OLLA Brew Lab

OLLA BREW LAB · SUPPORT

About & Support

Product details, common questions, and help when something goes wrong.

Available in 中文, English, and 日本語

A local-first companion for specialty coffee — create bean cards, look up coffee knowledge, track resting, and record brews and cuppings.

About OLLA Brew Lab

OLLA Brew Lab is a local-first specialty coffee logging and reference tool. It brings bean cards, coffee knowledge lookup, resting tracking, brewing tools, brew records, and cupping records into one place.

The app is built around a structured coffee knowledge base that helps you enter and review coffee information faster. Your personal app data — such as bean cards, brew logs, cupping records, notes, favorites, and preferences — is stored on your device; sign in with Apple and it can also sync across your devices through your own iCloud. All core features work without an account.

Bean Cards & Home Screen Widgets

Manage your beans as a card deck. Each bean card can record variety, origin, estate, process, roast level, purchase date, roast date, and resting information.

The card can expand into a full detail view, and resting / suggested drinking windows are visualized with a phased progress display. You can pin selected beans and show key information through iOS Home Screen widgets in small and medium sizes.

Label Scan & Image Sharing

When creating a bean card, tap the scan button and photograph the coffee-bag label, or pick a photo from your library. The app reads the origin, variety, process, roast level, roast date, altitude, and weight. Every recognized field shows its source text, and you confirm, edit, or exclude each one before it fills the card.

Recognition runs entirely on your device; neither the photo nor the recognized text is uploaded. You may optionally keep the bag photo as the bean-card cover, stored only on your device.

Brew, bean, and cupping detail pages can produce a lab-sheet style share image, sent through the iOS system share sheet. When a brew lands in the golden-cup range for both extraction yield and strength, a gold note appears on the brew card and detail page.

Coffee Codex & REF Data Cards

OLLA includes a built-in coffee knowledge base covering origins, variety lineages, estates, processing, roasting, brewing, sensory work, and coffee culture.

Selected entries include REF data cards: structured visual cards that summarize key information such as altitude, lineage, flavor notes, processing details, grading standards, harvest context, or other reference data where available. These cards are designed to help you understand an entry quickly before reading deeper.

The codex is searchable, cross-linked, and available in Simplified Chinese, English, and Japanese.

Brew Log & Sensory Panel

Record your brews and review them over time. Brew logs can include dose, grind, water temperature, ratio, TDS, extraction yield, brew method, notes, and sensory impressions.

The sensory panel helps you compare brews through aroma, acidity, sweetness, body, aftertaste, and balance. Where available, you can also record SCA-style flavor information and extraction-related data.

Cupping Records & Coffee Archive

Record cuppings on a professional three-part sheet: basic info, ten SCA-style ruler scores — fragrance, flavor, aftertaste and more — plus extraction info and brewing strategy. Scores of 80+ earn a SPECIALTY stamp, and any sheet can be exported as an A4 PDF to share.

The Coffee Archive brings bean cards, brews, and cuppings together in one hub with stats, search, and filters; the journal and yearly stats include cuppings as well.

The cupping feature, the in-app cupping sheet, and the exported A4 cupping-sheet layout are based on a prototype sheet provided by IvanYang, co-developed as OLLA BREW LAB × IvanYang. Rights to the prototype sheet design belong to IvanYang; the in-app implementation and the digital layout of the exported PDF are © OLLA Brew Lab.

Toolbox

OLLA includes a set of coffee tools for daily brewing and reference, including:

  • Brew timer with stepped recipes
  • Recipe library
  • Ratio calculator
  • Extraction-yield calculator
  • Espresso lab
  • Brewing water recipe tool
  • Cupping score sheet
  • Grind guide
  • Roast reader
  • Flavor wheel

Reminders

You can set local reminders for bean cards, such as reminders for resting progress or suggested drinking windows.

These reminders are scheduled on your device through the iOS notification system. They do not require a push server and do not upload your bean card or brew log data. Notification permission is requested only when you enable reminder-related features, and you can turn it off at any time in iOS Settings.

iCloud Sync & Sign in with Apple

You can optionally use Sign in with Apple to create a local identity and enable iCloud sync: bean cards, brew logs, cupping records, favorites, and preferences are written into the private iCloud container under your own Apple ID and sync across your devices automatically (on cold start, on returning to the foreground, or via Sync Now).

