Wine: 2023 Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 98
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2048
Review Date: 03/2026
Reviewed By: Antonio Galloni
Tasting Notes: The 2023 Pontet-Canet envelops the palate with silky tannins as hints of vibrant red-toned fruit, crushed flowers, spice and dried herbs fill out the layers. The 2023 is an exceptionally finessed Pontet-Canet. This is the first vintage in which the Grand Vin was blended early - in December following the harvest - as opposed to just before bottling, which had been the norm. That's one of many changes that resulted in a striking wine endowed with superb finesse. Tasted two times.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet Pauillac 2023
Score/Rating: 98
Review Date: 12/08/2025
Reviewed By: James Suckling
Tasting Notes: A crunchy and vivid Pontet Canet with aromas of blueberries, blackberries, roses, violets and some sandalwood and graphite. Medium-bodied with ultra-fine tannins that are long and caressing. Creamy texture, with crushed stones and light cement. Lots of energy at the end. Very approachable and long. Turns chewy and silky, with a bright and vivid finish. [...]. 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc and 3% Petit Verdot. Drink in three or four years.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet 2023 Barrel Sample (Pauillac)
Score/Rating: 98
Review Date: 11/01/2024
Reviewed By: Roger Voss
Tasting Notes: 97-99. Barrel Sample. This is a very aromatic wine with all the Pontet-Canet style of attention to detail. With ripe black-currant fruits, it is beautifully perfumed and dense. Rich tannins and spices are layered with velvet fruits. It is impressive and seriously ageworthy. [...].

Wine: 2023 Chateau Pontet-Canet (Pauillac)
Score/Rating: 97
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2065
Review Date: 05/07/2026
Tasting Notes: Currants, blackberries, cedar, mint leaves, wet earth, and cigar wrappers fill the perfume. The palate is juicy, dark, concentrated, and lush. There is power, without being overdone. Everything feel [sic] balanced and in harmony. The finish is long, creamy and deep, with a lingering finish that continues to build through to the endnote. The wine blends 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc, 3% Petit Verdot. Drink from 2030-2065.

Wine: 2023 Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 97
Suggested Drinking Window: 2028 - 2053
Review Date: 04/09/2026
Reviewed By: Yohan Castaing
Tasting Notes: Meeting the expectations set at the en primeur tastings, the 2023 Pontet-Canet wafts from the glass with a vibrant, perfumed bouquet of cassis, mulberries, rose petals, pencil shavings and licorice. Medium- to full-bodied, seamless and pure, it is layered and precise, framed by filigreed tannins and delivering a powerful yet controlled profile that extends into a long, crystalline, licorice-inflected finish. A blend of 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc and 3% Petit Verdot, it signals a new aesthetic era for the estate, marked by greater purity, brightness and precision.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet, Pauillac, 5eme Cru Classe, 2023
Score/Rating: 97
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2055
Review Date: 01/31/2026
Reviewed By: Georgina Hindle
Tasting Notes: Some sweet strawberry and floral notes. Lovely purity from the get go, smooth, sappy, succulent and all in line. Great structure and balance here, grippy but fine tannins. Feels really cool and classic, the blue fruit, soft liquorice not spicy at all, wood super well integrated. Leans into the vintage with a classical frame, straight, well defined, pure and finessed. Lacking a touch in the fleshy appeal of some but you can't fault the precision on show. Juicy acidity too adds lift from start to finish. A brilliant, hands off, very assured Pontet. Also very approachable. A modern drinkable wine from Bordeaux. Really lovely. Ageing 50% new oak, 35% concrete, 15% one year barrels. 3% of Petit Verdot completes the blend.

Wine: 2023 Chateau Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 96+
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2065
Review Date: 03/23/2026
Reviewed By: Jeb Dunnuck
Tasting Notes: A serious, age-worthy Pauillac, the 2023 Chateau Pontet-Canet is based on 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc, and the balance Petit Verdot, brought up in 50% new French oak, 35% amphora, and the rest in once-used barrels. Its deep purple hue is followed by a classic 2023 style in its aromatics and texture, with black cherries, ripe blue fruits, smoke, tobacco leaf, loamy earth, graphite, and beautiful floral nuances. It's medium to full-bodied on the palate, with a pure, pretty mouthfeel, remarkable elegance and purity, plenty of fine tannins, and a great finish. It already offers pleasure given its purity and vibrancy, but smart money will hide bottles for 5-7 years. It will see its 40th birthday in fine form. Drink 2030-2065.

Wine: 2023 Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 94-96
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2060
Review Date: 12/18/2025
Reviewed By: Ivar Bjurner
Tasting Notes: 2023 Pontet-Canet has an ink dark colour and a nose of cacao, truffles and dark chocolate. The taste is deep, fruity and plump at the same time offering a juicy, subtle freshness and roasted elegant notes in the aftertaste. It is not a heavyweight as Pontet-Canet sometimes can be, rather it’s an elegant, fresh and clean glass of wine which you should be able to approach in 5 years time. It will be interesting to follow also considering that this seems to be a new style of wine making at the chateau.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet Pauillac 2023
Score/Rating: 93
Suggested Drinking Window: Best from 2027 through 2040
Review Date: 04/30/2026
Reviewed By: James Molesworth
Tasting Notes: A solid red, with a core of dark currant and blackberry reduction notes laced with singed alder and chestnut leaf threads. Its grip is in cast iron form, and this is ample and well-buried, letting the fruit flow through the finish, where sweet bay echoes prettily. Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. Best from 2027 through 2040.

