Taiwan's tea-picking opera has always been classified by the government as one type of mainland Chinese opera. In Taiwan, however, it has become rather difficult to distinguish between tea-picking opera and Taiwanese opera, for the two have greatly influenced each other. It is only in recent years that Hakka tea-picking opera and other Hakka opera forms have come to be seen as a category in their own right.
台灣的採茶戲一開始被政府列入大陸劇種，後來又與歌仔戲混淆不清，直到近年，客家採茶戲才以「客家戲曲」之名，被視為單一劇種。