Beige/brite adipocytes are induced within white adipose tissues (WAT) and, when activated, consume glucose and fatty acids to produce heat. Classically, two stimuli have been used to trigger a beiging response: cold temperatures and β3-adrenergic receptor ( ) agonists. These two beiging triggers have been used interchangeably but whether these two stimuli may induce beiging differently at cellular and molecular levels remains unclear. Here, we found that cold-induced beige adipocyte formation requires 1, not , activation. 1 activation stimulates WAT resident perivascular ( +) cells to form cold-induced beige adipocytes. In contrast, activation stimulates mature white adipocytes to convert into beige adipocytes. Necessity tests, using mature adipocyte-specific deletion strategies, demonstrated that adipocytes are required and are predominant source to generate -induced, but not cold-induced, beige adipocytes. Collectively, we identify that cold temperatures and agonists activate distinct cellular populations that express different β-adrenergic receptors to induce beige adipogenesis.