Is a great wine vintage worth a long drive? In this guide, learn when the year on the bottle is a key indicator of quality and when it’s just a number.

Typically, when you look at a bottle of wine, a year is printed on the label[i]. This is telling us the year of the harvest, the year the fruit was picked. Vintage, then, is a snapshot of the terroir and general climate characteristics of the plot of land where the vines grow for any given year. Was spring too cold? Was summer too hot? Was there some early rainfall during autumn? Or were conditions just stressful enough for the vines to produce excellent fruit?

If you dig a little, you’ll find that the 2016 vintage in Bordeaux was precisely that[ii]. On the other hand, 2017[iii], though not awful, was a far more challenging vintage for wine in Bordeaux. Back-to-back years yielded wildly different wines. 2016 will be sought by collectors willing to pay a pretty penny for exceptional vintages. 2017 not so much, at least for reds in the region. In other words, wine vintages matter. Undoubtedly quality differs year to year. Each season we get a different snapshot. Some pristine, some out of focus.

But those two vintages are extreme cases great for making a point. Are wine vintages always important?

When Does Wine Vintage Matter?

There are wine regions in the world where climatic conditions can vary significantly from year to year. In those, vintages are important. France has that kind of capricious weather, and therefore wine vintage is important in regions like Bordeaux and Burgundy. Other regions in this country are also impacted by changing weather, like Champagne and Rhône.

But France in not alone in the finicky climate department amongst Old World wine producing countries. Vintage is equally important in Italy’s Piedmont and Alto Adige, as well as German and Austrian wine regions.

The New World is also susceptible. Some regions in New Zealand, for instance. Vintage can also play a role in some areas in the south of Chile. Let’s remember that south of the equator, the farther south you go, the colder it gets. And in Chile it gets colder, yes, but also rainier, and, as we know, it rains more in some years than in others. The regions I’m talking about are Itata, Osorno, and Bío Bío[iv].

Right. We’ve talked about climate and how it is important when talking about vintage in wines. Anything else?

Wine Vintage and Wine Aging

Yes. Those two are related. You never really know how well[v] a wine will age, providing it’s stored adequately. Wines with long aging potential are those with an ideal level of tannins, acidity, and sugars[vi]. An exceptional harvest year will spawn grapes with precisely those qualities.

If you’re looking to buy a bottle for long-term storage, it’s a good idea to pay attention to the vintage. In my example above, a 2016 Bordeaux is likely to age better than a 2017 one. Likewise, if you’re buying an already old bottle of wine, if you want to drink[vii]—and enjoy!—it, it’s good practice to find out how good that vintage was. For instance, most of the 1980s red Burgundies might be too old to drink. However, the 1978 vintage was excellent, and some of those bottles[viii] might be peaking right now!

That’s it for when you want to look closely at the wine vintage. Now let’s see when you might not.

When Doesn’t Wine Vintage Matter?

It never matters.

Ok, ok, drop the pitchforks. I wanted to get the “when does it” out of the way first, so you realize that there are times when vintage in wines is important, especially when thinking about aging potential.

However, most of us (or at least most of the wine we buy) will not be for long-term storage. And by “long-term” I mean over 20 years, where wine vintage truly becomes important. Remember, age is not an indicator of quality.

If you plan to drink your wine within five or so years[ix], different vintages will bring forth subtle distinctions between bottles, but they all will taste fine. In her wonderful book The Wine Bible, Karen MacNeil tells an anecdote in a wine store in California:

“A customer held up a bottle of wine (…) and demanded, “Is this a good vintage?” (the store owner) pleasantly replied, “Good for what? Good for sex? Good for oysters? Good for sitting outside on the deck?” The point was taken.”

(MacNeil 2022, p. 81)

Point was indeed taken. She goes on to describe a vintage as a mood. And I also agree with her there. One year it will be more outgoing and expressive, while in others neat and delicate. If you already like Brunello, you’ll like it in whatever mood it shows when uncorked. What you like in a wine is personal and independent of the vintage quality.

Besides, will you be surprised to know that vintage quality is determined by critics, but there’s not always consensus?

Vintage Quality is Subjective

If you look at different sources for 2011 Bordeaux reds, you will find great disparity. Critics rated Pomerol[x] as low as an 88 and as high as a 95. Now, a 95 is one I would happily store for a couple of decades at least. On the other hand, I might not even purchase an 88[xi]. What they all agree on is that these wines are ready to drink right now. So, if you were hoping to store them another decade or so, you’re out of luck.

I’m out of luck, because it just so happens that I have a 2011 Saint-Émilion (neighbor to Pomerol) in storage right now. It’ll be my Christmas wine, but I might have to bring a back-up, just in case.

Is Wine Vintage Important in The New World?

I mentioned above a few places where yearly weather variations are important enough to think about vintage, but in general I would say no. New World wineries care about consistency. They work hard to make their wines similar enough year to year. There are craft wineries that want a clearer expression of terroir in their wines, of course, but for most of the wine available, vintage is not really very significant.

The Last Drop

I’m fascinated by how wine develops inside a bottle, so I do study vintage charts whenever I’m looking for a wine to store. But I don’t go crazy about it. Furthermore, it’s not like aged wines are what I drink. I really don’t. Most of the time, if I uncork an old bottle it’s because I forgot I had it. The majority of the wines I drink are less than 10 years old, with a high percentage being less than 5.

To close, let me give you a hypothetical. You’re in a store looking to buy a bottle. The honest owner offers you a 2019 vintage, which he says was a good year. However, if you want, their sister store has a 2020, which was an exceptional vintage. The store is an hour drive away. Would the drive be worth it for a better vintage? How much better could the wine be? What about if the store was a three-hour drive away?

If I’m not planning on storing that wine for a long time, I have my answer. How about you?

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Footnotes

[i] There are some exceptions, particularly with sparkling wines and port, where no vintage is used. Winemakers blend different vintages to create their wines, so no single vintage is printed.

[ii] A long dry summer allowed grapes to fully ripen, and some late rain prevented overconcentration.

[iii] April frost reduced yields and caused uneven grape development. Also, a mid-September rain—right during harvesting season—was detrimental for some growers, as they still hadn’t harvested their Merlots and Cabernet Sauvignons. On the other hand, white wine grapes had already been picked, and they turned out excellent. It was an inconsistent year.

[iv] There are others, but those three are probably the better known ones. If you’re curious, however, you also have Cautín and Malleco. And I’ll say that even some regions north of Itata can get unwanted rainfall late summer. Also, it’s hard to predict where the wine industry will be in Chile in the next couple of decades due to climate chamge.

[v] Although the proper way to say this would be “for how long”. We don’t really know for how long a wine will age.

[vi] Sweet wines age for longer than dry wines, as sugar—like acid—is a preservative. However, I’m also talking about balanced alcohols (remember, sugar + yeast = alcohol + CO₂). Wine with too much alcohol might oxidize sooner.

[vii] Some people buy only to collect, or as an investment (to sell the bottle later), so they don’t plan to drink it, and therefore don’t care about how good the wine is to drink.

[viii] Particularly those from the Côte de Beaune AOC.

[ix] It’s worth noting that most wines are not made to be stored for over a year or two.

[x] AOC from the right bank of Bordeaux, therefore primarily Merlot and Cabernet Franc blends.

[xi] I use myself for this example, but you already know I don’t pay much attention to ratings.

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Cover Image: Wine Vintages proudly displayed on the shelves. Photo by Liv Kao.