Wine: 2023 Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 98
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2048
Review Date: 03/2026
Reviewed By: Antonio Galloni
Tasting Notes: The 2023 Pontet-Canet envelops the palate with silky tannins as hints of vibrant red-toned fruit, crushed flowers, spice and dried herbs fill out the layers. The 2023 is an exceptionally finessed Pontet-Canet. This is the first vintage in which the Grand Vin was blended early - in December following the harvest - as opposed to just before bottling, which had been the norm. That's one of many changes that resulted in a striking wine endowed with superb finesse. Tasted two times.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet Pauillac 2023
Score/Rating: 98
Review Date: 12/08/2025
Reviewed By: James Suckling
Tasting Notes: A crunchy and vivid Pontet Canet with aromas of blueberries, blackberries, roses, violets and some sandalwood and graphite. Medium-bodied with ultra-fine tannins that are long and caressing. Creamy texture, with crushed stones and light cement. Lots of energy at the end. Very approachable and long. Turns chewy and silky, with a bright and vivid finish. [...]. 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc and 3% Petit Verdot. Drink in three or four years.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet 2023 Barrel Sample (Pauillac)
Score/Rating: 98
Review Date: 11/01/2024
Reviewed By: Roger Voss
Tasting Notes: 97-99. Barrel Sample. This is a very aromatic wine with all the Pontet-Canet style of attention to detail. With ripe black-currant fruits, it is beautifully perfumed and dense. Rich tannins and spices are layered with velvet fruits. It is impressive and seriously ageworthy. [...].

Wine: 2023 Chateau Pontet-Canet (Pauillac)
Score/Rating: 97
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2065
Review Date: 05/07/2026
Tasting Notes: Currants, blackberries, cedar, mint leaves, wet earth, and cigar wrappers fill the perfume. The palate is juicy, dark, concentrated, and lush. There is power, without being overdone. Everything feel [sic] balanced and in harmony. The finish is long, creamy and deep, with a lingering finish that continues to build through to the endnote. The wine blends 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc, 3% Petit Verdot. Drink from 2030-2065.

Wine: 2023 Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 97
Suggested Drinking Window: 2028 - 2053
Review Date: 04/09/2026
Reviewed By: Yohan Castaing
Tasting Notes: Meeting the expectations set at the en primeur tastings, the 2023 Pontet-Canet wafts from the glass with a vibrant, perfumed bouquet of cassis, mulberries, rose petals, pencil shavings and licorice. Medium- to full-bodied, seamless and pure, it is layered and precise, framed by filigreed tannins and delivering a powerful yet controlled profile that extends into a long, crystalline, licorice-inflected finish. A blend of 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc and 3% Petit Verdot, it signals a new aesthetic era for the estate, marked by greater purity, brightness and precision.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet, Pauillac, 5eme Cru Classe, 2023
Score/Rating: 97
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2055
Review Date: 01/31/2026
Reviewed By: Georgina Hindle
Tasting Notes: Some sweet strawberry and floral notes. Lovely purity from the get go, smooth, sappy, succulent and all in line. Great structure and balance here, grippy but fine tannins. Feels really cool and classic, the blue fruit, soft liquorice not spicy at all, wood super well integrated. Leans into the vintage with a classical frame, straight, well defined, pure and finessed. Lacking a touch in the fleshy appeal of some but you can't fault the precision on show. Juicy acidity too adds lift from start to finish. A brilliant, hands off, very assured Pontet. Also very approachable. A modern drinkable wine from Bordeaux. Really lovely. Ageing 50% new oak, 35% concrete, 15% one year barrels. 3% of Petit Verdot completes the blend.

Wine: 2023 Chateau Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 96+
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2065
Review Date: 03/23/2026
Reviewed By: Jeb Dunnuck
Tasting Notes: A serious, age-worthy Pauillac, the 2023 Chateau Pontet-Canet is based on 52% Cabernet Sauvignon, 39% Merlot, 6% Cabernet Franc, and the balance Petit Verdot, brought up in 50% new French oak, 35% amphora, and the rest in once-used barrels. Its deep purple hue is followed by a classic 2023 style in its aromatics and texture, with black cherries, ripe blue fruits, smoke, tobacco leaf, loamy earth, graphite, and beautiful floral nuances. It's medium to full-bodied on the palate, with a pure, pretty mouthfeel, remarkable elegance and purity, plenty of fine tannins, and a great finish. It already offers pleasure given its purity and vibrancy, but smart money will hide bottles for 5-7 years. It will see its 40th birthday in fine form. Drink 2030-2065.

Wine: 2023 Pontet-Canet
Score/Rating: 94-96
Suggested Drinking Window: 2030 - 2060
Review Date: 12/18/2025
Reviewed By: Ivar Bjurner
Tasting Notes: 2023 Pontet-Canet has an ink dark colour and a nose of cacao, truffles and dark chocolate. The taste is deep, fruity and plump at the same time offering a juicy, subtle freshness and roasted elegant notes in the aftertaste. It is not a heavyweight as Pontet-Canet sometimes can be, rather it’s an elegant, fresh and clean glass of wine which you should be able to approach in 5 years time. It will be interesting to follow also considering that this seems to be a new style of wine making at the chateau.

Wine: Chateau Pontet-Canet Pauillac 2023
Score/Rating: 93
Suggested Drinking Window: Best from 2027 through 2040
Review Date: 04/30/2026
Reviewed By: James Molesworth
Tasting Notes: A solid red, with a core of dark currant and blackberry reduction notes laced with singed alder and chestnut leaf threads. Its grip is in cast iron form, and this is ample and well-buried, letting the fruit flow through the finish, where sweet bay echoes prettily. Cabernet Sauvignon, Merlot, Cabernet Franc and Petit Verdot. Best from 2027 through 2040.