MAR 17, 2026

IMPOSSIBREW vs Heineken 0.0 Ultimate - Adding vs Removing

One strips everything out of beer. The other puts something back in. I've tried both. This isn't close.

Dave Dave A Shaw - 8 min read

A mate brought back some Heineken 0.0 Ultimate cans from a work trip to the States. I've been drinking IMPOSSIBREW at home for months. The comparison basically wrote itself while I was standing in my kitchen.

These two beers represent completely opposite ideas about what AF beer should be. Heineken thinks the answer is removing everything. IMPOSSIBREW thinks the answer is adding something. After trying both extensively - one can of the Heineken, dozens of cans of IMPOSSIBREW - I know which philosophy I'm backing. I've written a longer standalone review of the Heineken if you want the deep dive on that alone.

The Quick Comparison

IMPOSSIBREW Heineken 0.0 Ultimate
ABV 0.5% 0.0%
Calories per 100ml 15 kcal 0 kcal
Sugar per 100ml <1g 0g
Functional ingredients L-Theanine, Ashwagandha, B1, Magnesium (375mg) None
Range Lager, Pale Ale, Triple Hopped IPA + seasonals One lager
Brewing process Cryogenic fermentation (alcohol never produced) Brewed then vacuum distilled
Gluten free Yes (Lager) No
Can size 440-500ml 330ml
Reviews 4.7/5 (1,229 reviews) 3.1/5 (63 ratings on Untappd)
UK availability Yes - DTC + retailers Not yet (US, NL, Poland only)
Overall IMPOSSIBREW. Not close.

Two Opposite Philosophies

I keep coming back to this framing because it's the most honest way to explain the difference.

Heineken's philosophy: Beer has bad things in it (alcohol, calories, sugar). Remove all the bad things. What's left is the product.

IMPOSSIBREW's philosophy: People drink beer for a reason (relaxation, the social thing, the end-of-day ritual). Remove the alcohol, then add ingredients that deliver the feeling people actually wanted.

The Heineken approach makes sense if you think of beer as a nutrition problem - too many calories, too much sugar. Solve the nutrition problem, job done. The IMPOSSIBREW approach makes sense if you think of beer as an experience problem - people miss how it made them feel. Solve the feeling problem, job done.

I know which problem I actually have. I wasn't sitting on the sofa on a Tuesday evening thinking "I wish this lager had fewer calories." I was thinking "I wish I could feel like the day is over without needing four pints and a kebab on the way home."1

Taste: It's Not Even Close

The Heineken 0.0 Ultimate was thin. Watery. The carbonation did most of the work. There was a faint suggestion of hops, like someone had waved a Tettnanger in the general direction of the can. It was drinkable in the sense that water is drinkable.

IMPOSSIBREW's lager is a proper lager. It has body. It has flavour. It tastes like someone actually wanted it to taste like beer rather than like the absence of beer. Is it the best AF lager in the world? I don't know - I'm not a connoisseur. But it does the job, and the job is "taste like a decent pint."

The Pale Ale is better. Really solid, proper session beer character. If the lager does the job, the Pale Ale does the job and then tidies up afterwards.

And then there's the Triple Hopped IPA, which is the one that actually knocked my socks off. Don't be fooled by "triple hopped" - you'd expect something aggressively bitter, the kind of thing where you can feel your fillings dissolve. It's not that at all. It's creamy, fruity, properly hazy. Like a Vocation but without the 6am regret. It is more expensive, and I buy it anyway, which tells you everything.2

Heineken 0.0 Ultimate has one product: a stripped-down lager. IMPOSSIBREW has a full range. That matters if you're actually replacing a drinking habit rather than occasionally having an AF beer at a work event.

The Functional Stuff

Heineken 0.0 Ultimate has no functional ingredients. None. Zero nootropics, zero adaptogens, zero added vitamins. The product is defined entirely by what's been taken out.

IMPOSSIBREW puts 375mg of what they call the Social Blend into every can - L-Theanine, Ashwagandha, Vitamin B1, and Magnesium. Those aren't random wellness buzzwords thrown on a label. L-Theanine is the thing in tea that makes you calm without making you sleepy. Ashwagandha is an adaptogen with a stack of research behind it for stress reduction. B1 supports your nervous system. Magnesium helps with muscle relaxation and reducing tiredness.

I don't know exactly which ingredient is doing what. I'm a programmer, not a biochemist. What I know is that twenty minutes after an IMPOSSIBREW, my evening has started. The work brain has switched off. I'm watching telly and actually watching it, not pretending to watch it while mentally rewriting the SQL query that's been bugging me since 3pm.

Twenty minutes after the Heineken 0.0 Ultimate? I was still thinking about the deployment that had gone sideways at work. The beer hadn't changed anything because there was nothing in it to change anything. It had removed the alcohol without replacing the reason I was drinking.

The Calorie Argument

The one area where Heineken wins on paper: zero calories vs IMPOSSIBREW's 15 kcal per 100ml.

In practice, a can of IMPOSSIBREW has roughly 50 calories. That's less than an apple. Less than a glass of orange juice. Less than the three Hobnobs I had at my desk this morning. The idea that those 50 calories are a dealbreaker is a position I find very difficult to take seriously.

Those 50 calories buy you: actual flavour, proper body, functional ingredients that change your evening, and a beer that 1,229 people have rated 4.7/5 instead of 63 people rating 3.1/5. That's not a bad trade.

When Heineken 0.0 Ultimate Makes Sense

I'm trying to be fair.

For everyone else - everyone who actually wants their AF beer to taste good and maybe, just maybe, make their evening a bit better - this comparison has a very clear winner.

My Verdict: IMPOSSIBREW vs Heineken 0.0 Ultimate

IMPOSSIBREW wins. Comprehensively. On taste, on range, on functional ingredients, on can size, on customer reviews, on the thing that actually matters - whether the beer makes your evening better or just makes your fridge more interesting.

Heineken 0.0 Ultimate is a technical achievement. They've removed everything from a beer and kept it sort-of drinkable. That's clever engineering. But "sort-of drinkable with zero everything" is not a compelling reason to buy something. Especially when the alternative is genuinely good beer with ingredients that actually work.

I finished the Heineken, put it in the recycling, and opened an IMPOSSIBREW Triple Hopped IPA. Creamy, fruity, hazy, and twenty minutes later I'd forgotten about the deployment. That's what I want from an AF beer. Heineken can keep their zeroes.

If you want to try IMPOSSIBREW - I have a refer-a-friend link that gets you £10 off. No affiliation, I just signed up for their referral programme because I was ordering anyway and figured I might as well.

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  1. The kebab habit has also stopped, incidentally. Connected? Possibly. I've lost 9 lbs since January. I'm not attributing that to IMPOSSIBREW specifically but the kebab thing is definitely part of it.
  2. My wife asked why the beer budget hasn't gone down since I stopped drinking. This is why. The Triple Hopped IPA is not cheap. But it's cheaper than four pints of Doom Bar and a taxi home, which is the actual comparison.