What is made here
Wine colours
Colours the rules allow. Pick a colour to filter the rules and grapes below.
Where it is
Alentejo in Portugal
- Latitude
- 37.7°–39.5° N
- Vineyard altitude
- 154 m to 440 m
- Production zone
- 912,882 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 Alentejo must meet.
Blend rules
Alentejo vinho tinto
- ≥ 75% Quadro 1 varieties (Antão-Vaz, Arinto, Roupeiro, Aragonez, Trincadeira, Alicante-Bouschet...) · Main grape
- ≤ 25% Quadro 2 varieties · Allowed
Blend rules
Alentejo vinho branco
- ≥ 75% Quadro 1 varieties (Antão-Vaz, Arinto, Roupeiro, Aragonez, Trincadeira, Alicante-Bouschet...) · Main grape
- ≤ 25% Quadro 2 varieties · Allowed
Blend rules
Alentejo vinho rosado ou rosé
- ≥ 75% Quadro 1 varieties (Antão-Vaz, Arinto, Roupeiro, Aragonez, Trincadeira, Alicante-Bouschet...) · Main grape
- ≤ 25% Quadro 2 varieties · Allowed
Blend rules
Alentejo vinho espumante de qualidade
- ≥ 75% Quadro 1 varieties (Antão-Vaz, Arinto, Roupeiro, Aragonez, Trincadeira, Alicante-Bouschet...) · Main grape
- ≤ 25% Quadro 2 varieties · Allowed
Blend rules
Alentejo vinho licoroso
- ≥ 75% Quadro 1 varieties (Antão-Vaz, Arinto, Roupeiro, Aragonez, Trincadeira, Alicante-Bouschet...) · Main grape
- ≤ 25% Quadro 2 varieties · Allowed
Other varieties allowed
Besides the main grapes, the rules allow these varieties in some wines. Grape names link where a profile exists.
67 varieties · Alentejo vinho espumante de qualidade, Alentejo vinho licoroso
Alfrocheiro, Alicante Bouschet, Alicante Branco, Alvarinho, Antão Vaz, Arinto, Baga, Bical, Cabernet Sauvignon, Caladoc, Carignan, Castelão, Chardonnay, Chasselas, Cinsaut, Corropio, Diagalves, Durif, Encruzado, Fernão Pires, Gewürztraminer, Gouveio, Grand Noir, Grenache, Larião, Malvasia Fina, Malvasia Rei, Manteúdo Preto, Marsanne, Merlot, Moreto, Moscatel Graúdo, Mourisco Branco, Nero d'Avola, Perrum, Petit Manseng, Petit Verdot, Pinot Grigio, Pinot Noir, Rabo de Ovelha, Riesling, Roussanne, Sangiovese, Sauvignon Blanc, Semillon, Sercial, Syrah, Síria, Tamarez, Tannat, Tempranillo, Tinta Barocca, Tinta Caiada, Tinta Carvalha, Tinta Grossa, Tinta Miúda, Tinto Cao, Touriga Franca, Touriga Nacional, Trincadeira, Trincadeira Das Pratas, Tália, Verdelho, Vermentino, Viognier, Viosinho, Zinfandel
In the vineyard and cellar: rules for every wine
Training
Systems allowed
cordão; guyot; taça
02 · Climate fingerprint
The climate
The growing season averages 20.6 °C, hot on Gregory Jones's scale, with 2,274 growing degree days (Winkler V).
The average year 1991–2020, vineyards at about 260 m
Monthly mean, °CRain, mmGrowing season
- Growing-season temperature
- 20.6 °C
- Hot · 19–21 °C (Jones)
- Growing degree days
- 2,274
- Region V: 2,222 and over degree days
- Growing-season rain
- 243 mm
- Of 561 mm a year
- Harvest rain
- 112 mm
- September–October
Copernicus ERA5-Land monthly averages at 5 vineyard points (Vineyard point 1, 200 m; Vineyard point 2, 423 m; Vineyard point 3, 136 m; Vineyard point 4, 225 m; Vineyard point 5, 316 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. Campidano di TerralbaVery similarCompared with Alentejo: same season warmth, similar rain.
2. Rosso di CerignolaVery similarCompared with Alentejo: same season warmth, similar rain.
3. Sardegna SemidanoVery similarCompared with Alentejo: same season warmth, similar rain.
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, 112 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
- Product specification: Alentejo (Caderno de específicações- DO Alentejo 07.09.011.pdf) · National authority, as filed in the EU register (eAmbrosia) · Official document
- Climate profiles calculated by Vinous: method
Still to check (3)
- Generated from EU reference data: check against the current product specification.
- From the specification: Sub-regions: Borba, Évora, Granja-Amareleja, Moura, Portalegre, Redondo, Reguengos and Vidigueira. Quadro 1 (at least 75 % of the blend) lists Antão-Vaz, Arinto, Fernão-Pires, Manteúdo, Perrum, Rabo-de-Ovelha, Síria (Roupeiro), Tamarez, Trincadeira-das-Pratas, Alfrocheiro, Alicante-Bouschet, Aragonez, Cabernet-Sauvignon, Castelão, Syrah, Touriga-Nacional and Trincadeira; Quadro 2 lists further varieties allowed up to 25 %. Yields may be adjusted annually by up to 25 %; no natural-strength minimum is given for rosé. Vinho de Talha (amphora wine), Colheita Tardia (late harvest) and Vinho Edulcorado are described but have no separate analytical limits. Vines must be low-trained; vines in alluvial, colluvial and black or non-calcareous red-brown clay soils are excluded, and areas above 700 m are excluded in Portalegre. 85 % of a lot must come from the stated vintage.
- National tier (DOC/DOCG) not captured yet; rules extracted from the specification text.