Brunello di Montalcino 2021 tops James Suckling’s Top 100 Wines of Italy 2026

• The 2021 Brunello di Montalcino vintage stands out in James Suckling’s Top 100 Wines of Italy 2026 report, published earlier this month.
• More than 20% of the wines across Suckling’s last five Top 100 Italy reports have been from 2021, a higher percentage than any other vintage.
• Scoring from other critics shows investors a broad consensus on the 2021 vintage in Italy.

Critic James Suckling published his Top 100 Wines of Italy 2026 on 16 September, naming Eredi Fuligni Brunello di Montalcino 2021 as Italy’s top wine of the year. Suckling and senior editor Aldo Fiordelli tasted roughly 7,000 Italian wines over the past 12 months, a fifth of the 30,000+ wines JamesSuckling.com has rated in total over the last year. Their verdict: “Among the many Italian wines and vintages we reviewed coming onto the market, one stood above the rest: Brunello di Montalcino 2021.” Critical appraisals such as this help investors understand the relationship between a wine’s price and its quality, and influence its future prospects.

2021 accounts for nearly 30% of the wines in the 2026 report and 105 of the 500 wines featured across the 2022 to 2026 reports combined, more than any other single vintage, including widely admired years such as 2020 and 2019. Cross-referencing scores from Wine Advocate and Vinous points the same way: our review of the highest scoring wines since the 2000 vintage in Wine Advocate’s Piedmont coverage shows 2021 ranks as the third most-featured vintage.

Among Vinous’s highest scoring reviews of all Italian wine since the 2000 vintage 2021 is the second most-featured, trailing only 2016. Three separate critics rewarding the same vintage consistently is a stronger signal for investors than any single report on its own.

Suckling crowns Brunello di Montalcino 2021 as the standout Italian appellation in 2026

Eredi Fuligni’s Brunello di Montalcino 2021 took the top spot in Suckling’s ranking, described as combining “exceptional quality with excellent availability and a reasonable price.” While all the best vintages have reasonable liquidity, its low price point and negligible history of appreciation mean that it is not a core Italian wine for investors regardless of its quality.

Brunello di Montalcino is a legally defined appellation in southern Tuscany making wine exclusively from Sangiovese, aged a minimum of four years before release. 

More pertinently for investors Suckling calls 2021 “one of the best Brunello vintages of the past two decades,” Fuligni’s wine is joined in the Top 10 by two other 2021 Brunellos and one 2021 Piedmont.

The concentration goes deeper than three top 10 placings. 29 wines from the 2021 vintage feature in this year’s report, of those: 

• 19 from Tuscany (of which 12 are Brunello di Montalcino) 
• 5 from Piedmont
• 2 from the Aosta Valley
• 2 from Campania
• 2 from Trentino

2021’s strength lies in multiple regions

Brunello is far from the only region carrying 2021’s reputation. Across the last five top 100 Italian wine reports from James Suckling 2021s from fourteen different Italian appellations are featured, showing considerable depth. That spread across Italy’s many fine wine regions supports the case that 2021’s strength is a vintage story, not a single-appellation one.

For investors weighing exposure to Italian wines that regional breadth helps to build the reputation of the year. A vintage that performs well in a single appellation can of course make a good investment, but the highest status is confirmed upon those vintages that perform well beyond just a single region.

2021’s five-year pattern across Suckling’s Top 100 Italy reports

Suckling’s enthusiasm for 2021 did not arrive this year; it has been the most-featured vintage in his Top 100 Italy reports since it first appeared in the 2022 edition, accounting for 105 of the 500 total wine ahead of 2020 (86) and 2019 (85), the next closest vintages.

The 2021 share has climbed steadily as more of the vintage has come to market: from just three wines in the 2022 report, when few 2021s had even been bottled, to 24 in 2023, 25 in 2024, 24 in 2025 and 29 this year. That steady climb is itself informative. It suggests 2021’s reputation has held up as more producers have released their wines and more bottles have had time to show in the glass, rather than resting on a handful of early, highly selected releases.