This data moves only between your own devices and your own iCloud — we do not operate account servers and cannot access or receive it. You can sign out at any time, turn off the app’s iCloud permission in iOS Settings, or use Restore from Backup.

Local-First · Private · Trilingual

Your personal app data is stored on your device (and in your own iCloud if you choose to enable it). All core features work without an account.

Core features are designed to work locally. The app may connect to the network only for limited purposes, such as checking for public coffee reference content updates or industry reference content. These requests do not include your bean cards, brew logs, cupping records, notes, favorites, or other personal coffee data. The optional Apple sign-in and iCloud sync are Apple system services — your data never passes through our servers. See the Privacy Policy (updated 2026-07-06).

OLLA supports Simplified Chinese, English, and Japanese. It also includes multiple appearance themes, including light and dark styles.

Data export and import are available in Settings → Data, including full JSON backup and CSV export where supported.

Data & Accuracy

OLLA's coffee codex and tools draw on public industry standards, official sources, and community references; each entry and recipe is labeled by source confidence (verified / community / approximate). Some information — dates, competition and auction records, grind settings, community recipes — is compiled from public sources and may be dated or differ from an official figure. All of it is provided for reference and learning, not as authoritative or professional advice. If you spot anything inaccurate or out of date, please email us — we genuinely appreciate corrections and update the data.

FAQ

Do I need an account?

No. All core features work without an account. You can optionally use Sign in with Apple to create a local identity — it signs your cupping sheets as the taster and enables iCloud sync; staying signed out does not limit any local feature.

Do I need internet access?

Core features are designed to work locally. You can create bean cards, record brews and cuppings, use tools, and access built-in reference content without an account. Network access may be used for public reference content updates and connectivity checks; these requests do not include your personal coffee data. If you enable iCloud sync, sync traffic goes through Apple’s iCloud, not our servers.

How do I back up or move my data?

The easiest way is to sign in with Apple and enable iCloud sync — your data then follows you across devices automatically. You can also go to Settings → Data to export a full JSON backup, export brew records as CSV where available, and import or restore on another device.

Is iCloud sync data safe?

The synced snapshot is written only into the private iCloud container under your own Apple ID, transmitted and stored by Apple; it moves only between your own devices and your own iCloud, and we cannot access it. See the Privacy Policy (updated 2026-07-06).

Are reminders private?

Yes. Bean reminders are scheduled locally on your device through the iOS notification system. They are not sent through a push server, and they do not upload your bean cards or brew logs. You can manage notification permission in iOS Settings and reminder settings inside the app where available.

Does label scan upload my photos?

No. Text recognition runs on your device using Apple’s Vision framework; neither the photo nor the recognized text is sent to us or to any third party. A photo kept as the bean-card cover is also stored only on your device.

If tapping the scan button shows a message asking you to update, the installed build does not yet include the recognition component; please update to the latest version from the App Store or TestFlight.

Which languages are supported?

OLLA Brew Lab supports Simplified Chinese, English, and Japanese. The app can follow your system language where supported.

Which themes are supported?

OLLA includes multiple visual themes, including light and dark styles. Theme behavior may follow your system appearance or be selected manually inside the app.

The Home Screen widget is not updating. What should I do?

First, make sure you have pinned at least one bean card. The widget displays pinned bean cards. If the widget still looks stale, try the following:

  1. Open OLLA Brew Lab once to refresh app data.
  2. Long-press the widget, remove it, and add it again.
  3. Restart your device if iOS does not refresh the widget timeline.

Widget refresh timing is partly controlled by iOS, so updates may not appear instantly in every case.

I found a bug or have a feature request. How can I contact you?

Email us with your device model, iOS version, app version, and a short description of the issue or request. Screenshots are helpful when the issue is visual or layout-related.

Contact

Email: kokennka@gmail.com

For bug reports, please include:

  • Device model
  • iOS version
  • App version
  • Steps to reproduce the issue
  • Screenshots if relevant

Legal

Privacy Policy: /olla/

© 2026 OLLA Brew Lab. All rights reserved.

OLLA Brew Lab and OLLA are names used for this app and related services.

Third-party brand, product, and standard names mentioned in the app (such as Hario, AeroPress, SCA, and others) are used for reference and educational purposes only and belong to their respective owners. OLLA Brew Lab is not affiliated with or endorsed by any of them.