Did you know that last year, the winner of the US Brewer’s Cup, for the first time in its 20-year history, won the competition with a decaf?
Yep. Decaf is no longer an afterthought—it’s having a moment and if you’ve noticed more specialty decaf options from quality brands popping up in serious cafes, you’re not imagining it.
The coffee world who once spurred decaf as an inferior product, blasting ‘death to decaf’ memes and giving snide looks to decaf drinkers are beginning to rethink the caffeine craze.
What’s all the buzz about decaf?
Decaf is one of the biggest growing trends in the coffee industry in 2025 and it has outpaced the growth of regular coffee over the last five years. And while there’s an increased demand for decaf coffee overall, it’s the specific focus on specialty decaf that’s got everyone interested – coffee nerds included.
And it makes sense; decaf consumers were once caffeinated connoisseurs. They have an appreciation for quality coffee and they know what they like. Whatever their reason for switching to decaf, they have zero interest in consuming a substandard product.
They seek the same premium coffee experience, quality, choice and flavour with fair trade, single origin, organic options being as important. Nor will they tolerate toxic decaffeination processes and seek out (and pay more for) chemical-free products labelled Swiss Water, Mountain Water and Sugar Cane.
Who is leading the trend?
It’s the wellness-conscious customers who are driving demand for high-quality decaf coffee, mainly millennials but a growing health cohort who are questioning their intake of caffeine at the expense of their: sleep, anxiety, baby’s health, heart rate, indigestion, hormones and/or mental health.
The reasons why people are switching to decaf, or swapping in decaf, are varied but the stats show society’s subservience to the the most widely consumed psychotropic drug – caffeine – is now being questioned.
While we wouldn’t extol the line, Caffeine has become the drink of losers (it is a great article though) the data is in, there is a buzz about decaf, the market is listening, and the trend doesn’t look like it going away anytime soon.