A popular soft drink has been dumped from Australian shelves, replaced by another that is dividing fizzy fans.

Rumours that the lemon-flavoured drink Lift was about to be dumped circulated earlier this year – and were confirmed on Tuesday.

“Ready-to-drink formats of Lift will be phased out of stores by the end of September 2022, except for glass 330 millilitres, which will be phased out by the end of 2022,” a Coca-Cola Australia spokesperson told news.com.au.

Lift, described by Coca-Cola as “hard-hitting lemon”, has been sold in Australia since the 1970s. It has declined in popularity in recent year, with consumers turning to alternatives such as Solo and Kirks.

Coca-Cola Australia said it would replace Lift with a new lemon-based carbonated drink. Sprite Lemon+, which is sold through Coles, Woolworths and other major supermarkets, is a variation on the traditional lemon and lime combination of Sprite.

The new Sprite Lemon+ and its Zero Sugar variety both contain caffeine, which Lift does not. The spokesperson told TND the company believed both new options would be popular with Lift drinkers.

“We’re always evolving our product portfolio to provide more of what people want and we only introduce recipes we feel will bring more followers to our brands,” they said.

But that change has already divided some social media viewers.

Fans flooded a recent TikTok video showing the new Spite Lemon+ in a Coles supermarket with disappointed comments.

“Lift with caffeine added, great,” one user said.

“Why did they have to add caffeine,” another said.

“Solo is better anyways,” wrote one TikTok user on a post from Russ.Eats, who replied: “Apparently that’s the reason for deleting! Solo is killing them in sales”.

In addition, there was at least one vote for a popular home-grown staple.

“Eh, the 75 cent pub squash is better anyway,” posted a fan.