Updated August 26, 2026
If you’ve heard anything about Asheville, you’ve probably heard the words “Beer City USA.” That nickname isn’t just marketing—it grew out of national polls and a serious craft beer boom that started in the early 2000s. Asheville first earned the Beer City USA title in 2009 and has held onto that reputation ever since, with dozens of breweries of all sizes packed into the city and nearby towns.
Today, the Asheville area boasts 40+ breweries and beer pubs, giving it one of the highest brewery-to-population ratios in the country. You can’t see them all in one trip—but you can hit a few standouts and get a real taste of Beer City. For prices and hours checked against official sources, see the brewery chapter of our Asheville field guide.
Here’s a friendly overview you can share with guests who want to explore Asheville breweries before or after their tour with Asheville Tours & Excursions.
What Makes Asheville’s Brewery Scene Different?
Lots of cities have great beer. Asheville adds a few extra ingredients:
- Walkable clusters: Downtown, South Slope, the River Arts District, and West Asheville each have multiple breweries within a short stroll.
- Scenery: Mountain views, riverside decks, and mural-covered warehouses turn brewery-hopping into a mini sightseeing tour.
- Sheer variety: From Belgian-style sours and barrel-aged stouts to easy-drinking lagers and hop-heavy IPAs, you’ll find a style for every palate.
Our Asheville City Tour drives the same downtown blocks these taprooms share.
Add in food trucks, live music, and dog-friendly patios, and it’s easy to see why beer lovers plan entire vacations around Asheville.
Downtown & South Slope: The Core of Beer City
If guests only have a few hours, downtown and nearby South Slope are the easiest places to start. A single afternoon can include:
Wicked Weed Brewing
One of Asheville’s most recognizable names, Wicked Weed is known for bold IPAs, barrel-aged sours, and a lively downtown brewpub space just off Biltmore Avenue. It’s a great first stop for visitors who want to dive into the local “headliners.”
Burial Beer Co.
In the South Slope brewing district, Burial has earned national praise for its creative lineup—everything from saisons to dark, dessert-like stouts—served in a quirky beer garden with murals and a wraparound patio.
Hi-Wire Brewing
Hi-Wire started in Asheville and has grown into a regional brand, but it hasn’t lost its approachable vibe. Locals love it for balanced, “anyone can enjoy this” beers and fun spaces, from its South Slope taproom to the RAD Beer Garden.
Green Man & Highland Brewing (The Old Guard)
Green Man and Highland Brewing helped put Asheville on the craft beer map. Highland is often credited as Asheville’s first successful modern craft brewery, while Green Man helped define the downtown pub-style taproom.
Highland’s main brewery is a quick drive from downtown with a rooftop and disc golf; Green Man has a multi-level South Slope taproom with city views. Both are “musts” for craft beer history buffs.
River Arts District & West Asheville: Beers with a View
If your guests love art, live music, and river views, steer them toward the River Arts District (RAD) and nearby neighborhoods.
Wedge Brewing
Wedge Brewing is famous for its murals, industrial-chic taproom, and location right in the heart of RAD. It’s the kind of place where you can sip a pint, watch trains roll by, and wander to nearby artist studios.
New Belgium Brewing – Riverfront Vibes
Across the river in the RAD-adjacent “West Asheville riverfront” area, New Belgium’s Asheville brewery offers a taproom and expansive lawn perched above the French Broad River and greenway.
Guests can:
- Relax on the cantilevered deck overlooking the water
- Sample year-round favorites and small-batch brews
- Enjoy rotating food trucks and a very dog-friendly space
It’s a perfect “after your morning tour” stop—especially on sunny afternoons.
Big Destination Breweries Just Outside the City
Two of the country’s largest craft breweries chose the Asheville area for their East Coast homes, and both are worth the short drive.
Sierra Nevada – Mills River “Beer Campus”
About 20 miles south of Asheville, Sierra Nevada’s Mills River brewery is often described as a “beer resort” or “Taj Mahal of breweries”—a huge campus with a taproom, full restaurant, outdoor amphitheater, trails, and river access.
Guests can:
- Take a brewery tour
- Enjoy farm-to-table pub food and 20+ beers on tap
- Stroll the grounds and gardens along the French Broad River
It pairs beautifully with a day of scenic touring or waterfall chasing.
How Beer Fits Into an Asheville Tours & Excursions Trip
You don’t have to build a full “brewery tour day”. Instead, think of breweries as bookends to your experiences:
- Morning: Sunrise or Blue Ridge Parkway scenic tour
- Afternoon: Self-guided stroll through South Slope or the River Arts District breweries
- Evening: Dinner and a nightcap at a downtown taproom
That way, you get both sides of Asheville: wild mountains in the morning, craft culture in the evening.
After your mountain adventure with Asheville Tours & Excursions, raise a glass to Beer City USA at one of our favorite breweries—you’ve earned it.
How many breweries does Asheville actually have?
You will see wildly different numbers, because people are quietly counting different places.
Explore Asheville puts the city at more than 40 breweries as of April 2026. A separate Visit Asheville count also lands on “over 40” — but that one spans South Slope, the River Arts District, Black Mountain and beyond, a regional catchment rather than a city figure. The two numbers look identical and are not measuring the same ground. Widen the lens again and a Hillman Beer directory maps 50+ Asheville microbreweries, which sets a floor rather than a final tally; statewide, North Carolina holds over 400 craft breweries.
