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Fermentation Atlas

Soft drinks from Worldwide

Water kefir (tibicos)tibicos

Water kefir is sugar water with dried fruit, fermented by grains made of dextran that hold lactic bacteria and yeasts. In two to four days at room temperature it turns fruity, sour, fizzy and slightly alcoholic. The grains are sieved out and start the next batch. Made in 4 steps over 2 days – 7 days. The longest step, ferment at room temperature, takes 2–7 days (Laureys D 2022) and runs at 17–29 °C (Laureys D 2022). Liquorilactobacillus nagelii and Lentilactobacillus hilgardii do most of the fermenting.

Key numbers
Main step2–7 daysReported[laureys2022][garmendia2025]Ferment at room temperature
Temperature17–29 °CReported[laureys2022]Ferment at room temperature
Fully documentedSoft drinks2 days – 7 daysMore soft drinksMore from Mexico

Recipe

Amounts from a sourceHousehold-style laboratory recipe from Laureys et al. 2022, made in 250-mL bottles. Grains kept in Uruguayan households were fed 500 mL of 100 g/L unrefined cane sugar per 50 g of grains (Garmendia et al. 2025).
50 g (wet weight)Water kefir grains[laureys2022]
10 gSugar[laureys2022]
5 gDried figs[laureys2022]
160 mLTap water[laureys2022]
Starterkefir-grains

Total time across the recorded steps: 2 days – 7 days

Start
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What changes: Sugar dissolves into water with dried figs as food for the grains

Step 1 of 4
Mix sugar water with dried figs
Time
Not documented
Temperature
Not documented
Salt
None given
Acidity
Not documented
Which microbes the steps name, step by step
Yeasts
Lactic acid bacteria

Output: sugar and fig medium.

Flavour
sweet
Texture
thin
Colour
Not documented

Microbes at work in this step

Not documented for this step.

Method

Measured measured in a studySet fixed by a specification or tested recipeReported one source reports itTypical a general value, not sourced for this fermentUnconfirmed not yet checked against a source

What makes this one different

Water kefir grains are a different community from milk kefir grains. They are dextran, not kefiran, and they ferment sucrose and fruit in water rather than lactose in milk. Kombucha ferments sweet tea under a floating cellulose mat instead.

Related ferments

Variants

  • Unrinsed grainsGrains not rinsed between batches give more acid and alcohol in the drink and more Dekkera bruxellensis and Liquorilactobacillus nagelii.
  • Long cyclesLonger gaps between feeds (up to 4 days were tested) favour Oenococcus sicerae and Dekkera bruxellensis; short gaps favour Liquorilactobacillus nagelii and S. cerevisiae.

Safety

Water kefir is not always alcohol-free. Household drinks held 0.94–1.32 % ethanol after 7 days, and 8 retail drinks held 0.14–1.70 % ABV, above the US limit of 0.5 % ABV for non-alcoholic drinks in some cases (Canada allows 1.1 %). The finished drink reaches about pH 3.5.

Hazards the sources name: Clostridium DNA in some household grains; not detected in the finished drinks.

History and sources

Every number is labelled with how it is known. How this atlas is made

Water kefir is kept going in households by passing grains from batch to batch. Grains studied in Uruguay had been shared and propagated that way for years (Garmendia et al. 2025).

  1. [laureys2022] Laureys D., Leroy F., Vandamme P., De Vuyst L. 2022, Backslopping time, rinsing of the grains during backslopping, and incubation temperature influence the water kefir fermentation process, Frontiers in Microbiology 13:871550paper
  2. [garmendia2025] Garmendia G. et al. 2025, Dynamic microbiota in water kefir, microbial shift and ecological selection during fermentation, BMC Microbiologypaper
  3. [sy2023] Sy H., Chan M., Finley J. 2023, Determination of ethanol content in water kefir using headspace GC-MS, Journal of AOAC International 106(2):348–355paper