International top scores

99 top marks from global wine guides

99 top grades for 68 Alto Adige wines by 29 producers: the current editions of the six most renowned non-Italian wine guides worldwide once again bestowed the best possible ratings on a whole range of Alto Adige wines.

Above all else, those marks show that the top of the quality pyramid of Alto Adige wine production is not a peak but a plateau, with room for many. That is definitely true for the grape varieties, which are testament to the fact that Alto Adige has turned into a white wine country. 60 out of the 99 top grades went to white wines, 30 went to red wines, and the remaining nine were awarded to sweet wines.

However, even though white wines collected more top marks in total than reds, the one variety with the most accolades is, in fact, a red: Pinot Noir accounts for twelve of the 68 accoladed wines. It is followed by Chardonnay (ten top-rated wines), Pinot Blanc (eight), Lagrein (seven), and Sauvignon (six).

The wide range of top products also becomes evident in the large number of those who received at least one top mark—no fewer than 29 producers, with the Cantina Terlano winery in the lead with 21 top marks. The wine with the highest number of top grades (five), the 2020 Primo Grande Cuvée, is also a Cantina Terlano wine. The 2018 Appius by the St. Michael-Eppan winery as well as the 2010 Rarity Pinot Bianco by the Cantina Terlano winery each scored four top ratings.

Decanter

Decanter

Founded in London in 1975, Decanter is one of the oldest and most renowned media aimed exclusively at wine lovers. Over almost 50 years, Decanter has become one of the world’s leading wine critics, reaching around 2.2 million users each month in over 100 countries around the world through its print, digital and social channels.

Falstaff Weinguide

Falstaff Weinguide

Falstaff’s roots are in Austria, where a wine magazine was first published under this name in 1980. With its web and print offerings, Falstaff has in the meantime become one of the leading wine media in the German-speaking world, with a total circulation of around 150,000 copies. Falstaff also publishes its own country-specific wine guides.

Gault&Millau

Gault&Millau

The 1970s saw French journalists Henri Gault and Christian Millau start their experimental gourmet guide which has been published under the name of its founders ever since. In its fifty years of existence, Gault&Millau has become one of the world’s most renowned gourmet guides, in 2021 adding a series of regional wine guides, including its own guide to Alto Adige.

James Suckling

James Suckling

For almost 30 years the Los Angeles-born wine critic James Suckling was one of the brains behind “The Wine Spectator”, according to the business magazine Forbes “one of the most powerful wine critics in the world”. Since 2010 Suckling has assumed responsibility for his own wine platform, JamesSuckling.com, on which some 25,000 wines are rated annually.

Robert Parker – The Wine Advocate

Robert Parker – The Wine Advocate

Hailing from Baltimore in the USA, Robert Parker is actually a lawyer, but his heart has always belonged to wine. In the late 1970s he began publishing a wine guide under the title “The Wine Advocate”, today one of the most renowned and influential in the business, reaching readers in more than 40 countries around the world.

VINUM wine guide

VINUM wine guide

Launched in Zurich in 1980, the VINUM trade journal today describes itself as a “magazine for wine culture” and is published in different editions in several countries (as well as online). VINUM also publishes its own wine guides year on year, which in a relatively short time have achieved an influential position, especially in the German-speaking wine world.

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