Since opening its first location in Duluth in 2018, Unbelibubble has spread across Atlanta with additional locations, including a stall at Chattahoochee Food Works, the Underwood Hills food hall. Popular items include the rose black milk tea, Unbelibubble fruit tea, and various crushes, fruit purees topped with a milk cap. Unbelibubble also offers a latte flavored with ube, a purple sweet potato popular in Filipino desserts.

A short walk from the campus of Georgia Tech, Tea Corner offers a selection of boba tea and coffee and a make-your-own option using a base of black tea, oolong tea, green tea, or coffee flavored with a selection of fruit flavoring and milks. Tea Corner also offers a croissant topped with a house-made brown sugar milk tea cream and boba. 

A green tea with a fruit mixture of blueberry, dragonfruit, lemon, mango, strawberry, pineapple, and kiwi, the Supreme (this shop’s best seller) lives up to its name. Another tea-forward boba shop, try the ceremonial-grade matcha and cheese teas here. Teamo also offers a selection of six herbal tea blends, each with a specific purpose, from detoxification to digestion. 

Located just down the street from Ponce City Market, Honey Bubble tries very hard to be a local bubble tea shop, and it succeeds. Expect a selection of milk teas (offered with dairy substitutes) and snowcap slushies here.

On the edge of the Emory University campus, Tea Leaf and Creamery is known for its signature smoothie teas with flavors such as avocado, black grape, and red dragon fruit. Along with its smoothies, Tea Leaf and Creamery offers various tea infusions with ice cream or yogurt. A second location on Buford Highway opened in 2021.

Tucked away in a far corner of Doraville’s H Mart Plaza, the presence of 4.0 Ice Cream and Drinks is muted by its more recognizable neighbors, Tea Top and Meet Fresh. Now operating as a pick-up window, 4.0 features one of the more extensive, borderline intimidating, boba menus in metro Atlanta, with toppings such as mochi and chestnut (both $1.00). Customers are met with a storefront collage of posters for new limited-time specials, of which the mango sago slush and mochi sesame milk tea are stand-outs. 4.0 also offers milk teas by the gallon.

A map of essential Atlanta boba shops isn’t complete without Sweet Hut Bakery. First opened in 2012 on Buford Highway, the Asian bakery and cafe has become a cornerstone of Atlanta’s boba scene, with four additional locations in Midtown, Duluth, Buckhead, and Marietta. The reliable line-up of milk teas here tend to lean toward the sweet side at 100-percent sugar, so order accordingly. 

Compared to boba shops with sprawling lists of toppings and flavors, Tan-Cha’s menu might seem limited. A more accurate word might be “curated.” Located in Doraville, the Los Angeles-based chain is known for its fresh fruit teas and its brulee milk tea, best enjoyed with an inch and a half of sweet foam on top. Said foam comes in three flavors: matcha foam; tiramisu puff cream; and cheese foam (a cream cheese-based foam that gives the drink a cheesecake edge.) The shop often hosts food pop-ups, too.

With multiple locations throughout the northern Atlanta suburbs, Pearl’s Tea features both milk teas and loose leaf teas on its menu. Try the brown sugar or mango jasmine milk teas. Or, for taste of Georgia in the summer, order the white peach boba tea. Pearl’s also serves slushies and matcha lattes.

Sustainability is central to Bubbly Boba in Alpharetta, offering fair-trade tea and vegan milk. In addition to traditional tapioca, the shop also offers a soft tapioca boba, “for those of us who don’t like chewy,” the menu reads. 

A more recent addition to Atlanta’s boba scene, Tiger Sugar in Duluth and Kennesaw offers a limited selection of drinks sweetened with cream mousse and the shop’s signature brown sugar that streaks down the side of the cup like tiger stripes. The staff at Tiger Sugar advises people to shake the drink 15 times to fully incorporate the sugar. As part of a recent summer menu, the Taiwan-based boba chain served a tiger mango sago in limited daily quantities.