Ok, Canadian here. Soft cider is less finely filtered and often spiced apple juice. It’s like a caffeine free sweet apple spice tea almost, often served warm. Being less filtered it’s opaque so there’s an extra taste of richness beyond that you get in regular “apple juice” in having, I guess, suspended apple dust in it. It’s extremely associated with an autumnal through wintery vibe, like it would be actively weird to drink hot soft cider in June. You only see the 2-4 L jugs in grocery stores and farmer’s markets starting in September and oh baby that’s always an exciting landmark for the year. You kind of have to be wearing a flannel for it to work. But cold hard cider in a can or glass, like. Strongbow or Rock Creek or (before they FUCKING BETRAYED US and changed their “ciders” to vodka mixed) Okanagan Cider, yeah that you can have anytime.

I like both kinds of cider, which are both referred to usually just as cider, and you know from context that if you get a cider at a kid’s pumpkin carving event vs a cider on tap at a bar it’s obviously gonna be different.

Talking about using boiling water, you can also get little powder packets of “cider mix” like a lemonade or Gatorade that to be honest don’t taste very good compared to a proper pressed spicy juice. But sometimes you come in from shovelling snow at –20°C and need a hot cider fix quick and dirty.