How long do you ferment?

[Psylocide]

This beer has been fermenting 5 days now. I will forget about going 4 weeks.

I don't know what the yeast is that comes with Coopers Canned extract kits, but could it handle upping the temperature for the remaining time?
I'm currently fermenting at about 68-69°

Personally, I wouldn't go any higher, though Coopers states that it can go up to 75° (Ale yeast).

 

[FatDragon]

I am completely qualified to give an opinion - it might or might not be correct. For average beers, I like 3 weeks fermentation. I just take gravity readings 3 days apart to be sure it's stable - I don't like to leave it any longer once I have opened it and dipped into it. 4 weeks is ok, but I doubt if it will improve the beer. Even the third week probably doesn't make any difference if all the fermentation conditions were favorable, but it might help clean up if necessary.

For conditioning, 3 weeks at 70 degrees is the general guideline for average beers. Then 7 days in the fridge. I don't have room in the fridge for 7 days worth of beer, so mine gets 2 days. Seems fine to me. Hope this helps.

For fridge conditioning, I notice a difference between a day and a few hours and a similar difference between two days and one day, but anything beyond two days brings diminishing returns. My fridge is similarly inadequate so even though I only drink a beer a day, I rarely refrigerate a beer more than three or four days because there's not much room for beer to sit around undrunk in there.