The 2025 Wynn Signature Chinese Wine Awards, held on 11 April in Macau, marked a pivotal moment for Chinese wine on the international stage.
The pinnacle of Chinese winemaking was put under the spotlight in Macau when Wynn Palace hosted the 2025 Wynn Signature Chinese Wine Awards earlier this month.
With over 200 industry professionals, winemakers, wine experts and global media in attendance to honour the best wines of China, the event underscored a clear message: Chinese wine is no longer a domestic novelty — it’s now ready for global recognition.
A panel of 27 internationally-acclaimed wine judges – including seven Masters of Wines and three Master Sommeliers such as Fongyee Walker MW, Xing Wei MW, Richard Hemming MW, and Kevin Lu MS – headed by panel chair Edward McDougall of The Flying Winemaker assessed blind nearly 900 wines from close to 200 of China’s top wineries to identify winners for 29 individual award categories. The evaluation followed the well-established international 100-point scoring system, awarding only wines that met rigorous benchmarks.
The biggest winner to emerge from the competition was Ningxia Helan Mountain Renyiyuan Winery. Named after the Helan mountain range in China’s most prestigious winemaking region, the winery picked up four major awards with its Renyiyuan Tao Cabernet Sauvignon 2020 – ‘Best Red Wine’, ‘Best of Ningxia, ‘Best Cabernet Sauvignon’, and the most coveted of all, ‘Best Wine of China’.
Renyiyuan winemaker Kai Kang also earned the inaugural ‘Best Young Winemaker’ title, signalling the emergence of a new generation of talent in Chinese viticulture and winemaking.
Renyiyuan’s success at 2025 Wynn Signature Chinese Wine Awards comes after Ningxia’s Fei Tswei picked up the ‘Best Wine of China’ accolade in last year’s inaugural edition, cementing Ningxia as China’s dominant premier fine wine producing region. Another Ningxia winery, Helan Mountain, also claimed ‘Best White Wine’ and ‘Best Chardonnay’ with its Helan Mountain Special Reserve Chardonnay 2021.
The diversity and technical depth of China’s winemaking regions was also on full display at the show.
Among other awards Hebei’s Domaine Franco-Chinois took home the titles for both ‘Best of North China’ and ‘Best Marselan’ with its Domaine Franco-Chinois Reserve Marselan 2012, spotlighting a lesser-known varietal that has become poster child of China’s viticultural identity. Meanwhile ‘Best Sparkling Wine’ and ‘Best of Xinjiang’ went to Xinjiang’s Tiansai Winery for its Tiansai Sparkling Wine 2017 that demonstrated the versatility of that northwest China region, while the Sacred Snow Mountain Winery Hualuoxiangyun Icewine 2023 represented Yunnan and impressed with its balance and purity, winning both the ‘Best Sweet Wine’ and ‘Best of Southwest High Mountain’ titles.
An interesting addition this year to the 2025 edition of Wynn Signature Chinese Wine Awards was the Wynn Sommelier’s Choice categories, which saw sommeliers from Wynn’s fine dining venues – such as the award-winning Cantonese restaurant Chef Tam’s Seasons – make their own selections to showcase the wonders of pairing different cuisines with Chinese wines. Examples include the Fei Tswei Petit Manseng Sweet White Wine 2021 picked by Japanese restaurant Mizumi, while fine-dining Jiangnan restaurant Lakeview Palace opted for the Domaine Franco-Chinois Réserve 2019.
The Macao SAR government recently included the Wynn Signature Chinese Wine Awards as part of “Culture City of East Asia 2025 – Macao, China”, its official tourism initiative, recognising Wynn’s commitment to promoting the city as an attractive travel destination. “Macao serves as the perfect international platform to showcase wines, and we also look forward to continuing to host world-class wine events, masterclasses and other major events to promote Chinese wines on the global stage,” said Ms. Linda Chen, President, Vice Chairman and Executive Director of Wynn Macau, Limited.
“We are also excited to share captivating Chinese cultural stories with the world and showcase the excellence of Chinese brands,” Chen added.
At a forum following the official awards ceremony, winemakers and representatives of the participating Chinese wineries gathered to discuss the future of China wine. Veteran winemakers Guo Songquan and Zhang Chunya, together with Professor Zhan Jicheng of China Agricultural University, shared with the audience stories such as how China’s wine industry started with Hebei’s Shacheng Winery making a dry white wine from the indigenous Longyan varietal native to the Shanxi region back in 1976.
Almost 50 years later, China now boasts 12 major wine producing regions, with producers from Ningxia to Xinjiang now regularly winning accolades for quality. And with expanding distribution channels — Chinese wine is now widely sought-after in overseas markets such Japan, Canada, the UK, and Singapore — China is no longer emerging when it comes to wine.
It has arrived.
See below for a full list of the 2025 Wynn Signature Chinese Wine Awards winners, or visit:
wynnresortsmacau.com/wynn-signature-chinese-wine-awards.
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