Glossary · Cider
Vintage
Definition
A cider or perry made wholly from the fruit of one stated harvest year, as distinct from a blend across seasons.
- Subject
- Cider
In more detail
A vintage statement is a claim about provenance, not about quality, and in most countries it is unregulated for cider. It matters because apple crops vary: a wet season lowers sugar and dilutes acid, a hot one raises both, and a frost at blossom can remove a cultivar from the blend entirely. Declaring a year exposes that variation instead of smoothing it away.
The separate phrase vintage quality, applied to fruit rather than to a finished drink, means something else again.
Where this is covered properly
The glossary defines; these pages explain. Each is described in its own words.
Style
Vintage cider
Cider from the fruit of a single named harvest, made and sold as an expression of that season rather than of a house style.
Production
Vintage and non-vintage blending
The choice between bottling a single season as it came and carrying stock across years to hold a house character steady, and what each choice costs.
Related terms
Terms that belong to the same part of the subject, or that this one is routinely confused with.
Fruit
Vintage quality
A traditional West Country designation for a cider apple capable of making a balanced, complete cider on its own, without blending. It is a judgement about the fruit, not a statement about a harvest year.
Cider
Blend
A cider or perry made by combining juices or finished batches, either by mixing fruit before milling or by assembling separately fermented lots to a target balance.
Cider
Single varietal
A cider or perry made from one named cultivar, usually with a stated minimum proportion — commonly 90 or 100 per cent — rather than from a blend.
Where to go next
- Cider glossary — The whole vocabulary, by subject and A–Z.
- Comparisons — Terms that are only really clear when set against the thing they are not.
- Search — Finds terms by their aliases and by their spellings in other languages.
Sources
What this page rests on. Where a source is marked as registered rather than read, CiderHQ is recording that the body is authoritative on the subject without claiming to have worked through the document itself. See our evidence policy for what each state means.
A Somerset Pomona: The Cider Apples of Somerset
Liz Copas, The Dovecote Press, 2001. ISBN 9781874336877 · reference work · bibliographic record verified, not opened 2026-08-25
Bibliographic record verified on 2026-08-25 against Open Library: Liz Copas, The Dovecote Press, 2001, ISBN 9781874336877. The author was Long Ashton’s cider pomologist, which is why this work is registered for Somerset cultivar identity at all — it is the nearest thing to a successor to the station’s own descriptions. No copy was opened. Not digitised in any open collection.
National Association of Cider Makers
NACM · specialist organisation · retrieved 2026-08-24
The UK trade association. Useful for industry-agreed definitions and for the voluntary labelling standards its members work to. A trade body has an interest in how its product is described, so CiderHQ cites it for what the industry says about itself rather than for neutral scientific claims.