BeerAdvocate.com is a popular website where users review and rate beers from around the world. Each beer listing includes tasting profile information—such as appearance, aroma, flavor, and mouthfeel—along with style, alcohol content, and overall scores. Reviews often include written comments and are tied to individual users, allowing analysis of both beer characteristics and reviewer behavior.
In this class, we use a curated dataset from BeerAdvocate that includes reviews from over 1.5 million users covering 3,197 beers from 934 breweries. This data allows students to explore how people describe and rate different beer styles, and how factors like brand, flavor, and personal taste influence overall perception.
| Beer Dataset Feature Descriptions | |
|---|---|
| Feature | Description |
ABV |
Alcohol by volume; a measure of the beer’s alcohol content as a percentage. |
Min.IBU |
Minimum estimated bitterness level for the beer style, measured in International Bitterness Units. |
Max.IBU |
Maximum estimated bitterness level for the beer style, measured in International Bitterness Units. |
Astringency |
A perception of dryness or puckering, often from tannins or roasted grains. |
Body |
The perceived weight or thickness of the beer in the mouth (e.g., light, medium, full-bodied). |
Alcohol |
The strength of alcohol perception in taste or aroma, separate from actual ABV. |
Bitter |
The perceived bitterness, usually from hops or roasted ingredients. |
Sweet |
Perceived sweetness in the flavor, often from residual sugars or malts. |
Sour |
The degree of tartness or acidity in the beer’s flavor profile. |
Salty |
The perception of saltiness, which is rare but present in styles like Gose. |
Fruits |
Presence of fruit flavors, either from actual fruit additions or fermentation characteristics. |
Hoppy |
Intensity of hop aroma or flavor, often citrusy, piney, floral, or herbal. |
Spices |
Perception of spice-related flavors, either added directly or from yeast activity. |
Malty |
The richness of grain-derived flavors, often sweet, bready, or caramel-like. |
https://www.kaggle.com/datasets/ruthgn/beer-profile-and-ratings-data-set