Wine Spectator Scores and Tasting Notes

How does Wine Spectator taste and evaluate wines?
Wine Spectator's experts review more than 15,000 wines each year in blind tastings.  Our database features only those ratings and does not merge ratings...
Tue, 28 May, 2019 at 11:17 AM
What does it mean when a wine is rated and it specifically says "Drink Now"?
A wine described as "Drink Now" is one that we believe will not improve with further aging. It may stay at its current quality for some time—six m...
Wed, 6 Aug, 2014 at 3:06 PM
How do I submit wines for review?
If you produce or represent a wine you would like Wine Spectator to review, please contact the appropriate office for detailed information. Contacting u...
Sat, 20 Sep, 2014 at 1:03 AM
I am a wine producer (importer, distributor, retailer) whose wine was sent to Wine Spectator for tasting. How can I find the review? Can I request it directly from Wine Spectator?
No wine review is released before it is made public to our readers. Wine Spectator staffers are not permitted to share wine reviews with anyone, including t...
Sat, 4 Oct, 2014 at 5:17 AM
Do distributors and retailers get advance notice of wine ratings before magazine and online subscribers?
Our Wine Spectator Advance newsletter provides online members and retailers a look at selected ratings from the upcoming issue of the magazine; we have timed...
Wed, 6 Aug, 2014 at 3:23 PM
Does the price information online reflect prices of wines on release or the current price?
The price information included in our Wine Ratings Search database and many of our articles shows the U.S. prices of wines at the time they were released fo...
Tue, 5 Aug, 2014 at 11:47 AM
Do the auction prices reported include the buyers' premium?
Auction prices reported by the magazine and the website always include the buyer's premium.
Tue, 5 Aug, 2014 at 11:47 AM
How much effort do you put into trying lower cost, widely available wines? Are ones that score low omitted?
We put significant effort into finding and reviewing lower-cost wines. A search of our database for reviews in 2013 found 19 percent of them priced at $15...
Wed, 6 Aug, 2014 at 3:29 PM
Why are many of the wines in Insider made in such small quantities?
The Insider newsletter features picks from our latest set of tastings and is intended to get these ratings out quickly, before publication in the maga...
Wed, 6 Aug, 2014 at 3:05 PM
Is there a way that I can be alerted when wine reviews from a certain region appear on WineSpectator.com or in the maagazine?
Yes, indeed, there is! You can sign up for our free RatingsFlash email alerts, which were added to WineSpectator.com in 2014. You c...
Mon, 5 Jan, 2015 at 4:49 PM