Wine Advocate and Vinous confirm 2021’s vintage quality

That pattern is not confined to Suckling’s own scoring. In an examination of Wine Advocate’s highest-scoring Piedmont wines since the 2000 vintage, 2021 is the third most common vintage behind 2016 and 2019. Across Vinous’s broader Italian coverage, again since the 2000 vintage, 2021 has the second-highest share of any vintage, trailing only 2016. Three independent critics converging on the same handful of standout years is a stronger signal than any single ranking. It places 2021 alongside 2016 and 2010 among the vintages most consistently rewarded by Italy’s leading critics over the past 25 years.

Much of the 2021 Italian vintage has yet to reach the market

Despite that consensus, a meaningful share of 2021’s best wines are still unreleased. Most 2021 Brunello di Montalcino is now on the market, but several of the appellation’s most sought-after producers have not yet released their 2021s.

Riserva level wines are the highest tier of quality under Italian regulations known as Denominazione di Origine Controllata e Garantita (DOCG) laws and have an longer mandatory aging period.  In Brunello they must age for at least 5 years, making them Tuscany’s most rigorously regulated red.

In Piedmont, reserve-tier Barbaresco from the 2021 vintage has been trickling out since January 2026, though several top producers have yet to release theirs. Reserve-tier Barolo will not be released at all until next year.  

• Case Basse (Soldera), Biondi-Santi and Valdicava 2021 Riserva Brunello di Montalcino wines are still unreleased
• Roagna and Bruno Giacosa’s 2021 Barbaresco Riservas are still unreleased
• In Barolo 2021’s reserve-tier releases are not due until next year

For long-term investors a vintage already showing this level of critical consensus, with some of its most collectible bottlings still to come, means the current picture of 2021 is still partial rather than final and could become more positive as the final wines come to the market. The producers still holding back their 2021s are, in several cases, exactly the names collectors watch most closely, so their eventual releases should draw further critical attention to the vintage rather than close the story down.

What 2021 means for Italian wine investment

Italy has also been a relatively strong place to hold fine wine through the downturn. Italy has been the best-performing mainstream wine region since prices peaked in autumn 2022. Italian wine has shown the smallest declines as the market fell and was one of the first sectors to begin meaningful recovery. 

This comes together to tell investors that 2021 vintage Italian wines looks to be a worthy long-term addition with pricing on early releases grounded in a stable rather than accelerating market. With critical consensus hailing the vintage, investors can feel confident in the long-term view of 2021’s quality even if the fullest test of 2021’s reputation will only arrive once more regions and more producers have released their wines.

FAQ: James Suckling’s Top 100 Wines of Italy 2026

Why does James Suckling rate 2021 so highly for Italian wine? 

Suckling calls Brunello di Montalcino 2021 the standout wine of his Top 100 Wines of Italy 2026 report, citing its structure, freshness and balance, and describes 2021 as one of the best Brunello vintages of the past two decades. Three 2021 Brunellos, from Eredi Fuligni, San Filippo and Giodo, feature in his Top 10.

Is 2021’s strength limited to Brunello di Montalcino?
No. This report alone features 2021 vintage wines from 5 regions, our own five-year review of James Suckling’s top 100 Italian wines shows 14 different regions contributing at least one 2021 wine to his reports.

How consistent has 2021’s performance been across Suckling’s reports? 

2021 has been the most-featured vintage across Suckling’s last five Top 100 Italy reports, appearing in 105 of 500 total placings between 2022 and 2026. That is more than 2020 (86) or 2019 (85), the next closest vintages, and the 2021 count has risen every year as more of the vintage has reached the market.

Do other critics agree with Suckling’s assessment of 2021? 

Yes. Both The Wine Advocate and Vinous rank 2021 among the best vintages across Italian wine making regions.

Which top 2021 wines have not been released yet? 

Several high-profile Brunello producers, including Case Basse, Biondi-Santi and Valdicava have yet to release their 2021s. In Piedmont, Roagna and Bruno Giacosa have not released 2021’s Riserva level Barbarescos, and reserve-tier Barolo from the vintage is not due until next year.

Why have all the 2021 vintage Italian wines not yet been released?
Two forces are at play: DOC and DOCG rules set minimum legal ageing before release, so Riserva-tier Barolo and Barbaresco cannot reach the market for several years after harvest. Separately, top producers often hold back longer still, judging the wine isn’t ready or timing release to their own commercial strategy.

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