Feb 2012 What are imperial pint beer glasses? Normal pint glasses, not to be confused with the 2 pint beer glasses so beloved of monumental European (i.e. German) beer-offs. A UK liquid measure must by law be served in Imperial pints and halves (unless it’s a wine or spirit, in which case, confusing as ever, other rules apply). You can’t sell a third of a pint, or two thirds – only a half, or a pint. Even beer festivals, where special measures technically apply, can only sell (in other words, actually transact money for) either half pint or full pint measures. So even if they actually dispense their beer in thirds (it is possible to by festival glasses designed to hold a third of a pint), they must do so by selling three thirds at a time: in other words, the same measure as would be held in one of the normal Imperial pint beer glasses.

2 pint beer glasses, or steins, are legal in the UK, even in pubs – though again the actual sale of the liquid is transacted according to the half pint or pint, and multiples thereof, scale. When a person purchases a stein of beer in the UK, he or she is technically actually buying two separate pints – they just happen to be in the same glass.

There’s a reasonable variation both in the design of glasses intended to hold one UK pint and the degrees to which a pub can vacillate around the actual measure of liquid dispensed. So, for example: Imperial pint glasses must be used at all times, but it is not illegal for a pub to dispense less than one actual pint of liquid into them, provided that they charge for one pint. This rule comes into effect in the case of drinks like Guinness, which are supposed to have a one quarter inch head on the serve. In technical terms, it is illegal for a pub to refuse to top the actual liquid level in a pint glass up to the pint mark – though there is some speculation as to whether one is required to do so if the drink in question is the stout just mentioned.

2 pint beer glasses will have the exact same rules applied to them, only taken again as individual units of pints or multiples of halves. So it would be perfectly legal to sell one pint of beer in a 2 pint stein, provided the price charged was for a single pint. Pouring the contents of two imperial pint glasses into a stein and charging for two pints is also legal: technically speaking (again) those two pint carry out cartons are steins, and are treated in law as two separate measures of one pint each.

All very confusing. Particularly when you’ve had one over the eight...

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