In the sense of making tea/beverages, what’s the difference between 淹れる vs 入れる?
The difference is that… they don’t mean the same thing at all?
淹れる means to make tea/coffee
入れる means to put in. I guess you could use it to describe specifically the action of putting tea into something, but that’s still different.
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Nope they do in this case, 茶を入れる is taken straight out of the genki II textbook defined as “To make tea, coffee, etc.” Also listed as the 7th definition on Jisho.
That’s probably there just for beginners to be able to describe something without using complex Kanji and whatnot. 淹れる is by far the more common way of writing it. In fact, I kind of agree with @Naphthalene on his assessment of the two above
My japanese sensei actually used 入れる in this context in the homework、I’ll probably just ask tomorrow. This is an intermediate course and we’ve used more difficult kanji, so still sort of unconvinced about that assumption.
淹 is outside of the range of Jouyou kanji, so even though it is the “correct” way to write the いれる used for making tea or coffee, for instance, I have seen plenty of packaging and other Japanese people use 入れる more commonly instead. Probably not a bad idea to keep the more advanced one in the back of your mind if you can, though.
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Yeah. I tried the Google Search trick - 淹れる gets 1.2 million results, while 茶を入れる gets 9.2 million.
Also found this page on the subject (albeit specifically in reference to coffee):
http://www.kimameya.co.jp/mame/ireru.html
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Exactly my point and why I’m confused. Both are used interchangeably… so are there any differences?.. All we have to go on are assumptions based on the frequencies of use.
Using google to act as corpus doesn’t really prove anything because it also includes trash data and fragmented results. I did check the Tsukuba corpus and お茶を入れる has come up more times than お茶を淹れる. (In fact the latter did not make the list at all). According to monolingual dictionary sources 淹れる is specifically making a drink using hot water, and 入れる also means 淹れる in addition to a long list of other things as well. So one way is more specific than the other with regard to use.
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The link @Belthazar gave actually explains the difference.
淹れる means only “make”
入れる means either make or pour. It’s also used when 常用漢字 are favored (since the other one isn’t a 常用漢字)
not to toot my own horn, but that’s pretty much what I just said in my first post…
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thanks guys 
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I see the “make tea” definition as #10 for 入れる with “also written as 淹れる” just for that one definition. So it’s not that they mean something completely different, I guess I’m just nitpicking your toot 
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That’s rather anecdotal, but the last time I looked for coffee brewing methods on YouTube I saw both kanji. Actually, I had the slight impression that 入 was more frequent, but… well, it’s been months since that, so…
Apparently, it can also be written 点れる, at least according to my dictionary, though that’s probably not too common.
So I just consulted my native Japanese colleague and he said he’d never even used the kanji 淹 before. In his dictionary, 淹れる is listed as making tea, coffee, etc. So it’s a kanji that exists, but is rarely used by native Japanese people.
He said that everybody uses 入れる or just the hiragana いれる in reference to making tea/coffee and that there really isn’t a meaning difference between the two.
Well, maybe he didn’t, but it’s a pretty common kanji anyway 
(cf the packaging a few comments above. It’s the first character in there)
I’d also be careful with the “I’ve never used that before” from random Japanese people. They might not go to the trouble of using it while texting someone or writing something simple, but I’ve seen this kanji in coffee shops (those info things like “How do we make our coffee?” or “What’s so good about the way we make our coffee?”) and novels countless times. I doubt most adults would be stumped upon seeing it, even if they might instinctively say out of context that they never use it.
If someone studying English came to me and asked me how to use “in the midst of”, I might instinctively say that it’s not really used, even though that’s not exactly the case. There might be a feeling of “this is way too advanced for what I’ve seen you do, or what I think you can do” behind these kinds of answers. I try to nuance my answers as much as I can when these things happen. But it’s easy to underestimate a learner’s ability.
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I feel I should amend what I said a little 
Not random Japanese people, but I work at a Japanese public school. I’ve now asked three of the Japanese teachers that I work with, including one Japanese language teacher and two English language teachers. (And yes I do acknowledge that three people do not represent all speakers.) One of the English teachers was totally unfamiliar with the kanji and had to look it up in a dictionary, even with a contextual sentence, while the other two knew it and insisted that they would never use it. The other English teacher likened it to certain English phrases you could read in a novel or advertisement, but would sound silly/overly dramatic if used in the real world.
Take that as you will, but that’s what I was told when I asked.
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Someone doesn’t drink much coffee on top of the picture I posted earlier, I just passed a coffee shop which used it on its sign (as @Kqaotix said as well)
My spouse (Japanese) mentioned they would use that kanji if using an IME, but probably hiragana if writing by hand. So, yeah, it probably varies a lot from person to person.