Why do you give beers a score of 1 for appearance?

Originally posted by solidfunk
Mostly what other people said. The few ones I’ve give are because the beer was already so foul for other reasons that a 1 for look seemed appropriate. Rarely, the packaging comes into play, negatively such as this beer: https://www.ratebeer.com/beer/against-the-grain-the-brown-note/170312/

Or positively such as this one: https://www.ratebeer.com/beer/cerveceria-aztlan-beer-metal/448349/128160/

If the label affects my score, I make that change in overall impression.

I try to keep the appearance as independent from the other scores as possible. As a result, I’ve definitely given good scores (4 or more) to otherwise garbage pale lagers or extremely sweet and fruity beers (La Verte au Génépi’s fantastic green colour comes to mind as getting a 5 from me despite being really strange otherwise). Bold or interesting colours are much more likely to get a good appearance score out of me. The same goes with how murky it looks: if it’s a bold golden or orange, then I’m willing to give it a better score there; if it’s barf green, then probably not.

I also find that the density of the head also plays into it for me; if it’s big and soapy, then I’m not much of a fan of that aesthetic.

As for the label, I’ll usually mention it in the actual review but I don’t let it affect the score.

I give so many 4s. Most beers look decent without looking quite immaculately perfect. That ends up being pretty useless information, though (the way I do it, anyway).

Flatness/gushers and floaties are always the fastest way to a low score for me, though. Big fish-eye bubbles in the head don’t help but I forgive them sometimes, too, if there aren’t many of them.

For better or worse, a four has become my sort of standard appearance score over the years. I do tend to vary it more now with more threes mixed in.

I’m not generally offended by the hazy IPA appearance--some of them can look pretty decent--but some of them look disgusting to me (e.g., completely milky and opaque brownish color with no head). I guess conversely if something really matches or exceeds my expectations, I’m apt to give it a five (e.g., crystal clear pilsner with pillowy white foam and great retention).

But, really, the appearance is not typically an important factor to me so I tend to just adjust that and the overall number to get the final score I want to give to the beer. If it is ugly, maybe I give the beer a two in appearance but boost my overall score a point or two.

1 is sort of rare for me, needs to look really bad.

I try not to let the other parts of the beer influence my appearance score, a lot of really boring beers that I don’t liek can still look really good and get a 4.

3 is still standard for me though, looks OK/good, but not really good and nothing wrong with it.

Lots of particles, lacking head in a style that "should" have it, really weird color wise like muddy or rotten fruit, tends to lower the scores.

I do love my black and red beers though, so biased to give them 5’s more often that I would a lighter or less shiny beer a higher score for this.

Originally posted by gnoff
1 is sort of rare for me, needs to look really bad.

I try not to let the other parts of the beer influence my appearance score, a lot of really boring beers that I don’t liek can still look really good and get a 4.

3 is still standard for me though, looks OK/good, but not really good and nothing wrong with it.

Lots of particles, lacking head in a style that "should" have it, really weird color wise like muddy or rotten fruit, tends to lower the scores.

I do love my black and red beers though, so biased to give them 5’s more often that I would a lighter or less shiny beer a higher score for this.

Originally posted by brokensail
For better or worse, a four has become my sort of standard appearance score over the years.

Originally posted by chriso

Originally posted by brokensail
For better or worse, a four has become my sort of standard appearance score over the years.

I think if I was starting again that would be what I’d do. Like you, I don’t find appearance particularly important. Having realised that (after some time) it feels like I’m penalising good beers a touch by sticking with the midpoint. I’ve very rarely given 5 for appearance and that’s mainly been for great-looking imperial stouts. So I think that 4 as the norm, 5 a bit above, 3 a bit below and 2 for those that really don’t look too good would be "fairer". But I’m not going back & changing everything now.

Originally posted by SarkyNorthener

Originally posted by chriso

Originally posted by brokensail
For better or worse, a four has become my sort of standard appearance score over the years.

I think if I was starting again that would be what I’d do. Like you, I don’t find appearance particularly important. Having realised that (after some time) it feels like I’m penalising good beers a touch by sticking with the midpoint. I’ve very rarely given 5 for appearance and that’s mainly been for great-looking imperial stouts. So I think that 4 as the norm, 5 a bit above, 3 a bit below and 2 for those that really don’t look too good would be "fairer". But I’m not going back & changing everything now.

I agree. First enter your 30,000+ backlog then change everything to a default 4.