This is one of the most famous and the oldest tea estates in Darjeeling district, producing some of the finest tea varieties, and is also one of the first to set up a tea processing factory. It's located 3 km from Kurseong town. Makaibari tea estate was established in the year of 1859 by Girish Chandra Banerjee who was from a Zemindar family from Borai. The Makaibari Tea Estate is beautifully located in the land of the white orchids along with 70% of the estate is covered under forest. There is a flora and fauna in the dense forest of the tea estate. When the Makaibari Tea Estate was first established it was the first tea factory in the world which had no connections with British and it was the only tea estate owned by an Indian family. Earlier the Makaibari Tea Estate was owned by Girish Chandra Banerjee but in the year of 1970s he handed over the tea estate to Swaraj Kumar Banerjee. Later in the year of 2014, the tea estate was overtaken by the Luxmi Group the Kolkata based Group, however; Swaraj Kumar Banerjee continued to be a chairman of the company till 2017. In 2017, Swaraj Kumar Banerjee finally left Makaibari handing over reigns of the tea estate to Rudra Chatterjee who was his junior. Now the Luxmi group owns almost 17 tea estates in Tripura, Assam and North Bengal. The Makaibari Tea Estate has more than 500 workers and almost 40 plus permanent staff. The workers of the tea estate are provided with some facilities like food grains, umbrella, and shoes. The management has also established a primary school along with a club, a computer centre, community halls with a set of television and a library for the children of the garden workers. They also have a facility of free medical treatment in the garden hospital. The visitors can explore the estate through activities like tea plucking, tea tasting or scaling the slopes where the tea grows. Now a day’s Makaibari has also organized a home-stay arrangement in and around the villages of tea estate for the travellers those who want to stay and learn more about the tea plantation and the lifestyle of the villagers. The homestays provide accommodation along with a delicious local food.