Burton-on-Trent, in Staffordshire, England, is the single most influential water source in brewing history — not because its water is unusually pleasant to drink, but because its unusually high mineral content, especially sulfate, happened to produce exactly the sharp, dry, hop-accentuating character that came to define English pale ale as a style.
The profile
The classic reference figures for Burton water: calcium 352 ppm, magnesium 24 ppm, sodium 54 ppm, sulfate 820 ppm, chloride 96 ppm, bicarbonate 320 ppm. The standout number is sulfate — at 820 ppm, it's dramatically higher than almost any other classic brewing-city water profile, and high sulfate is specifically associated with accentuating a drier, sharper, more assertive perceived hop bitterness. This is the direct historical origin of "Burtonisation," the practice of adding gypsum (calcium sulfate) to brewing water to deliberately chase this effect anywhere in the world, regardless of the local water's natural mineral content.
Why it shaped a style
When large-scale commercial pale ale brewing developed in Burton-on-Trent in the 19th century, brewers were working with this water without fully understanding the chemistry behind it — they simply found that beer brewed there came out with a distinctive dry, crisp, hop-forward character that became closely associated with the town and, eventually, with English pale ale as a category. The high bicarbonate alongside the high calcium also helps buffer mash pH effectively even with a fairly pale grain bill, which suits a hop-forward, moderately-coloured beer better than a very dark one.
Using this profile
This is a historical reference approximation, not a live feed of Burton's actual current municipal supply — treat it as a target to build toward with brewing salts (primarily gypsum) rather than an exact certificate of analysis. If you're chasing a sharp, dry, English-pale-ale-style bitterness, building your brewing water up toward something in this general sulfate range — while testing your own base water first, since starting mineral content varies enormously by location — is the standard approach. See the water reference hub for how this compares to softer profiles like Pilsen's, which pushed brewing in the opposite direction entirely.
Reaching genuine Burton-level sulfate from scratch with most municipal water supplies takes a meaningful gypsum addition, and pushing sulfate that high can read as harsh or minerally if overdone on a beer that isn't built to carry it — most modern brewers use a scaled-down version of this profile rather than reproducing it exactly.