Singapore’s Own Craft Beer Breweries

Singapore’s craft beer scene is small but genuinely homegrown, built by people who started as homebrewers or spent years inside the regional beer industry before striking out alone. Brewlander, RedDot BrewHouse, Sunbird Brewing Company and Lion Brewery Co each carry a distinct origin story, from a purpose-built brewery in Tuas to a heritage name dating back to 1836 London.

Singapore doesn’t have hundreds of breweries competing for tap space. What it has instead is a handful of independent operations, each one started by someone who either brewed in their kitchen first or spent years working inside the region’s beer industry before deciding to build something of their own. That distinction matters.

The Brewers Association’s definition of a craft brewer rests on being small and independent, free from major ownership by a larger non-craft beverage company. Singapore’s local names fit that description closely, and the people behind them tend to have real skin in the game rather than a head office overseas calling the shots.

Here’s a closer look at four of the names shaping that scene, and where they came from.

Brewlander was founded by John Wei and launched in 2017, at a point when Singapore’s local beer options were still fairly thin on the ground. Rather than staying reliant on contract brewing arrangements, Brewlander went further than most local outfits by building its own automated brewery in Tuas in 2020. That’s a significant commitment for a young local label. Owning the physical brewery, rather than renting time and equipment from someone else, gives a brand direct control over recipe consistency, batch timing and how quickly it can experiment with new releases.

RedDot BrewHouse holds a specific title in the local scene: Singapore’s first locally owned independent microbrewery. It was founded by Ernest Ng Kah Hoe, and the brand has built a presence at two well-known addresses, Dempsey and Boat Quay. Both locations put RedDot BrewHouse in spots that get heavy foot traffic from locals and visitors alike, which has helped keep the brand visible even as newer names have entered the market since. Being first doesn’t guarantee staying relevant, but RedDot BrewHouse has managed to hold its ground through consistent presence rather than a single big launch moment.

Sunbird Brewing Company launched in April 2020, founded by Clive Tan, who had previously worked with both Archipelago Brewery and Brewerkz before starting his own venture. That’s worth pointing out, because it says something about how Singapore’s craft beer scene actually grows. It isn’t only outsiders parachuting in with capital. Some of the most interesting local labels come from people who already understood the regional beer business from the inside, and used that experience to build something under their own name instead of someone else’s.

Lion Brewery Co carries the longest history of the group by far. It’s a British heritage brewery originally founded in 1836 in Lambeth, London. The name went quiet for roughly seven decades before being re-established in both London and Singapore in 2017. That’s an unusual path for a brand to take, reviving a nineteenth-century identity and giving it a foothold in two cities at once rather than simply relaunching where it started. For drinkers, it means a brand with genuine heritage behind it, not a manufactured backstory built for marketing purposes.

These four names are far from the whole picture. Alive Brewing and Ren Min are also part of the broader local scene, and each deserves its own closer look rather than a passing mention here. If you want more depth on any single brewery, individual spotlight pieces are the better place to go digging.

In the meantime, keep an eye on Craft Beer by Ki-setsu’s rotating selection, where local names occasionally sit alongside imports from Japan, Taiwan and Australia. Tasting a Singapore-made beer next to something brewed on the other side of the region is a genuinely useful way to work out what you actually gravitate toward, rather than guessing from a label alone.

• Where can I try beers from Singapore’s local craft breweries?
  
  Availability varies by brewery. Some, like RedDot BrewHouse, run their own taprooms at Dempsey and Boat Quay, while others distribute through bars and bottle shops that rotate local names alongside imports. Dropping into a craft beer bar in Singapore is usually the fastest way to try several without committing to a full bottle of each.
• Is Singapore craft beer more expensive than imported beer?
  
  Pricing depends heavily on the individual bar or shop and how a beer is imported or distributed, so there’s no fixed rule that local beer costs more or less than imported options. It’s worth comparing menus directly rather than assuming either way.
• What sets these local breweries apart from bigger regional beer companies?
  
  The key difference is independence. Each brewery covered here, Brewlander, RedDot BrewHouse, Sunbird Brewing Company and Lion Brewery Co, was founded and is largely run by people with direct ties to Singapore’s beer scene, rather than being owned by a large non-craft beverage group.
• Which Singapore brewery should I try first?
  
  It depends on what draws you in. If a purpose-built local brewery interests you, Brewlander’s story stands out. If history matters more, Lion Brewery Co’s 1836 origins are hard to beat. There’s no wrong starting point, only different stories to follow.

For a wider list of names worth tracking down, our roundup of best craft beer Singapore has more to explore.