Tencha is the leaf product matcha is ground from: shade-grown tea leaves that have been steamed, dried flat without rolling, and had their stems and veins removed. It is traded by weight in Japan, stored cold, and milled into matcha as it is needed.

What is the difference between tencha and matcha?

They are the same tea at two stages. Tencha is the loose, unground leaf; matcha is that leaf after milling into powder. Grinding is the only step between them, which is why the quality of a matcha is largely set before it is ground.

What is the difference between tencha and gyokuro?

Both are shade grown, but gyokuro is rolled and dried to be steeped as loose-leaf tea, while tencha is dried flat, de-stemmed and de-veined so it can be ground. Rolled leaf cannot be milled into a smooth matcha powder.

Can you drink tencha as tea?

Yes, and in Japan it is occasionally sold that way. Steeped, it is light, sweet and delicate rather than intense, because you drink an infusion rather than the whole leaf. It is rarely sold at retail in New Zealand.

Tencha and how it becomes matcha

Tencha is the leaf matcha is ground from: shade-grown tea that has been steamed, dried flat without rolling, and stripped of its stems and veins. It is almost never drunk as a brewed tea. Grinding tencha is the step that produces matcha, and no other leaf gives the same result.

What is tencha

Tencha is a half-finished tea. It looks like flat, papery green flakes rather than the tight needles of sencha, because it is never rolled. In Japan it is a trade product more than a drink: bought and sold by weight at tencha auctions, stored cold, and milled into matcha when it is needed. Commercially the word matcha applies to the ground powder, while the leaf it came from is tencha.

That is why matcha's story really starts a step earlier than most people expect. Almost everything that decides how good a matcha will be, the shading, the harvest, the steaming and the refining, has already happened by the time the tencha reaches the mill.

How is tencha made

Four steps separate a shaded tea bush from a bag of tencha, and each is a deliberate departure from ordinary green tea processing.

Shade: the plants are covered for three to four weeks or more before picking, which raises L-theanine and chlorophyll.
Steam: the picked leaves are steamed for roughly 15 to 20 seconds to stop oxidation and fix the green colour.
Dry flat: the leaf goes through a tencha furnace and is dried without rolling, so it stays brittle and papery.
Refine: stems, veins and stalk are separated out by air and blade, leaving only soft leaf flesh.

How does tencha compare with gyokuro and sencha

All three come from the same plant and diverge on two questions: was the leaf shaded, and was it rolled. Gyokuro is shaded like tencha but rolled and steeped like sencha. Sencha is neither shaded nor ground. Tencha is shaded and never rolled, because rolling would ruin its one job.

Three Japanese green teas from one plant
	Tencha	Gyokuro	Sencha
Shaded	Yes, 3 to 4 weeks or more	Yes, about 3 weeks	No, grown in full sun
Rolled	No, dried flat	Yes	Yes
Stems and veins	Removed	Kept	Kept
How it is drunk	Ground into matcha	Steeped, leaf discarded	Steeped, leaf discarded
Flavour	Sweet and mild as a leaf	Intensely sweet and umami	Fresh, grassy, brisker

Why does grinding tencha make matcha when grinding sencha does not

Because the two leaves are physically and chemically different before the mill ever touches them. Sencha is sun-grown, so it is higher in catechins and lower in L-theanine, and the powder tastes sharp and bitter no matter how finely it is ground. Sencha is also rolled, which compresses and toughens the leaf, so it mills into a coarser, gritty powder rather than the talc-fine one that suspends in water. And sencha keeps its stems and veins, which are fibrous and dull the colour.

Powders labelled green tea powder, matcha-style powder or culinary green tea are often exactly this: ground sencha or bancha. They are usable in baking and considerably cheaper, but they are noticeably more olive in colour and more astringent in the cup.

Can you buy or drink tencha

You can, though it is uncommon outside Japan and effectively unavailable in New Zealand retail. Brewed as an infusion, tencha is light, sweet and delicate, with much less of matcha's intensity, simply because you are steeping the leaf rather than drinking all of it. Some Japanese producers sell it as a curiosity or blend it into roasted teas.

For NZ buyers the practical takeaway is about labels rather than shopping lists. When a tin states the grade, the harvest and the region, what it is describing is the tencha behind the powder, and that is where the quality was decided.

Common questions

What is tencha?: Tencha is the leaf product matcha is ground from: shade-grown tea leaves that have been steamed, dried flat without rolling, and had their stems and veins removed. It is traded by weight in Japan, stored cold, and milled into matcha as it is needed.
What is the difference between tencha and matcha?: They are the same tea at two stages. Tencha is the loose, unground leaf; matcha is that leaf after milling into powder. Grinding is the only step between them, which is why the quality of a matcha is largely set before it is ground.
What is the difference between tencha and gyokuro?: Both are shade grown, but gyokuro is rolled and dried to be steeped as loose-leaf tea, while tencha is dried flat, de-stemmed and de-veined so it can be ground. Rolled leaf cannot be milled into a smooth matcha powder.
Can you drink tencha as tea?: Yes, and in Japan it is occasionally sold that way. Steeped, it is light, sweet and delicate rather than intense, because you drink an infusion rather than the whole leaf. It is rarely sold at retail in New Zealand.