How orange juice is made
Orange juice can sit in oxygen-free tanks for up to a year, and then get its fresh flavor sprayed back on.
- stations
- 8
- things upstream
- 2
- raw sources
- 2
- step from the ground
- 1
The short version
Oranges are washed, inspected and squeezed by machines that ream out the juice. A screen removes seeds and heavy pulp. The juice is heated to destroy enzymes, stripped of air and either chilled and stored as not-from-concentrate or boiled under vacuum to a thick concentrate. Lost aromas are added back before the juice is packed.
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Inspect and wash fruit
Trucks tip oranges onto roller conveyors where inspectors pull out moldy, rotten or split fruit. The rest is washed and sorted by size so the extractors can grip it evenly.
Goes in -
Peel off the oil
Rollers scrub oil from the peel before the juice is taken. The cold-pressed orange oil is saved, because it is the main ingredient of the flavor packs added later.
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Ream out the juice
Machines halve the oranges and press out the juice, or push a tube through each fruit. The fruit is squeezed gently so the bitter peel does not leak into the juice.
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Screen out the solids
Finishers push the juice through a perforated screen with a conical screw. Seeds and large pieces of pulp are removed, and some pulp is added back later for pulpy juice.
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Strip out the air
A vacuum chamber removes dissolved air so the juice does not foam when it is filled, and so it keeps longer.
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Flash-heat the juice
Juice is quickly heated to inactivate the enzymes that would spoil it. The heating also destroys microbes. Quick heating keeps the damage to flavor and vitamins small.
197 °F for about 40 seconds
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Concentrate under vacuum
Juice for concentrate is boiled at low temperature under vacuum until most of the water is gone. The thick result is about 65% sugar by weight and is stored in a freezer.
stored at about 10 °F (−12 °C)
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Restore the flavor
Processing strips out aroma, so makers blend in a flavor pack. It is built from compounds taken from orange peel oil. Concentrate is diluted with water, and the juice is chilled and packed.
Goes in
Worth repeating
- Not-from-concentrate juice is often held in aseptic tanks stripped of oxygen for up to a year.
- Frozen concentrated orange juice was developed in 1948 at the University of Florida's Citrus Research and Education Center.
- Futures contracts on frozen concentrated orange juice have traded in New York since 1966.
- Flavor packs are not mentioned on the label.
Back to the ground
Follow every input upstream and orange juice starts as these 2 raw sources.
Keep walking
Sources
Cite this page: "How orange juice is made." Assembly Line, 2026-11-03. https://assemblyline.org/make/orange-juice