Coffee school / In the cup
Altitude
Higher up it is colder, the cherry ripens more slowly and the bean gets denser — usually more flavour.
When you see “1800 m” or “2025 m” on a bag, it is telling you how high the coffee grew.
Why it matters: higher up the nights are cooler, so the cherry ripens more slowly. A longer ripening builds more sugar and more complex aromatics into the seed, and produces a denser, harder bean.
What it means in the cup: coffee grown higher tends to have brighter acidity, more complex aromatics and a cleaner flavour. Coffee grown lower is often softer, nuttier and less acidic.
It does not hold on its own: altitude is not everything — latitude and microclimate count too. In southern Brazil, far from the equator, a farm at 1200 m can be as cool as much higher farms in Central America. And “high” is a local yardstick: in Costa Rica 1500 m already counts as high; in Ethiopia it does not. To a Costa Rican 1600 m is the top of the mountain; to an Ethiopian grower it is where you start.
It matters to the roaster too: a dense, high-grown bean takes more heat before its surface cooks too quickly. That is why a 2000 m Ethiopian can be roasted light without staying grassy.
Labels you may run into: SHB (Strictly Hard Bean) and SHG (Strictly High Grown) mark this same altitude class in Central America.
Taste it
