Dragon Well tea has a long history. The earliest record of the tea may be found in a book by the tea expert of the Tang dynasty Lu Yu, the first book on tea in the world. According to this book, Dragon Well tea was first planted in two famous temples in Hangzhou, Tianzhu and Lingying temples. The tea was given the name of Dragon Well tea in the Song dynasty and the name was spread in the Yuan dynasty. The fame of the tea rose in the Ming dynasty and became popular in the Qing dynasty. It was so well-known that it was designated as a tribute to the royal family. For more than one thousand years, the Dragon Well tea has gone a long way rising from obscurity to international fame.

      As early as in the North Song dynasty, the growing area of Dragon Well tea had initially taken shape. At that time the Fragrant Woods Tea produced in Lower Tianzhu of Lingying, the White Cloud Tea in Upper Tianzhu and the Treasure Cloud Tea in Geling had already been listed as tributes to the royal family. Here, at the foot of the Lion Peak Hill, Master Bianchai, an eminent monk of the North Song dynasty, lived in seclusion in Shousheng Temple, where he and Su Dongpo, an outstanding writer of the North Song dynasty, often drank tea and sang poems together, some of which were praises for the Dragon Well tea. Su also wrote three Chinese characters meaning Old Dragon Well to show his love for the tea, the inscription of which is still there, on a cleve at the foot of Lion Peak Hill in the Shousheng Temple and the Eighteen-Tea-Tree Royal Garden. The South Song dynasty saw further development in tea production as Hangzhou was established as the capital of the country.

      By the Ming dynasty, the name of the Dragon Well tea became known to more and more people. Walking out of the temple, the tea gradually became a daily drink for ordinary people. According to the local annals, the Dragon Well tea ranked among the famous teas of the time in China. The tea was also listed as famous tea by men of letters including Huang Yizheng and Xu Wenchang.

      The Dragon Well tea which had been one of the famous teas in the Ming dynasty stood out above the rest in the Qing dynasty. A scholar of the Qing dynasty proved through investigation that Dragon Well tea was one of the three famous teas in China. During his six travels to South China, Emperor Qianlong paid four visits to the growing area of Dragon Well tea, watching how the tea was picked and roasted, drinking the tea and singing poems praising the tea. He liked the tea so much that he even named the eighteen tea trees in front of the Hugong Temple as "royal tea". Since then the tea has become increasingly popular among ordinary people. It was said that only the tea produced in Dragon Well of Hangzhou is dark green in color, flat-shaped and stiff, quite different from the teas produced in other provinces which are normally curl-shaped and not as green as Dragon Well tea. The tea came to the first place in the early 20th century.

      Since the establishment of the People's Republic of China, the State has attached great importance to the development of Dragon Well tea. The old-fashioned firewood roasters were replaced by electrical ones. New varieties of tea were bred and advanced technology in planting, picking and roasting were promoted. A quality standards system for tea-grading was set up. All these contributed to the standardization of tea production.

      The Dragon Well tea is famous because of its good quality, as well as the historical interest and cultural connotation the tea bears itself. So the Dragon Well tea has not only the value of a tea, but also cultural values.