Bordeaux 2025: The region's exciting exploration of top dry whites continues

Despite significant summer heat and drought, many producers crafted wines with adequate acidity and moderate alcohol levels, thanks largely to early harvesting decisions and, in many cases, naturally small berries with concentrated acids.

As Antoine Médeville, enologist with the Médoc wine consultant Oenoconseil, explained, the pace of the harvest was unusually rapid.

‘We never picked grapes as early or as quickly as we did this year, starting around 15 August,’ Médeville said.

‘It had to happen quickly, as we were already seeing low acidities and wanted to preserve freshness.

‘In a normal harvest, many of our clients would make three passes in the vineyard, but this time, many only did the harvest in just one quick go.’

Such haste and extremes are rarely ideal, and not all wines found their balance.

A longer, more gradual harvest window generally allows for greater precision. And 2025 cannot match such excellent dry white vintages in Bordeaux as 2014 or 2017.

And yet, concerns about the unusually compressed picking period may be somewhat overstated.

The dry white at Château Margaux, for example, showed strong balance and freshness, suggesting that timely decisions could deliver convincing results even under pressure.

As director Philippe Bascaules observed, such conditions are in fact less problematic for whites than for reds.

‘It is enough to harvest earlier,’ he noted, even if a shorter ripening period is not ideal.

He added that hot, dry conditions are ‘more concerning’ for reds than for whites, remarking: ‘Now I finally understand why Greek dry whites are better than their reds.’

Well-timed picking

This perspective helps explain why, even in a challenging year, well-timed picking preserved freshness and avoided excessive alcohol: key factors behind the vintage’s success.

One of my favourite wines from the Médoc is the Brane-Cantenac blanc, harvested between 20–28 August from vines on cooler clay soils, and a marked improvement over the inaugural 2019, which showed a more overtly varietal profile.

Some readers may wonder whether the late August rains played a role, but most producers say they were not decisive, as many white grapes had already been harvested.

‘The grapes were ready to pick before the rains,’ Médeville stressed.

That said, cooler terroirs, whether due to microclimate or deeper clay and limestone soils, allowed for harvesting into early September.

In these cases, producers such as Olivier Bernard of Domaine de Chevalier suggest that waiting slightly longer helped to achieve better ripeness and balance.

Outcomes nevertheless vary. While some wines lean toward either softness or angularity, the stronger examples reconcile freshness with sufficient ripeness.

Winemaking choices also proved critical: Médeville emphasised that lees stirring (bâtonnage) played an important role in not only building texture and mid-palate weight, helping to integrate the vintage’s naturally high acidity, but also for binding oxygen and oxidative compounds, slowing down oxidation.

What's new?

Dry whites are one of the clearest growth stories in Bordeaux right now.

2025 marked the first widespread commercial releases under the new AOC Médoc Blanc designation.

White cuvées such as Baron de Brane, Les Griffons de Pichon Baron, Caillou Blanc de Talbot and De Malleret Blanc will be designated under the new label.

First-ever or expanded white projects have appeared across the region.

Château Meyney produced Bordeaux’s potentially only Blanc de Noir dry whites – 100% Cabernet Sauvignon vinified as white from silt and gravel soils with a 9,000-bottle production.

Ormes de Pez released the first vintage from newly planted Sauvignon and Sémillon inside St-Estèphe (replacing Merlot and Cabernet Sauvignon on 4ha).

Château du Tertre introduced the second vintage (but first EP tasting) of its new white wine project, Alba, a blend of Chardonnay and Gros Manseng on sandy soils as a sister wine to its main white wine.

Château Siran made its first dry white in 50 years – a single barrel of Chardonnay and Chenin bottled as Vin de France.

Château La Lagune launched the first vintage of its white wine made from Sémillon and Sauvignon Blanc from 3ha of vines grafted in 2023 and a further 2ha grafted last year.

Château Montrose incorporated Marsanne and Roussanne into its blanc for the first time.

Château Léoville Las Cases presented the first vintage of its white white, a project that started in 2019 with the purchase of seven vineyard plots (2.5ha) in the northern Médoc.

It is a blend of 50% Sémillon, 25% Roussanne and 25% Marsanne and will be labelled as a Vin de France.

Its inception co-incided with the arrival of Arnauld Hubert who wrote his thesis on Bordeaux whites for his degree at Bordeaux Sciences Agro, an elite engineering school specialising in agricultural sciences, food, environment and related fields..

Further reading from this report

• Pomerol
• St-Emilion
• Pessac-Léognan & Graves
• Crus Bourgeois
• Pauillac
• St-Estèphe
• Margaux
• St-Julien
• Sauternes

Bordeaux 2025: Top dry white wines

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