The best tonic water you can buy in the UK (top 6)

Like so many everyday products, tonic water has seen a recent rise in "premiumisation". By this, we mean that although in recent history it was perfectly acceptable to use the cheapest tonic water available to make drinks like gin and tonic, nowadays, people tend to take much more care when it comes to choosing what tonic water they'll use with their drinks.

What this has meant is that there is now a lot of choice when it comes to tonic water, so much so that it can be hard to know which to choose. We wanted to publish a guide about the best tonic water you can buy in the UK, let's get into it:

The London Essence Co Indian Tonic Water

We're starting to see the tonic water from The London Essence Co stocked in lots more supermarkets here in the UK, and we're not surprised at all by this - it's a high quality product. Made using lemon peel extract and cold pressed lime oils, it has a refreshing citrus flavour and a pleasantly bitter aftertaste. This tonic water contains no artificial sweeteners and is instead sweetened using fructose. Learn more and buy it here - tesco.com

Bon Accord

Unlike the tonic water from The London Essence Co, it's actually quite hard to find bottles of the tonic water from Bon Accord. But we're really not sure why more supermarkets don't stock it, as it's excellent - made using 100% natural quinine and only natural flavourings, this tonic water has a crisp taste and lovely flavour. This tonic water works perfectly with gin, but is also great as part of other cocktails. Learn more and buy it here - amazon.co.uk

Fever-Tree

Despite being a premium brand, Fever-Tree has managed to take a remarkable chunk of the tonic water market, so much so that many bars up and down the country won't serve you a gin and tonic with any other brand of tonic water. We think the Fever-Tree tonic water is well worthy of this reputation - made using spring water and quinine, the team at Fever-Tree adds botanical oils to this tonic water to really bring out the refreshing and crisp flavour. Quinine gives it bitterness and bitter orange leaves a slightly citrus, slightly bitter aftertaste. Learn more and buy it here - groceries.asda.com

Schweppes

As we mentioned in our soda water guide, Schweppes are good at what they do. We wouldn't describe the tonic water from the brand as premium, but it's still very good and at a price point which is much closer to a supermarket's own-brand tonic water. Made with natural flavourings, this tonic water from Schweppes still has plenty of flavour, just not as much as some of the other options in this guide, but it's a great no-nonsense option. Learn more and buy it here - tesco.com

Essential Waitrose Indian Tonic Water

It wouldn't be one of our food and drink guides without mentioning Waitrose - despite the posh reputation that this supermarket has, there is no denying that the standard of the Waitrose food and drink products is impressive. That's exactly how we feel about this tonic water from Waitrose - and considering it's 75p per 1 litre bottle, it's great value too. Learn more and buy it here - waitrose.com

Teso Indian tonic water

The only other own-brand supermarket tonic water that we feel is worthy of a place in our list is the Indian tonic water from Tesco, mainly given its price. We picked up a 1 litre bottle for 70p, which was just about the cheapest tonic water we could find. And considering it tasted great and had that quintessential bitterness and crispness, we'll be buying it again. Learn more and buy it here - tesco.com

Hopefully, this guide helps you to find an excellent tonic water to enjoy in whichever way you like. Let us know if you've tried any of our suggestions or if you have any other suggestions for us. If you're interested in similar guides, we have a guide about the best mineral water you can buy and the best sparkling water you can buy.