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In terms of clarity, you should look through the beer onto a white background and judge it on how clear or cloudy it seems, remembering that stouts and wheat beers should preferably be cloudy and the ales more clear and bright.

The second test is to smell the beer. This is considered the most important of the three stages of testing due to the powerful perceptions of the human nose. The beer should be smelt twice, the first smell being undertaken as soon as the beer is poured. This will allow the detection of the beer's dominant aroma which will have been released from the beer at the time of its pour. There should be a hint of malt, butterscotch, and/or hops. There may be some unusual scents as well, such as a vegetable type smell or an unpleasant odor, which might give you an indication as to the beer's poor quality. The second smelling of the beer should follow a short while after the first smelling, once the beer has been allowed to settle. The beer should be swirled about in the glass a little before being smelt and a secondary aroma should be able to be detected. It should have a flowery or fruity or spicy scent to it. Towards the end of this secondary smell, just before the tasting of the beer, the beer's residual signatory aroma should be detectable, the better beers having an underlying nutty or earthy type of aroma to them.

The drinking of the beer is the final stage of the beer-taste and should be completed in three separate sips. The most important thing to remember is that the beer must be swallowed and not just tasted and discarded as is often the case in wine-tasting. The first sip of the beer is dedicated to determining the flavor. To do this it is best to sip the beer and let it sit in your mouth for a couple of seconds while breathing in through your nose. This will give your sense of smell a chance to help your taste buds fully appreciate the aromas and flavors the beer has to offer. The second sip of beer will allow you to concentrate on how the beer feels in your mouth, whether it has a metallic feel to it, or powdery quality, or if it is heavily carbonated or seems sticky or gluey. The final sip of the beer is dedicated to the aftertaste which will allow you to form an overall opinion of the beer. The aftertaste will differ between types of beer, from a US ale having virtually no aftertaste, to an Irish stout having an incredibly long heavy bitter aftertaste. What should be noted no matter the type of beer is whether the aftertaste is mostly bitter, sweet, or malty, and as to how long the aftertaste lasts.

The final thing to remember for beer-tasting etiquette is that no more than 20 tastings are recommended in one sitting for the fact that the beer must be swallowed to be properly tasted and that any more than 20 beers tasted would likely see the taster considerably intoxicated!

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