The diagram pictures the process in which five various types of tea are made from tea leaves.
Overall, the process of making tea consists of three to six steps, starting from cultivating tea leaves and ending with drying them in the oven. Additionally, while tea leaves are the common ingredient in the manufacturing process of all tea types, the key difference among them lies in the way these leaves are processed.
Initially, tea trees are grown until their leaves are mature enough to be harvested through plucking manually. Afterwards, they are withered to be ready for any additional processing steps depending on different types of resulting teas.
To continue the process, withered leaves only need to be dried in the oven to result in white tea, while for green tea, they have to be steamed and rolled before the last drying step. Regarding Oolong tea, withered leaves are also rolled before being fermented slightly before being put into the oven. Meanwhile, black tea requires a full fermentation process after they are either rolled ( large leaves) or crushed (small leaves), with a final oven drying step.