Sterling
An American noble-style hop — Saaz character with a citrus lift.
What it tastes like
Sterling is an American aroma hop bred from Saaz, offering noble, herbal and spicy character with floral, citrus and a hint of tobacco. With its high farnesene it's a homegrown stand-in for Czech Saaz in pilsners, lagers and Belgian styles.
Best in these styles
Beers showcasing Sterling
Specific beer examples coming soon.
Substitutes & relatives
If you can't source Sterling, these hops bring overlapping character.
Lineage & family
How Sterling connects to the rest of the hop family — its parents, and the varieties it spawned. Trace the full pedigree in the Hop Lineage explorer →
Blood relatives
Genetically closest in the pedigree (may taste different):
Pedigree data adapted from the Rohwer (2021) hop family tree (CC0 1.0). Compilation, analysis & visualisation © 2026 Veryation · Freshie™.
For brewers — technical profile
History
Sterling was released in 1998 by the USDA breeding program, a seedling of Czech Saaz developed to give American growers a noble-type aroma hop with Saaz-like character.
Sources
So you can see nothing here is made up — the published specifications on this page are traceable to grower / breeder data: