Coffee Varieties Explained: Bourbon, Typica, Gesha & More

6 min read · Updated June 1, 2026

What coffee varieties are, why they matter, and where the labels mislead. A practical guide to Bourbon, Typica, SL28, Gesha, Pink Bourbon and the rest.

Walk into a good coffee shop and the bag will often name a variety: Bourbon, Caturra, Gesha, SL28. The variety is one useful clue to how a coffee might taste, and a few of the most common labels turn out to be misleading.

This guide covers what coffee varieties are, the main families you’ll meet, and where the labels can fool you.

Variety, species, and cultivar

A species is a biological group. Most coffee you drink is one of two: Coffea arabica and Coffea canephora (sold as Robusta). The genus Coffea actually holds over 120 species, but specialty coffee runs almost entirely on Arabica.

A variety (or cultivar) is a plant type within a species, often selected or bred by people. Bourbon and Typica are Arabica varieties. A landrace is a locally adapted, genetically diverse population rather than one uniform plant; much of Ethiopia’s coffee is landrace material. The word varietal gets used loosely on menus, but “variety” is the precise term.

One fact shapes everything below: Arabica is young and genetically narrow. It arose from a single natural hybridization of Coffea eugenioides and Coffea canephora, so cultivated Arabica has strikingly low genetic diversity. Most of the famous varieties are close cousins.

How much a variety tells you

Genetics affect yield, disease resistance, plant size, bean size, and sometimes the cup. But two things keep variety from being a reliable taste predictor.

First, environment. World Coffee Research’s multi-location variety trials show strong genotype-by-environment interaction: the same variety can score and taste very differently depending on altitude, soil, and climate. “This variety is floral” is an oversimplification.

Second, the label may not even be true to the genetics. WCR’s seed-sector quality study found that more than a third of sampled seed lots had very high genetic non-conformity, and only about a quarter were 90% or more genetically conforming. A bag that says “Pacamara” may have grown from mixed seed.

So treat variety as one clue, read alongside origin, producer, processing, and roast.

The Bourbon and Typica family tree

Two lineages anchor most of specialty coffee. Typica and Bourbon both spread out of Yemen: Typica traveled through India and Java to the Americas, while Bourbon mutated on Île Bourbon (today’s Réunion). Most well-known varieties descend from one or both.

• Dwarf mutations. Caturra, Pacas, and Villa Sarchi are compact mutations of Bourbon (one gene makes the plant short and dense, which helps yield). Maragogipe is a Typica mutation with very large beans.
• Crosses. Mundo Novo is a natural Typica × Bourbon cross from Brazil. Catuaí is Mundo Novo × Caturra, bred for a compact, productive plant. Pacamara is Pacas × Maragogipe.

These are the workhorses of Latin America, picked as much for productivity and plant size as for flavor.

Kenya’s SL28 and SL34

Two of the most loved varieties for cup quality, often giving the blackcurrant acidity Kenya is known for. Scott Laboratories selected them in Kenya in the 1930s. One common claim needs a correction: SL28 is sometimes called “drought tolerant,” but its real trait is a deep root system that copes with limited rainfall. Both SL28 and SL34 are susceptible to leaf rust and Coffee Berry Disease, which is the opposite of climate-proof.

Gesha (Geisha)

Gesha is the variety behind some of the most expensive coffees on earth, prized for floral, jasmine, and bergamot notes when grown high. The celebrated Panamanian Geisha traces to an Ethiopian collection (the T2722 accession). One thing to know: World Coffee Research notes that “Geisha” and “Gesha” are applied to many genetically distinct plants, so the label alone tells you little about the genetics or the flavor in the cup.

Pink Bourbon

Despite the name, DNA testing reported by Cafe Imports found that Pink Bourbon is genetically an Ethiopian landrace. Its lineage traces to Ethiopia rather than to Bourbon, and several sampled lots were also mixed with Bourbon or Catimor. The coffee can be very good; the label mostly describes how the cherries look as they ripen.

Ethiopian landraces and JARC selections

This is where flavor excitement runs highest and naming precision runs lowest. “Ethiopian heirloom” is a vague marketing term that covers a wide mix of local genetics. Ethiopia holds enormous diversity, so more precise labels point to local landrace groups (Wolisho, Kurume, Dega) or to research selections from the Jimma Agricultural Research Center, like 74110, 74112, 74158, and 74165. If a bag just says “heirloom,” read it as “Ethiopian landrace, exact genetics unknown.”

Disease-resistant lines: Timor Hybrid, Catimor, Sarchimor, Castillo

Many varieties are bred mainly for yield and disease resistance, with cup quality a secondary goal. The Híbrido de Timor is a natural Arabica × Robusta hybrid, and it carries the leaf-rust resistance genes behind a whole branch of the family. Crossed with Caturra it gives the Catimor group; crossed with Villa Sarchi, the Sarchimor group. Colombia and Castillo, bred by Colombia’s Cenicafé, are Catimor-derived and widely planted for rust resistance. Cup quality across these lines varies, and good farming matters more than the name.

F1 hybrids

F1 hybrids are first-generation crosses of genetically distinct parents, and they can combine high yield, disease resistance, and strong cup quality. Centroamericano is one example. Starmaya is notable because it can be grown from seed rather than expensive cloned plantlets, which makes a high-quality hybrid far easier for farmers to adopt.

Beyond Arabica

Specialty coffee is slowly looking past Arabica as the climate shifts. Fine Robusta (Coffea canephora) is hardier and higher in caffeine, and careful processing is lifting its quality. Liberica and Stenophylla are separate species drawing real interest: Kew Gardens research found that West African Stenophylla tolerates much higher temperatures than Arabica while tasting surprisingly close to it.

Varieties worth knowing first

If you want a short list that explains most of what you’ll see, learn these: Bourbon and Typica (the roots), Caturra and Catuaí (the Latin American workhorses), SL28 and SL34 (Kenyan cup quality), Gesha (the floral benchmark), Pacamara (big and distinctive), Castillo and Colombia (rust resistance), and the Ethiopian landrace / JARC 741xx group. Between them they cover the main trade-offs: flavor, yield, disease resistance, and marketing value.

How to read a bag

Variety is most meaningful when the roaster also tells you the producer or farm, the processing method, the altitude, and the harvest and roast dates. That context is what turns a name into useful information. Pay a premium for a famous variety only when the rest of the provenance is there too.

Track it in BeanBench

In BeanBench you can record the variety on every coffee alongside country, region, producer, process, and elevation, then rate what you brew. Over time you stop guessing from the label and start seeing which varieties you actually like, in the conditions you actually buy them. Curious how processing changes the same variety? Read coffee processing methods next.