Beaucastel named world's best wine by James Suckling
The Perrin family's 2024 Châteauneuf-du-Pape red scored 99 out of 100, topping the critic's global selection and crowning decades of organic and biodynamic farming.
Château de Beaucastel's 2024 red has been named Best Wine in the World 2026 by critic James Suckling, who scored the Châteauneuf-du-Pape blend 99 out of 100, the top mark in his entire global selection this year.
Famille Perrin, which owns the estate, called the award a "crowning achievement" for Beaucastel and for the wider appellation. Suckling, who has followed the property for decades, said: "I started coming to Beaucastel in 1985."
A biodynamic estate since the 1970s
Preserving our natural ecosystem is at the heart of our work.
Beaucastel sits between Orange and Avignon, in the northern part of Châteauneuf-du-Pape, on an estate dating back to the 16th century. It has farmed organically since 1950 and biodynamically since 1970, decades before either practice became a selling point elsewhere in French wine.
The property grows all 13 grape varieties authorised in the Châteauneuf-du-Pape appellation side by side, a rarity even among its neighbours, most of which lean on two or three varieties for the bulk of their blends.
Validation for an older bet
Charles Perrin, the estate's co-owner, linked the award to that long-standing approach rather than to any single vintage. "Preserving our natural ecosystem is at the heart of our work," he said, adding that the recognition "validates the pioneering choices of previous generations."
Suckling's top-100 lists are a yearly fixture in the wine trade, read as closely for what they signal about a region's trajectory as for the individual scores themselves. A Châteauneuf-du-Pape estate topping the list, rather than a Bordeaux first growth or a Napa cult wine, puts the southern Rhône back at the centre of that conversation. Italy's own critics have made a similar statement this year, crowning a Tuscan producer in the Corriere della Sera wine guide.
For Beaucastel, the score lands on a vintage, 2024, that growers across the southern Rhône have described as uneven; the estate's own result suggests its older vines and wider blend gave it room to absorb a difficult year better than most of its neighbours managed.
