A brewery is any facility licensed to make beer, but the word gets used loosely to cover very different kinds of operations, from a national name producing millions of barrels a year to a single-room brewpub that only sells what it makes on-site.
The terms microbrewery, brewpub, and nanobrewery all describe specific scales and business models within that broader definition. Here is what actually separates them.
What Counts as a Brewery
Legally in the US, a brewery is any facility that holds a federal Brewer’s Notice from the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau, plus whatever state and local licenses apply. That single requirement covers everything from a homebrewer who scaled up to a global name producing beer by the tanker load.
Everything else, microbrewery, brewpub, nanobrewery, is an informal size or business-model label layered on top of that same basic license, not a separate legal category.
Microbrewery
The Brewers Association’s traditional cutoff for a microbrewery is producing 15,000 barrels or less a year, with the majority of that beer sold off-site through distribution rather than consumed on the brewery’s own premises. Most of what people call craft beer today falls into this bucket.
Anchor Brewing in San Francisco is often credited as the brewery that kicked off the modern American microbrewery movement in the 1960s and 70s, and names like Pete’s Wicked Ale helped push it into the mainstream in the decades after.
Brewpub
A brewpub brews beer and operates a restaurant or bar on the same premises, selling most of that beer directly to customers on-site rather than through wide distribution. Where state law allows it, a brewpub can also sell beer to-go or distribute a limited amount off-site, but the defining feature is that the food and the brewing happen in the same building.
Some of the best on-site drinking experiences take this even further with outdoor seating attached, see our guide to Munich’s beer gardens for a look at how that culture built up around brewery-attached beer halls.
“Brewpub” is not actually a federal licensing term. The TTB only issues a Brewer’s Notice, not a separate brewpub permit, so the distinction is really about the restaurant attached to the license rather than anything the federal government tracks separately.
Nanobrewery
A nanobrewery is the smallest end of the scale, typically brewing on systems well under a few barrels per batch, often started by a single person or a small team testing the waters before investing in bigger equipment. There is no official volume threshold that separates nano from micro, so the term is used loosely and inconsistently across the industry.
Most nanobreweries start life as a home setup that outgrows the garage. If you are at that stage yourself, our BeerSmith 3 review and homebrewing calculator suite cover the recipe and water chemistry tools that make scaling up less of a guessing game.
Regional and Macro Brewery
Once a brewery grows past the microbrewery volume cutoff, it typically gets called a regional brewery, and the largest national and multinational producers are usually referred to as macro breweries. The line between these categories is about scale and distribution reach rather than ingredients or brewing process.
Scale brings its own problems too. Our recent piece on how new tariffs are squeezing US breweries looks at how aluminum and packaging costs hit regional and macro producers differently than a nanobrewery running mostly kegs.
Why the License, Not the Size, Is the Legal Line
Federal law under 27 CFR Part 25 regulates beer production through the Brewer’s Notice regardless of how big or small the operation is. States then layer their own permits on top, and that state-level permit is usually where the practical brewpub-versus-brewery distinction actually gets defined, since it controls things like on-site sales and self-distribution rights.
FAQ
Is a taproom the same thing as a brewpub?
Not quite. A taproom serves beer on-site but typically does not have a full food-service restaurant attached, which is the key feature that defines a brewpub.
What is the biggest difference between a microbrewery and a brewpub?
A microbrewery’s beer is mostly sold off-site through distribution. A brewpub’s beer is mostly consumed on-site alongside food from its own kitchen.
Can a brewpub also distribute beer to stores?
In many states, yes, on a limited basis, but the rules vary significantly by state and that off-site distribution is not the brewpub’s primary business model.
