I have been using Brewfather for over 6 months now and, for me, it is the best money I have spent in my homebrewing journey so far. I am going to be upfront with you, this is going to be less of a review of the software and more of a full-throated endorsement.
About a year back, after getting into all-grain (BIAB) brewing, I was getting tired of brewing kits. I needed the ability to create my own recipes and the idea of calculating ABV, SRM, potential, and a growing number of variables by hand was not very appealing. So, naturally, I began to look for software that would do this easily. I jump onto using Beersmith after a buddy let me use one of his licenses. It worked GREAT! I was pretty excited to be creating the recipes on my own, even if some were not the greatest to start with. Though, the application felt old, and nagged at me… you see I am a software developer after all.
So I began looking into writing a simple web based application that would be a simplified version of Beersmith. In my research I came across Brewfather….. aaaaaaand pretty much gave up the project right then. It had everything I wanted. It was a progressive web app that works as well on PC as it does on mobile. It had a modern interface. It kept track of my ingredients I had on hand. And it organized my brew day so I didn’t have to keep track of everything. I could kick back and have fun and follow the steps and alarms.
In addition to what I thought I wanted there were additional features that have proven to be really nice. I can plan ahead brew days. I can look up recipes from right inside the app. I can share recipes with the click of a button. I also like the integration it has with my Tilt Hydrometers and Tilt Pi.
While I think Beersmith is the standard bearer for homebrewing software, Brewfather is certainly a generational step forward. Brewfather gets updates a few times a month and continues to improve. There is support available on Facebook, and through a web based bug tracker. You can even request new features and watch them get voted on and moved up into a release. I feel like Brewfather will be the new standard application for homebrewers in the next year or two as it continues to rapidly improve.
