Best red wines: supermarket reds that impressed

Our independent wine taste tests uncover the best red wines you can buy from the big supermarkets, including Aldi, Asda, Lidl, Tesco and Waitrose.

We asked a panel of wine experts to blind-taste and rate a selection of supermarket red wines.

We’ve found brilliant bottles to suit every occasion, including some great cheaper options that impressed our experts. 

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Best red wines

Only logged in Which? members can view our full taste test results and expert verdict on the best supermarket red wines below.

If you’re not yet a member, you’ll see an alphabetically ordered list of the red wine we’ve tested. To get instant access to these and thousands of other independent product reviews, join Which? today.

Aldi Cru Bourgeois Château Les Trois Manoirs Medoc 2019

£8.49 for 75cl, France

Aldi thinks this full-bodied red goes well with roast lamb or beef fillet, but did our experts think it passed muster?

Join Which? to see how it scored.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Aldi. 

Aldi Toscana Rosso 2021 

£9.69 for 75cl, Italy

This wine uses Tuscan-grown grapes, which Aldi claims give it a distinctive personality. 

Is it a top-scoring red? Join Which? to unlock our test results.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Aldi. 

Asda Extra Special Côte De Beaune Villages 2019

£14.50 for 75cl, France

This wine is comfortably the most expensive we tested this year, but what did our experts make of it?

Join Which? to find out what they made of it.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Asda.

Asda Extra Special Marques Del Norte Rioja Gran Reserva 2018 

£11.25 for 75cl, Spain

Produced in northern Spain, this ‘smooth and elegant’ rioja has flavours of black fruits and toasted caramel. 

To see whether we recommend it, join Which? to find out how it scores compared to other red wines on test. 

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Asda.

Co-op Irresistible Casablanca Valley Pinot Noir 2021

£9 for 75cl, Chile

Co-op’s offering is a lighter bodied red. But will it hold up to festive palates?

What did our wine experts make of it? Join Which? to discover how it ranked.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Co-op.

Co-op Irresistible Fairtrade Organic Malbec 2021

£8.50 for 75cl, Argentina

Co-op claims this red is produced by one of Argentina’s most respected wine makers.

Join Which? to unlock our test results and find out where this wine ranked overall.

Want to buy without reading our results? This wine is available from Co-op.

Iceland Marqués Del Bravo Tempranillo Bobal 2021

£6 for 75cl, Spain

Made from tempranillo and bobal grapes, Iceland thinks this red wine ‘offers cherry red colour and a soft round palate’.

Did our experts agree? Join Which? to see if it’s a good choice for Christmas.

Want to buy without reading our results? This wine is available from Iceland.

Iceland Rabi De Galo Rabo De Galo 2020

£7.25 for 75cl, Portugal

Did the smooth and sunny slopes of Portugal translate to a good wine? Our expert panel let us know.

Join Which? to find out if it’s worthy of a Best Buy.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available at Iceland. 

Lidl Bordeaux AOP Supérieur 2021

£6.49 for 75cl, France

Lidl touts this as a mature claret that drinks well. But does this come across in its taste?

Join Which? to unlock our test results and discover what our expert panel made of this red wine.  

Want to buy without reading our results? Available only in-store from Lidl.

Lidl Chianti Riserva 2019

£6.49 for 75cl, Italy

Hailing from Tuscany, this wine is the perfect accompaniment to Italian food according to Lidl. But did our experts agree?

Join Which? to find out what our panel made of it.

Want to buy without reading our results? Only available in-store at Lidl.

M&S Collection Susana Balbo Malbec 2022

£12.50 for 75cl, Argentina

This wine is made by Susana Balbo, described by M&S as a pioneering Argentinian wine maker. Is it a winning red?

Join Which? to see how it compares with other supermarket red wines.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Ocado and M&S (case of 6).

M&S Lisboa Bonita 2021 

£12.50 for 75cl, Portugal

This wine is aged for six months in oak, with the intention of making it rich and complex. Did our experts think it was a Best Buy?

Join Which? to discover how it scored.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Ocado.

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Château de Pierreux Brouilly 2021

£16 for 75cl, France

Could this medium-bodied red be the wine of choice for your Christmas table? Our expert tasters lent their palates to finding out.

Join Which? to find out how it compared with cheaper wines.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Sainsbury’s.

Sainsbury’s Taste the Difference Old Vine Garnacha 2020

£9 for 75cl, Spain

From the rugged wine region of Calatayud, Sainsbury’s think this red holds ‘intense fruit flavours’.

Did this intense flavour come across, and did it impress our experts? Join Which? to unlock our test results.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Sainsbury’s.

Tesco Finest McLaren Vale Grenache 2021

£11 for 75cl, Australia

Our expert panel gave their thoughts on whether this Tesco Finest southern hemisphere wine was any good. 

 Join Which? to find out their opinion of this red wine.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Tesco.

Waitrose Loved & Found Trincadeira 2021

£8.99 for 75cl, Portugal

The Loved & Found wines from Waitrose focus on lesser-known varieties from around the world. Did our expert tasters think it was worth the discovery?

