Bavarian Beer Glasses: Maßkrug, Weizen Glass, Willi Becher and Which Beer Goes in Which

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Nobody in Munich is drinking out of the correct glass because they read an article about it, they are drinking out of it because that is the glass the beer hall has always used for that beer, and it happens to be the right one. My Bavarian beer guide covers the styles themselves; this page is about the three vessels behind them and why swapping one for another is not just a style choice.

The Maß: a liter, not a size on a menu

The Maß is a one-liter glass mug, the one you picture the second someone says “Oktoberfest,” and it is not an exaggeration for the tourists: Oktoberfest’s own beer-price page and the menus at Munich beer gardens like the Hirschgarten quote every price “per liter,” which only makes sense because the liter mug is the standard pour, not an upsize¹². It usually has a handle and thick, slightly dimpled glass walls, built to survive being set down harder than it should be after the third round.

One number about the Maß is not something I can hand you with a straight face: the commonly repeated claim that an empty Maß weighs about 1.3 kilograms and a full one about 2.5 kilograms could not be confirmed on any official source, so I am leaving it out rather than repeating a number nobody official will stand behind. What is confirmed is simpler and more useful: it is a liter, which is 33.8 ounces, more beer than most people expect the first time they lift one.

A glass version of the classic Hofbräuhaus Maßkrug, one liter, dimpled and stamped with the Munich crest, lists on Amazon at $24.90 as of September 2026⁵.

Resi says The Hofbräuhaus Maßkrug above is exactly the mug you have seen in every Oktoberfest photo, and it is heavy even empty, which is the point: a Maß that felt light would not survive a beer hall. The limit is real too, a full one is genuinely more beer than a single sitting calls for outside of a festival, so treat it as a two-person prop as easily as a one-person drink.

The Weizen glass: built for the head, not the beer

A hefeweizen throws a head most other styles cannot manage, dense and long-lasting because of how the beer is brewed, and a standard tumbler collapses it or, worse, doesn’t leave room for it at all. The Weizen glass solves that with height and a curve: tall, narrowing toward the base and flaring again near the rim, giving the foam somewhere to go and the pour something to show off. My hefeweizen page covers which brands to look for; this section is only about the glass.

A Schott Zwiesel Basic Wheat Beer Glass, 0.3 liter and made in Germany, sells as a set of four for $45.64 as of September 2026, which works out to $11.41 a glass⁴. That is a restaurant-sized pour rather than a full half-liter bottle, so at home you will be topping it up partway through a bottle, which with this style is normal rather than a flaw.

The Willi Becher: the everyday tumbler

Most of what Germany actually drinks day to day does not go in a mug or a curved wheat-beer glass, it goes in a plain tumbler called the Willi Becher, made by German glassmakers including Rastal in a run of sizes from about 26.5 centiliters up to 63.5 centiliters, a little under 9 ounces to a little over a pint, each with a calibrated fill line molded into the glass³. It is straight-sided rather than shaped like anything in particular, which is exactly why it works under so many different beers: Pils, Helles, Kölsch-style lagers and plenty of everyday drinking beer all show up in one. It is the glass you get in an ordinary Bavarian Gasthaus when nobody has decided the beer needs a special vessel, which describes most beer, most of the time.

Source: Oktoberfest.de and Hirschgarten menu on the Maß as the standard beer-garden unit¹²; Rastal on Willi Becher sizes³.

How to pour into each one

The glass only does half the work; the pour does the rest.

1. Into a Maß or a Willi Becher, tilt the glass at an angle, pour down the side rather than straight into the bottom, and straighten up as it fills so the last inch builds a modest head rather than a foam overflow.
2. Into a Weizen glass, do the opposite on purpose. Pour most of the bottle in at a steeper angle to build the tall head the glass is shaped for, leave the last inch or so of beer in the bottle where the yeast has settled, swirl the bottle to bring that sediment back into suspension, and pour it in last, on top of the head. A hefeweizen is meant to be cloudy; that swirl is not a mistake, it is the point.
3. Rinse with cold water, not soap, before either style. Soap residue is the single fastest way to kill a good head, in any glass.

None of this is complicated, and none of it requires the exact glasses named on this page. It is the shape and the pour that matter, not the label on the box they came in.

Getting it wrong is not a crime, but it changes the beer

Pour a hefeweizen into a straight tumbler and the head that is supposed to last the whole glass collapses in a minute, taking most of the aroma with it. Pour a Helles into a tall Weizen glass and you have mostly demonstrated that the glass is the wrong shape for a beer with a thin, quick head; nothing bad happens, it just looks like you are trying too hard. None of this is a rule enforced by anyone. It is just that Bavarian brewers, tents and beer halls settled on these shapes generations ago because they work, and there is no reason to fight three centuries of trial and error over what a beer glass should look like.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is a Maßkrug?

The one-liter mug used at Oktoberfest and in Bavarian beer halls, usually glass with a handle and thick, dimpled walls, and the standard pour on most beer-garden menus.

How much beer is in a Maß?

One liter, which is 33.8 fluid ounces, noticeably more than a standard US pint.

Why does hefeweizen need its own glass?

The style throws an unusually large, long-lasting head, and the Weizen glass’s height and curve give that head somewhere to sit without collapsing the way it would in a straight tumbler.

What is a Willi Becher?

A plain, straight-sided tumbler made by German glass manufacturers in sizes from around 7 ounces to a bit over a pint, used for everyday beers like Pils and Helles rather than for a specific style with special requirements.

Do I need special glasses to drink German beer at home?

No. The shapes make a real difference to how a beer smells and pours, but any clean glass will get the beer into you. Buy the shaped glasses when you want the full effect, not because the beer will otherwise go to waste.

Does the weight of a Maß matter?

People repeat a figure for how much an empty versus full Maß weighs, but it could not be confirmed on any official source, so this page does not state one.

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