Sharetea [SOMA]

Sharetea in Downtown San Francisco

Sharetea has been around since 1992 with two locations in downtown San Francisco (Metreon & Westfield). Sharetea has its franchises in 18 countries and over 1,400 stores. Because of that, the stores feel very fast-paced and are less focused on customization and flavor. However, Sharetea has stores in places with no nearby boba stores for which I really appreciate them. Their prices are a bit higher than what I expected to get from a chain store as I knew I wasn't paying for in-store made boba nor for a very high-quality tea.

Here's the breakdown:

Tapioca Balls:

Their boba was soft but a bit chewy. It was quite flavorless but that is the general trend for a lot of boba places that don't make their own tapioca balls.

Overall Taste:

I got the matcha milk tea and the flavor wasn't as rich and, together with the flavorless tapioca balls, it didn't taste any better. I always expect matcha to be full of flavor and this matcha didn't taste more than just packaged powder with some water and jelly.

Sugar Levels:

I got 30% sugar level and it was not enough to make it as sweet as I wanted my matcha to be. I was mostly expecting for matcha to add a lot to the sweetness level but that was not the case. So, if you decide to get it from there, my recommendation would get anything above 50%.

Ice Levels:

Because that matcha was simply packaged powder, it needed a lot of water to dissolve and, it turned out to taste pretty watered down. Usually, the matcha makes the drink feel more thick and less watered down but that was, again, not the case for this place.

Boba:Drink Ratio:

This one was actually pretty good. I still had a couple of tapioca balls at the bottom of my cup when I was done but the overall ratio was good so that I didn't run out of boba before finishing my drink.

Overall Rating: 5/10

Go visit Sharetea at Metreon (135 4th Street) or at Westfield (865 Market Street) and let me know your thoughts in the comments!