The honest answer is that there is no audited current count, only a well-supported floor. What is not in dispute is the density: Asheville has more breweries per capita than nearly any other city in the country. For a visitor that ratio matters more than the exact number, because it means you are rarely more than a few blocks from the next one.
The beer districts, and what walking each one is really like
Asheville’s breweries are not scattered evenly across the map. They sit in tight pockets, and choosing your pocket before you set out is the difference between a relaxed afternoon and a lot of driving.
South Slope — the dense one
South Slope is the walking district. It sits roughly inside Asheland, Biltmore, Southside and Hilliard Avenues, with the newer arrivals clustered along Coxe, Banks and Buxton. Explore Asheville counts roughly 10 breweries within a few blocks here.
That density is not new. A January 2019 Explore Asheville document already described the neighbourhood as filled with eight breweries — Green Man, Asheville Brewing, Hi-Wire, Burial, Bhramari, Twin Leaf, Catawba and the Funkatorium. If you only have one afternoon and no car, this is the answer.
Downtown and the River Arts District — the trade-off
Downtown is not a brewery district so much as a district that happens to have breweries in it, which is its advantage: a taproom sits between a bookshop, a gallery and dinner without your moving the car. Those are the same blocks our Asheville City Tour covers, so a morning of history pairs easily with an afternoon at your own pace.
The River Arts District is the opposite trade: more to look at, more distance between stops. Comfortable shoes, and do not assume two RAD addresses are within a stroll of each other.
Who got here first: a short Asheville beer timeline
Asheville’s beer scene reads as one boom from outside. Up close it arrived in waves, and knowing the order makes the taprooms more interesting to sit in.
1994 — Highland Brewing. The one that started it: founded by Oscar Wong and described as Asheville’s original craft brewery and the first legal brewery in the city since Prohibition. Wong was a Chinese-Jamaican immigrant and a retired engineer; the company is woman-led today. Its brewery and taproom are in East Asheville, with live music, disc golf and volleyball on site, and Gaelic Amber Ale is its signature beer.
1997 — Green Man. Asheville’s second officially established brewery began inside the Jack of the Wood brewpub downtown, changed hands in 2010, and now anchors South Slope. Its original tasting room is still called Dirty Jack’s, and the house loyalty is to traditional English ale styles rather than whatever is trending.
2008 — Wedge. Still describing itself as a neighborhood brewery, Wedge runs two River Arts District locations — Wedge Studios at 37 Paynes Way and Foundy Street — with resident food trucks instead of a kitchen. Worth knowing, because most lists have not caught up: its downtown Grove Arcade taproom has closed. The brewery’s own site now lists that location as closed and describes the company as having two locations, both in the River Arts District.
2013 — the South Slope wave. Burial Beer opened that summer in a renovated transmission shop, starting on a one-barrel system and growing to ten-barrel inside about a year; the name honors New Orleans’ music-filled funeral processions. Hi-Wire was founded the same year by Adam Charnack and Chris Frosaker, taking over a closed brewery’s space and lease, and is known for Hi-Pitch Mosaic IPA, Lo-Pitch Hazy IPA and Mountain Water. One correction worth carrying, because it circulates: the travel guides listing Hi-Wire as founded in 2003 are wrong, contradicted by the brewery’s own history and four other sources.
What is open in 2026, after Helene
Tropical Storm Helene brought record-breaking floods in September 2024 that hit the River Arts District hardest, and a lot of the brewery advice still online was written either before it or in the weeks after. Both versions are now out of date.
The recovery is real. Visit Asheville reports over 40 local breweries have reopened across the region, and an April 2026 River Arts District guide records the RAD breweries it covers — including Wedge at Wedge Studios — as all reopened. Asheville Cotton Mill Studios, severely damaged in the flood, reopened in February 2026 after 16 months of renovations.
Two things to keep straight. First, the district is still changing shape rather than simply being restored: Burial Beer announced in April 2026 that it plans to take over the Curve Studios property in the RAD — that project is announced, not open, so do not build a visit around it yet. Second, the reopening reporting rests on a small number of hard datapoints, so a quick check of a brewery’s own hours the morning you go is still worth thirty seconds.
Common questions about Asheville breweries
Why is Asheville called Beer City USA?
It came from a national poll, not a marketing department. Asheville first claimed the Beer City USA title in 2009 and held it four consecutive years. The nickname stuck because the underlying fact stuck: the city has more breweries per capita than nearly any other in the United States, and Explore Asheville counts more than 40 in the city as of April 2026.
Which brewery is the largest in Asheville?
This one deserves a straight answer: it cannot be settled from the public record. No brewery in the area publishes production volume or facility size in a form that allows a fair comparison, so any confident ranking you read is an assumption. What can be said is that Sierra Nevada’s Mills River campus is the largest brewery site most visitors will set foot on, and Highland is the oldest.
Which brewery should I visit if I only have time for one?
Match it to what you want from the hour. For the history, Highland in East Asheville. For the most beer per step, South Slope, where roughly ten breweries sit within a few blocks. For a riverside afternoon with art around it, the River Arts District. For the full campus experience with a restaurant and grounds, Sierra Nevada at Mills River — though it sits outside the city, so budget the drive.
Is there a brewery walking district in Asheville?
Yes — South Slope, bounded roughly by Asheland, Biltmore, Southside and Hilliard Avenues. It is the one district where you can park once and reach a genuine spread of breweries on foot, which is why it is the standard recommendation for a first visit.
