Trade Event

Star Wine List of the Year Austria 2025

Star Wine List of the Year is celebrating the greatest wine lists in Austria for the fourth time.

On 15 June 2025, we will host an awards ceremony in Vienna to announce the winners of Star Wine List of the Year Austria. We welcome entries from all restaurants and wine bars in the country, and applications are free of charge.

See below for details of our expert jury panel, and learn what is means for teams to win at our global awards, with our sommelier stories.

All winners at Star Wine List of the Year Austria 2025 will qualify for our International Final, which will be held in Vienna the following day.

Finalists in our Austrian competition can be viewed here.

Star Wine List of the Year Austria 2025

Registration for this event has closed

Judges

Heidi Mäkinen MW, Salvatore Castano, Mikk Parre and Stefan Neumann MS.

The judging panel for Star Wine List of the Year Austria 2025 includes four top sommeliers from around the world:

• Heidi Mäkinen – Master of Wine
• Salvatore Castano – Best Sommelier of Europe and Africa 2021 (ASI)
• Mikk Parre – Best Sommelier of Europe, Africa and Middle East 2024 (ASI)
• Stefan Neumann – Master Sommelier

Categories and criteria

The criteria for the jury are straightforward but not simple: vote for the most exciting wine list representing the category.

THE CATEGORIES

INTERNATIONAL CATEGORIES:

• Grand Prix, presented by Premium Estates of Austria
The best list of the overall competition.

• Best Long List, presented by Esterházy
For wine lists with more than 600 references.

• Best Medium-Sized List, presented by Château Galoupet
200-600 references.

• Best Short List
Fewer than 200 references.

• Best By the Glass List

• Best Sparkling Wine List

• Sustainable Wine List
Recognises a wine list that has put extra emphasis on the wine program’s overall impact, including vine growing, winemaking, packaging and transport. Assessed via a questionnaire during the application process.

The winners in the international categories will qualify for our International Final in June 2025, where they will face off with the category winners from other countries and continents.

Read about the terms and how Star Wine List judges the wine lists here.