Tim Atkin South Africa Report 2026: Our Scores

Tim Atkin's 2026 South Africa Special Report is out. Here are our numbers.

Oxalis scored 94, alongside Syrah on Shale and Elodie, both also at 94. Cabernet Franc, Syrah on Sandstone, Amphora Sauvignon Blanc, Era René and Magdalena all came in at 93. Whole Bunch Syrah scored 92, Synonym Chenin Blanc 90, and The Blend 89.

We were also placed again in Atkin's "Third Growths" tier, in the company of producers like Kaapzicht, Waterford, Warwick and Vergelegen, and Kitchen Door made his list of recommended restaurants for the Bot River, Elgin, Grabouw and Walker Bay area.

 It's been a strong year for South African wine as a whole - Atkin writes that the country's Chenin-led whites are among the best in the world, and he rates South African reds, particularly Syrah, as having closed the gap on the whites over the past two decades. He's also on record calling 2025 one of the finest Cape vintages of his career, a view echoed by how often that vintage turns up across his Wines of the Year lists this time round.

So while our own numbers held rather than climbed, every wine on that list did so in a year when the bar across the whole industry moved up. That says something about the people behind them: Dean in the vineyard, Anmar and Peter-Allan in the cellar, and everyone else on the farm who had a hand in this harvest, from pruning through to picking.

Thank you, as always, for tasting our wines and telling their story alongside us.