What is made here
Wine colours
Colours the rules allow. Pick a colour to filter the rules and grapes below.
Where it is
León in Spain
- Latitude
- 42.0°–42.6° N
- Vineyard altitude
- 762 m to 835 m
- Production zone
- 359,069 ha
Boundary drawn from whole communes, so it is a little larger than the legal zone. Boundary: Eurac Research PDO inventory (CC0). Country outlines: Natural Earth. Dots on the zone map are the vineyard points used for climate.
Showing every colour The colour filter changes the rules and grapes. Climate, vintages and soils describe the vineyards, so they stay the same.
01 · What the law says
The rules
Limits on grapes, yields, ripeness and ageing that every wine labelled León must meet.
Blend rules
León aged and unaged rosé wines
- ≥ 60% Prieto Picudo / Mencía / Negro Saurí · Main grape
- ≤ 40% Tempranillo / Garnacha / white varieties · Allowed
Blend rules
León red wines
- ≥ 60% Prieto Picudo / Mencía / Negro Saurí · Main grape
- ≤ 40% other red varieties · Allowed
Blend rules
León aged red wines
- ≥ 60% Prieto Picudo / Mencía / Negro Saurí · Main grape
- ≤ 40% other red varieties · Allowed
Other varieties allowed
Besides the main grapes, the rules allow these varieties in some wines. Grape names link where a profile exists.
7 varieties ·
Albarín Blanco, Godello, Grenache, Mencía, Prieto Picudo, Tempranillo, Verdejo
In the vineyard and cellar: rules for every wine
1,100
Vines per hectare, minimum
Training
Systems allowed
goblet; trellis
02 · Climate fingerprint
The climate
The growing season averages 16.4 °C, intermediate on Gregory Jones's scale, with 1,384 growing degree days (Winkler Ib).
The average year 1991–2020, vineyards at about 800 m
Monthly mean, °CRain, mmGrowing season
- Growing-season temperature
- 16.4 °C
- Intermediate · 15–17 °C (Jones)
- Growing degree days
- 1,384
- Region Ib: 1,111–1,388 degree days
- Growing-season rain
- 291 mm
- Of 532 mm a year
- Harvest rain
- 102 mm
- September–October
Copernicus ERA5-Land monthly averages at 5 vineyard points (Vineyard point 1, 824 m; Vineyard point 2, 835 m; Vineyard point 3, 761 m; Vineyard point 4, 838 m; Vineyard point 5, 741 m), moved to each point's height from the model's terrain. Indices that need daily data are not captured yet. How the climate figures are made.
Closest climates in the database
Picked by the data, not by hand: the profiles nearest on season warmth (counted twice), degree days, rain, ripening-month nights and day–night range. Neighbours within 30 km are left out, as they share the same weather.
1. Prado de IracheVery similarCompared with León: same season warmth, wetter (+74 mm).
2. Távora-VarosaVery similarCompared with León: same season warmth, wetter (+85 mm).
3. RiojaVery similarCompared with León: same season warmth, wetter (+72 mm).
Growing-season temperature
Growing degree days
Growing-season rain
03 · Year by year
35 vintages
Each column is one growing season: heat above or below the 1991–2020 average, and rain at harvest. Pick a year for the details.
Warmer than averageCooler than averageHarvest rain (Sep–Oct)Average harvest rain, 102 mm
2025
- Growing-season temp.
- Growing degree days
- Harvest rain
- Growing-season rain
- September nights
- Hot days and frosts
Seasons are labelled by harvest year (April–October). Year-to-year changes from ERA5-Land; tested against station records in Alto Adige (r = 0.94 for season temperature at Bolzano). Rain varies more locally, so treat single-season rain with some caution. Vintage ratings, harvest dates and frost or hail events have places in the data model but are not loaded yet.
04 · Where the numbers come from
Sources
- A geospatial inventory of regulatory information for wine protected designations of origin in Europe · Candiago et al., Scientific Data 9, 394 (2022); Eurac Research · CC0
- ERA5-Land monthly averaged data (reanalysis-era5-land-monthly-means) · Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), Climate Data Store · CC BY 4.0 (Copernicus licence)
- OpenStreetMap vineyard areas (landuse=vineyard), from Geofabrik country extracts · OpenStreetMap contributors · ODbL 1.0
- Copernicus DEM GLO-90 (AWS open data tiles) · European Space Agency / Copernicus · Copernicus DEM licence
- Single document: León (Official Journal C, C/2024/1620, 16.2.2024; and the technical file 'Ares(2014)2153208' from the EU register) · European Union, Official Journal (C series) · EU law (Commission reuse policy)
- Climate profiles calculated by Vinous: method
Still to check (3)
- Generated from EU reference data: check against the current product specification.
- From the specification: Yields depend on training: gobelet white 7,000 kg/ha (51.80 hl/ha), trellised white 10,000 (74), gobelet red 6,000 (44.44), trellised red 8,000 (59.20); trellised limits recorded. Density at most 4,000 vines/ha and 40,000 fruitful buds/ha. Sweet and semi-sweet wines are made by stopping fermentation; Crianza, Reserva and Gran Reserva follow general legislation (no periods given). Bottling must take place in the production area.
- National tier (DOC/DOCG) not captured yet; rules extracted from the specification text.