UK's best Indie Beers revealed in historic night for British brewing

The results are in for the UK’s biggest beer competition, with three breweries taking the Overall Gold across the Cask, Keg, and Bottle/Can competitions – with winners from the UK now set to go on and be judged Worldwide.

Overall Champion of the Cask in the 2026 "Indie Beer Awards" was Almasty Brewery in Newcastle with their 6% 'Believe' New England style IPA, Lakes Brew Co in Kendall won Overall Champion in Keg with their decadent 8.4% "Don't Make Me Run" Imperial Stout, and Baker's Dozen in Stamford won Overall Champion in the bottle / can competition with their bright and refreshing 3.2% "Agua Fresca Sour".

Husband and wife team at Baker's Dozen, Dean and Jill Baker, were delighted to accept their award;

"Just absolutely incredible, we're just genuinely overwhelmed to win the best beer in the country it's just not something that was even on our radar. We brew pale ales and bitters as our bread and butter as a brewery so to win with a session strength sour beer is just incredible. I guess we'll have to make it again now!" Dean Baker.

"I'm absolutely blown away, it was our ten year anniversary last year so we entered all of these beers that mean a lot to us and we're really proud of - this beer came about because of a regular customer of ours who runs a mexican food truck and loves the combination of watermelon and hibiscus, and we thought that combo would just make a great sour beer. But we know it's a bit mad and not what we normally do, so to have judges recognise it at the UK's biggest beer awards is just huge for us." Jill Baker.

Judged by brewers and industry experts and organised by the Society of Independent Brewers and Associates (SIBA) at their flagship BeerX UK event in Liverpool, the Indie Beer Awards 2026 run across a huge range of beer style categories including pale ale, IPA, stout and lager. As the UK's best beer in a bottle or can Baker's Dozen will now get automatic entry into the World Beer Cup in America, judged against the best beers from around the Globe.

The Indie Beer Awards are the UK National finals and in order to earn a place at the competition brewers must first win Gold at their regional competition – making these Overall Champions very much the ‘best of the best’ when it comes to independent beer. Finalists from Scotland the North East, North West, Midlands & West, East of England, Wales, South East, and South West all fought it out to take home the top spots.

“The demand for independent beer has never been higher and it's easy to see why when trying some of these award-winners; varied, exciting and all absolutely delicious I want to congratulate all of the winners but in particularl our Overall Champions who are truly the very bets of the best in the UK right now. A huge well done!” Andy Slee, SIBA Chief Executive

The Indie Beer Awards 2026 take place at the UK’s biggest beer and brewing trade event BeerX, held at Exhibition Centre Liverpool. This year was the event’s biggest ever, attracting a record 3,700 Delegates to a packed conference of talks, seminars, tasting sessions, and of course the beer awards which name the very best of the best in the independent beer industry.

The awards were presented by Sunday Times columnist Pete Brown at the UK’s biggest beer and brewing event – BeerX UK in Liverpool, 19^th March 2026.

COPY ENDS 

Notes to Editors:

• The full list of winners: can be viewed here 

• Award winners, crowd reaction and BeerX event photos: can be accessed here

For all inquiries, please contact us at: neil.walker@siba.co.uk

Third-party news items are published as received for informational purposes. Publication does not imply endorsement by the Guild. Please use the contact details within the post for any enquiries.