As many as 62 liters of wine were drunk on average last year by every adult Portuguese. Second on the list are the French with 39.7 liters, followed by the Italians (38.6), the Swiss (30.7) and the Austrians (30.4). Germans, Spaniards, Czechs, Romanians, residents of the United Kingdom and Argentinians also consumed more than 20 liters per inhabitant last year. It is part of the State of the Wine Sector Report for 2025 of the International Organization for Vine and Wine (OIV). Looking at the total consumption in individual countries, which also depends on the number of inhabitants, the Americans drank 31.9 million hectoliters, the French 22, the Italians 20, the Germans 17.9, and the residents of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland 12.3 million hectoliters or one billion and 230 million liters.
Not even three liters per inhabitant
About 227 million hectoliters of wine were produced worldwide last year. On the last day of 2025, there were 8.26 billion people living on Earth, which means that 2.75 liters were wasted on each inhabitant of our small planet. By day?, some would ask. No, but throughout 2025. Total production rose 0.6 percent last year compared to 2024, which was the worst in this millennium, but it was 13 percent less than the average over the past decade.
A fifth of all world wines comes from Italy. It is followed by France with 16 percent, and the third is Spain with 14. Those three countries produced half of all the wines in the world and are the only ones in double figures. Close to that limit is the USA (9%), fifth is Argentina (5%) and a smaller percentage came from Australia, Chile and the Republic of South Africa. All other wine countries produced 24 percent of wine. If the European Union were a country, it would make as much as 60 percent of all wine in the world last year.
The lowest consumption since 1957.
Production showed a small increase compared to the year before, butall of us on the planet drank 19 percent less than what we made. This is 208 million hectoliters and it is the lowest consumption since 1957. The European Union is once again the leader with 48 percent of wines consumed. Among the countries, the USA leads with 15 percent, the second is France (11%), and the Italians stopped at 10 percent. In total, 2.7 percent less than in 2024. Croatia is not mentioned among producers, nor among consumers.
The largest exporters by volume are Italy and Spain with 21 and 19.6 million hectoliters, respectively. France is third with 12.5 million, followed by Chile (7.1) and Australia with 6.1 million hectares. In terms of wine value, France leads with 11.2 billion euros, Italy earns 7.8 from exports, Spain three billions, Chile 1.4 and Australia 1.3 billion euros. Germany imports 12.9 million hectoliters, the USA 12 million, the UK 11.9, France 5.3, and Canada 3.7 million.
Whoever drinks the most, pays the most
The Americans spent the most on imports, 5.5 billion euros. The English drank about six times less wines, and they spend only 22 percent less on imports: They obviously buy expensive wines. German imports are worth 2.6 billion euros, Canadian 1.8, and the Japanese also like fine wines, so they import them for a billion and a half. During import/export worldwide, 95 million hectoliters of wine crossed the borders. A little more than half was in bottles up to two liters, 34 percent in packages up to 10 liters (bulk) and four percent in bag-in-box.
Sparkling wines are listed as a special category. They account for 11 percent of all the wines by volume and 24 percent by value. In total, bubbles worth 33.8 billion euros crossed the border. Considering all of the wines, bottles of up to two liters accounted for 67 percent of the total amount, bulk wines for seven, and bag-in-box wines for two percent of the total value of cross-border trade. Trying to compare global figures with Croatian ones, we came across different data on the websites of different official institutions.
In Croatia everyone has their own data
The Ministry of Agriculture on the portal poljoprivreda.gov.hr cites data from the Central Bureau of Statistics, according to which in 2025 we had 19,100 hectares of vineyards and produced 121,499 tons of grapes and 773,000 hectoliters of wine. According to data from the Viticulture Register, on December 31, 2025, there were 16,399 hectares of vineyards, and in 2024 we grew 79,752.98 tons of grapes and produced 446,193.77 hectoliters of wine. Okay, the way the data is collected is different, but there is a more than 14 percent difference in vineyard areas, more than 34 percent in tons of grapes, and 44 percent in hectoliters of wine.
As for exports and imports, the data is in tons as if we all know the specific gravity of wine and can easily convert tons into liters. But OK, the less we know, the better.
Cover photo: Helena Lopes, Unsplash