People divided over why Corona is served with a lime

Debates have raged for years over why one of the ultimate holiday drinks, an ice cold Corona, is served with a lime.

It's a widely loved beverage that we associate with a getaway, or being the beach for some reason - or maybe you envision Vin Diesel shoving it down viewers' throats throughout the Fast and Furious franchise.

Either way, the Mexican beer brand is financially, the most valuable beer in the world, with its iconic crown logo recognisable from a mile off.

Why is it served with a lime? (Igor Golovniov/SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images)

The lager is known for being served with a zesty twist, a fresh green lime wedge that sticks out the top of the bottle.

But where did it come from, and why is it common practice today?

There are numerous theories around the inclusion of a lime, but it's unclear which one is true.

One theory says that the metal caps on Corona bottles are known for leaving rust marks around the edges, and lime is a known rust-remover and steriliser.

It makes sense, as citrus is a disinfectant and drinking water in Mexico is known to have possible negative effects on health.

However, the beer has been around for almost 100 years, and this lime trend has only come into the spotlight in recent years.

A Corona without a lime feels wrong. (Corona)

Another suggestion is that the use of clear bottles causes the beer to have a skunky flavour and smell, as light causes bitter alpha acids in beer to transform into the same chemical that you can find in skunk spray.

Lime just helps to mask the odour, while it also keeps flies away from your bottle, as citrus is a bug repellent.

But the most widely believed scenario is that a bartender started the trend in 1981, in efforts to increase the marketability of the lager to the wider public.

Apparently, he bet his friend that adding the zesty garnish to the popular Mexican drink would catch on and become a trend, though it is more likely that the whole thing is a marketing strategy put in place by Corona themselves to give the beer a more aesthetic feel.

There's no concrete evidence to back up any of these claims, unfortunately, but it may and probably would have been a combination of details that led to the popularity of the drink being served with a lime.

Who knows when the tradition began? (Getty Stock Photo)

The brand has leaned into this though, as almost every advertisement of theirs features a type of citrus, while in 2017, the beer brand became the sponsor of the University of Texas Longhorns American football team, launching a campaign called 'Horns Up, Limes In!"

Corona even toyed with the idea of a lime distribution partnership back in 2018, releasing branded limes in collaboration with Earth Source Trading.

Nobody is 100% sure where the lime tradition came from, but it feels wrong to drink a nice, cold Corona without a lime.