Grape Guide
Roter Veltliner
Pink-skinnedRoter Veltliner is an old Austrian variety with pink-skinned berries that makes full-bodied, spicy white wine. Plantings have shrunk to roughly 200 hectares, nearly all in Lower Austria and centred on the loess terraces of Wagram, where it is a permitted variety under the Wagram DAC, including for single-vineyard wines.
Key characteristics
- Pink-skinned berries, but used only for white wine
- Unrelated to Grüner Veltliner despite the shared name, according to DNA profiling
- Natural parent of Neuburger, Rotgipfler and Frühroter Veltliner
- Late ripening; needs warm, sheltered sites with deep loess soils
- Very compact bunches prone to botrytis; vulnerable to winter and spring frost
Typical flavors
Major regions
Wagram (Lower Austria) · Weinviertel · Kamptal · Kremstal · Slovakia
Also known as
Piros Veltelini (Hungary) · Rote Fleischtraube · Rotmuskateller · Roter Muskateller · Rotreifler (Austria) · Ryvola Cervena (Czech Republic) · Veltlínske Červené (Slovakia)
Roter Veltliner is a rare Austrian white wine grape. Its berries turn pink at ripeness, yet the wine is pale gold, since the colour stays in the skins. The style is full-bodied and textured, kept in check by firm acidity, and young wines taste peppery and spicy, so they can be mistaken for Grüner Veltliner even though the two varieties are not related. Alcohol is often generous, and the best bottlings gain almond and dried-fruit notes once they have spent two to three years in the bottle.
Quality depends heavily on site and crop level. Deep loess on warm, sheltered slopes, old vines and restrained yields give concentrated, savoury wines, whereas overcropped fruit gives thin, sharp ones. Today the variety is the specialty of a small group of growers, mostly in Wagram, and it has enjoyed a revival that includes Slow Food Presidium status for the Danube terraces and recognition within the Wagram DAC.
Nobody knows the parentage of Roter Veltliner. It is regarded as a very old variety, probably native to the Danube region of eastern Austria, although one theory points to northern Italy. DNA profiling in the late 1990s revealed that it has served as a natural crossing partner for several other Austrian varieties: crossed with Silvaner it gave Frühroter Veltliner and Neuburger, and crossed with Savagnin it gave Rotgipfler. Zierfandler is probably a descendant as well, the other parent being a close relation of Savagnin. Breeders later used it to create Devín and Hetera.
Despite the name, Roter Veltliner has no genetic link to Grüner Veltliner, whose parents are Savagnin and the old Burgenland vine now officially called Mater Veltlinis. The earlier belief that it was an ancestor of Grüner Veltliner has been disproved. The shared word Veltliner reflects a historical naming habit, not kinship.
In the early twentieth century it was planted far more widely than it is now. The Hietl selection was entered in the Austrian vine breeding register in 1932 as clone 1. When Grüner Veltliner spread from the 1950s onward, Roter Veltliner steadily lost ground, falling to roughly 270 hectares and later below 200. Interest in old-vine selections, a group of Wagram producers and the Slow Food Presidium awarded in 2020 have since given it a small but visible revival.
Roter Veltliner ripens late and is sensitive to frost in winter and again at budburst, so it needs warm, sheltered sites that warm early in spring. Deep loess is the preferred soil, with low-fertility gravel or sand as a second choice; fertile, wet ground encourages excess vigour. The bunches are very compact, which makes botrytis bunch rot a persistent risk, and downy mildew can also be troublesome. Yields are high but irregular from year to year. Green harvesting or cluster thinning is therefore standard practice for quality wine. Growers favour low-yielding old-vine selections. The vine is reported to tolerate heat and dry conditions.
Roter Veltliner is made almost entirely as a dry white wine. Stainless steel is the usual vessel, as it keeps the peppery, citrus-skin and stone-fruit character in focus, though some producers use large neutral oak to add texture without flavour of wood. The wines are typically full-bodied with generous alcohol that is balanced by high acidity. When young they show white pepper, melon, blood orange and spice. Wines from ripe loess fruit lean towards dried fruit and smoky spice, and bottle age brings out almond tones. The best single-vineyard examples can develop for a decade or more. Wagram DAC rules require its white wines to be dry, with no dominant oak flavour. The Slow Food Presidium adds organic farming, hand harvesting, native yeasts and a ban on added sugar or acidification.
Where it grows
Wagram
The heartland of the variety, holding roughly half of all Austrian plantings. It is permitted in the Wagram DAC at regional, village and single-vineyard (Riedenwein) level, and it is one of just three varieties allowed for Riedenwein, alongside Grüner Veltliner and Riesling. Producers include Leth, Fritz, Söllner, Ecker-Eckhof and Groiss.
Weinviertel
Scattered plantings survive from the days when the variety was more widespread. Wines may be bottled as varietal Roter Veltliner, but it plays no part in the Weinviertel DAC, which is reserved for Grüner Veltliner.
Kamptal and Kremstal
Both regions have small plots, typically on loess, where a few estates keep it as a local specialty. Volumes are tiny and the wines are rarely exported.
Slovakia
Called Veltlínske Červené, it covers an area similar to or larger than the Austrian vineyard, and older statistics give roughly 350 hectares. Most of it is sold as a local wine.
Hungary and the Czech Republic
Only remnant plantings exist. The Hungarian figure was just over 3 hectares as officially recorded for 2008, while the Czech Republic has so little that it does not appear in national statistics.