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Chianti Classico latest releases
Decanter
|August 2025
It can be hard to navigate the annual Tuscan Sangiovese releases, which span different vintages and styles. Start here, with our expert's view, and her pick of 30 recommended wines
Every year, wineries in Chianti Classico release their newest completed wines, which, rather than being from a single vintage, are always represented by a range of several different vintages. This is partly dictated by production regulations (for example, Chianti Classico Riserva must be aged for a minimum of 24 months), but it is also a matter of choice that varies from winery to winery, with some choosing to age their wines for extended periods before releasing them onto the market.
In the pages that follow, Michaela Morris talks through the recently bottled 2023 vintage, as well as providing an overview of other Chianti Classico new releases in 2025, here including Riserva and Gran Selezione wines from 2020, 2021 and 2022, plus a few later-release 2022 annata wines. Discover some top picks at every level, including some brand new wines, and uncover some of the biggest problems winemakers face and how they are overcoming these challenges. James Button, Regional Editor for Italy
The 2023 vintage
Chianti Classico's annata category has long been a reliable source for value. It's not a word that appears on labels, but annata is a general term of reference that effectively means of the year' - these are the wines on the first rung of Chianti Classico's quality ladder, aged for a minimum of 12 months (none of which is required to be in wood) and generally intended for consumption within three to five years. Given the diverse challenges of the most recent vintages in Tuscany, and the efforts made to overcome them, the latest annata releases are all the more impressive.
This story is from the August 2025 edition of Decanter.
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