g" for a standard cup and "2 shots, 6 g" for a large iced drink or a boba cup. The bar learns one unit, the recipe card is one line, and your ordering math becomes shots multiplied by 3 g.
The add-on
An extra matcha shot is the matcha version of an extra espresso shot. It gives the guest a stronger cup without a new recipe for you. Every add-on is 3 g out of the tin, so set its price from your own cost. The cost of 3 g, worked line by line, is in our matcha latte profit margin guide.
The straight shot
Serve one small and thick, 3 g in 45 ml, or pour it over sparkling water or ice. This is where Ceremonial grade belongs, because nothing else in the cup is competing with the tea.
Call it a "matcha shot" on the menu, and print the gram dose next to the name, "Matcha Shot (3 g)". It's a plain term, and the dose tells guests the shot is fixed, so a guest who compares your cup with another can see what they're getting. Here's a sample layout, with no prices.
| Menu line | Shots | Matcha | Water | Grade |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Matcha latte, hot or iced | 1 | 3 g | 45 ml | Latte Grade |
| Large iced matcha or boba matcha milk tea | 2 | 6 g | 90 ml | Latte Grade |
| Add a matcha shot | +1 | +3 g | +45 ml | Same as the drink |
| Matcha shot, straight or over sparkling water | 1 | 3 g | 45 ml | Ceremonial |
How much caffeine is in a 3 g matcha shot?
By Japan's national food composition table, a 3 g matcha shot has about 96 mg of caffeine (3.2 g per 100 g of matcha powder), or about 64 mg at a 2 g dose. An earlier study, as reported by Kika et al., found up to about 102 mg in 3 g. Two recent lab studies measured far less, about 7 to 14 mg, so across every source below the spread is more than ten times, and the samples, grades and methods differ. I'd give guests a range, never a promise, and if I printed a number I'd print the higher one. For comparison, 1 fl oz of espresso is about 63 mg (USDA).
What each source measured
Here's what each source says, with the per-shot figure worked out at 3 g.
- Japan's national food composition table. The 2020 edition lists matcha powder (food number 16035) at 3.2 g of caffeine per 100 g, which is about 96 mg in a 3 g shot (MEXT, Standard Tables of Food Composition in Japan, Eighth Revised Edition).
- A 2024 study of Uji matcha. Three packages of organic matcha from Uji, Kyoto, from different production runs, measured 2,213 µg of caffeine per gram, about 7 mg in a 3 g shot. The authors note that an earlier study (Koláčková et al., 2020) found 14.4 to 34.1 mg per gram, which is about 43 to 102 mg in 3 g (Kika et al., Foods, 2024).
- A 2025 study of three grades. By NMR, after a solvent extraction of each sample, caffeine came to 472.53 mg per 100 g in ceremonial grade 1, 386.6 mg per 100 g in grade 4 and 260.28 mg per 100 g in food grade. That is about 14, 12 and 8 mg in 3 g (Toniolo et al., Plants, 2025).
- For comparison, espresso. USDA lists restaurant-prepared espresso at 212 mg of caffeine per 100 g, and its serving is 1 fl oz, which weighs 29.6 g. That works out to about 63 mg (USDA FoodData Central, FDC ID 171891).
The two recent lab studies sit far below the other figures, and I wouldn't use them to tell a guest a shot is low in caffeine.
What to tell a guest
If a guest asks, say it varies by grade and batch, and give a range instead of a promise. If you print a number on a menu or a label, print the higher figure and say that it varies.
Figures vary by grade and lot, and the papers can't tell you which one is right for your cup. The samples, grades and assay methods differ: Kika used HPLC on second- and third-harvest Uji matcha, Toniolo used NMR after a chloroform-methanol extraction on three grades, and the MEXT figure is a food-table entry. The figures fall in two clusters, about 7 to 14 mg and about 43 to 102 mg, with nothing in between.
Our own preparation guide uses roughly 68 mg for a 2 g serving, which is 34 mg per gram, close to Japan's table (32 mg per gram) and the top of that published range.
We put them side by side: our caffeine comparison across teas.
Which matcha grade works for a shot?
Use Latte Grade for shots that go into milk, and Ceremonial for shots where the tea leads: straight, over sparkling water or ice, or in a signature drink. Latte Grade and Ceremonial are both USDA Organic and stocked in our US inventory.
Latte Grade (Organic) is 100% organic matcha with no sugar, no creamer and no premix, so the sweetness stays your recipe's call. Ceremonial (Organic) is for straight whisked matcha and the drinks where the tea leads. If you want a premium cup for a tasting menu, Superior and Royal are our premium Uji ceremonial grades. They aren't organic certified, and their availability and lead time are confirmed in your quote. Our guide to matcha for cafes and lattes goes deeper on which grade holds up in a latte.
Frequently asked questions
How many grams of matcha are in a matcha shot?
I use 3 g, the low end of the 3 to 4 g latte dose in the quick answer of One with Tea's preparation guide. A richer recipe uses 4 g in 60 ml, and a double of the 3 g shot is 6 g in 90 ml. At home, our guide makes the shot from 2 to 4 g in about 40 to 60 ml of water.
How many matcha shots go in a large iced drink?
I'd use a double: 6 g pulled with 90 ml of water. Large iced drinks and boba cups often run bigger than a latte, and staying in whole shots keeps the recipe card exact.
Is a matcha shot the same as matcha concentrate?
They carry the same dose. A shot is pulled to order for one drink, and a concentrate is a batch made ahead so each drink gets one measured pour. A concentrate batched at 1:15 and poured at 45 ml per drink carries the same 3 g dose.
How much caffeine is in a matcha shot?
By Japan's national food composition table, a 3 g shot has about 96 mg of caffeine, and published figures for 3 g reach about 102 mg. Two recent lab studies measured far less, so give guests a range, not a promise, and use the higher figure if you print one. USDA lists 1 fl oz of espresso at about 63 mg.
Which matcha grade should I use for shots in milk?
Latte Grade (Organic). It's 100% organic matcha with no sugar, no creamer and no premix, so the sweetness stays your recipe's call. Keep Ceremonial (Organic) for straight shots and drinks where the tea leads.
Can you pull a matcha shot ahead of time?
I wouldn't pull single shots ahead. Matcha settles when it stands. If a rush needs it made ahead, batch it as a concentrate, stir before every pour and keep it cold, as the concentrate guide explains.
Wholesale matcha for your matcha station
If you're building matcha shots into your menu, our wholesale terms are made for it. In-stock bulk starts at 1 kg and ships from our US inventory, and 1 kg is about 333 single shots, so you can test a matcha station before you commit to a large order. Latte Grade (Organic) and Ceremonial (Organic) are both stocked in the US. Samples are available on request, and the sample terms come with your written quote.
When you buy through a broker, you're trusting a middleman's word on quality. When you buy from us, you're buying from someone who stood in the field where your tea was grown.
Submit the quote request form and my current price sheet opens right away. I read every quote request myself, and your written quote follows within 2 business days.
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