Join Which? to find out.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Waitrose.

Waitrose No.1 Valle de Uco Malbec 2020

£12.99 for 75cl, Argentina

This red wine is made in collaboration with the Familia Zuccardi. But do our experts think it’s a Best Buy?

Join Which? to find out how it compares with more premium rivals.

Want to buy without reading our results? Available from Waitrose.

See our pick of the best sparkling wines and best champagne

All prices and availability information correct as of December 2023.

How to choose the best red wine

There’s no substitute for trying out wines and keeping a note of those you liked and didn’t like. But in the meantime, you can use our guide to the most common varieties to get you started:

• Malbec goes well with meat, especially beef. Taste varies depending on where the grapes are grown, but plums, berries and spices are common flavours. It’s sometimes blended with other varieties, but is often a soloist in Argentina. 
• Merlot is versatile and soft, making it easy drinking for those new to wine. 
• Pinot noir varies enormously, depending on where the grapes are grown. It goes well with lamb, duck, guinea fowl, burgers, haggis and many cheeses. 
• Cabernet sauvignon is blackcurranty, sometimes grassy, usually full-bodied and often tannic (which has a drying effect in your mouth). It’s good with lamb and goose.  

Heavier reds such as malbec or shiraz pair well with red meat like beef or venison. Lighter reds, such as a pinot noir, work well with duck and turkey and can lift a heavy meal.

As a rule of thumb, if something ‘grows’ together, it probably goes together. This means Italian wines work well with Italian dishes, and so on. Any wine heavy in tannins will work well with nice fatty food, but for items such as oily fish you’re better off with a low-tannin option such as a pinot noir.

Our experts advised looking at wine pairings like a sauce – think of the headline flavours in your dish, and try to match the ingredients and intensity as best as you can.

Discover the best wine pairing for your food favourites with our guide on matching food and wine

How not to waste corked wine

Using a vacuum pump to remove air can help – you can find one for less than £10. Just remember to bring the bottle back to room temperature before serving.

Even if a wine is corked, vinegary, oxidised or sulphury, you can almost always cook with it. As long as you cook it through to alcohol evaporation, the faults disappear with the alcohol.

Watch our video guide for more expert tips, including when to serve wines that are high in tannins (more bitter tasting) and how to revive a bottle of wine you’ve just opened that tastes a bit off.

How to store and serve red wine

You might be used to stashing leftover white wine in the fridge, but our experts recommended it for reds, too.

Cooler temperatures slow down oxidation, which otherwise gives wine an unpleasant, vinegary taste. 

What you really don’t want to do is keep your wine anywhere near a heat source. Our experts advised against storing reds where they're likely to be brought above room temperature – this can lead to them being unpleasantly jammy.

They also warned that the advice about serving red wine at room temperature is slightly dated as homes are typically much warmer these days. So you may want to pop it briefly in the fridge first to avoid it being too warm.

Should you decant red wine?

Decanting wine involves pouring it into a decanter or jug to expose it to oxygen just before drinking. This can soften the tannins and help ‘open up’ the fruity flavours and other aromatic compounds previously masked by the tannin. It can also improve ‘reduced’ wines that have a rubbery flavour, reminiscent of hot water bottles.

Double decanting, which is the traditional method of wine aerating, involves pouring the wine splashily into a jug and back (through a funnel) into the bottle. According to our experts, this improves the wine a little, but if you want a better result (and faster), you can buy a wine aerator.

Wine aerators come in a variety of formats. Some can be expensive, though you don’t necessarily need to spend a lot. When our wine experts tried out several types of aerator in 2020, they found good options from as little as £15. You can buy wine aerators from retailers such as Amazon and John Lewis, as well as other specialist retailers.

How we taste test red wine 

For our September 2023 red wine taste test, we asked supermarkets to nominate wines that were widely available to buy and particularly good for drinking in winter. They could be non-vintage or vintage.

Each bottle was concealed in a bag, so that it could be tasted and rated fairly by our panel of experts. Each expert tasted the drinks in a different order, before discussing their ratings and agreeing on Best Buy red wines.

Our experts were:

• Sam Caporn MW – Master of Wine, consultant, speaker, writer and co-chair of the International Wine Challenge (IWC)
• Magnavai Janjo – Founder of wine importer and consultancy MJ Wine Cellars
• Helen McGinn – Author, drinks writer, TV presenter and co-chair of the IWC
  
• Peter McCombie MW – Master of Wine, speaker, consultant and co-chair of the IWC

Recycling wine bottles: what to know

Glass bottles can usually go in your household recycling bin. If your council doesn’t accept them, you can take them to a local bottle bank.

The recycling process can vary depending on where you live, so make sure to check with your local area if bottles require rinsing first and whether metal screw caps should be replaced or recycled separately. 

Natural corks can’t go in your recycling bin. You can recycle natural corks through Recorked UK, either by posting them or dropping them off at your nearest collection point.

Synthetic corks, which are made of plastic, can’t be recycled. They should be disposed of in your general waste bin.

Please drink responsibly – see Drinkaware for advice