Yerba Mate Caffeine: I Analyzed 47 Studies to Build a Calculator That Actually Works

The Problem With "How Much Caffeine Is in Yerba Mate?" Google it and you'll get answers ranging from 30mg to 180mg per cup. That's a 6x range — completely useless for anyone trying to manage their caffeine intake. The reason? "A cup of yerba mate" is meaningless. Caffeine content depends on: Preparation method: traditional gourd (mate) vs. French press vs. tea bag vs. cold brew (tereré) Leaf-to-water ratio: a gourd uses 30-50g of yerba per session vs. 2-3g in a tea bag Number of refills: a traditional mate session involves 15-25 refills (cebadas) Water temperature: hot water extracts more caffeine than cold Yerba brand and processing: some brands have 2x the caffeine of others I wanted to know my actual caffeine intake from mate, so I built a calculator based on real published data. Here's what I found. The Data I compiled caffeine measurements from 47 peer-reviewed studies, mostly from Argentine, Brazilian, and Uruguayan food science journals. Key sources: Heck & de Mejia (2007) —