Penfolds Collection 2026: Ten Things You Should Know
My analysis this year is different. In preparation for this year’s Penfolds Collection 2026 – set for release on August 6 – I tasted all the wines, went through both the Penfolds tasting book and the accompanying press release, but from there I took the unusual step of opening all the equivalent Penfolds press releases from the past six years of Penfolds Collection launches. This gave me a view, in more business-like terms, of what Penfolds is up to with its range. Below therefore you will find a comment on price changes along with comment on wines where necessary and/or relevant. At the bottom of this page there is also an interactive graph that might blow your mind, depending I guess on your mind’s plasticity. Pro tip when using this graph: Switch on the Indexed tab to show movements in percentage terms; it gives a clearer picture.
Pure, independent reviews of the entire Penfolds Collection 2026 are available on the Winefront site at [Penfolds Collection 2026 – Winefront Reviews]. If you just want the review of the latest Grange, it’s available at [Penfolds Grange Shiraz 2022].
Published in July 2026, ahead of the Penfolds Collection 2026 release.
1. THE PRICE OF GRANGE
Penfolds Grange is A$1000 per bottle, RRP, once again. The price of Penfolds Grange has remained static at $1000 per bottle for the past five releases now. I’ve recorded the on-release RRP of Grange releases for the past twenty years and in this time, the price of a Grange release has never before remained static for this length of time. In real terms 2022 Grange is therefore less expensive than the 2018 Grange was, factoring in inflation. Given the market disruptions of the past five years, the fact that Penfolds has been able to maintain its $1000 price can be seen as a win or as Grange-market softness, depending on your view. Interestingly, Henschke Hill of Grace and Penfolds Grange have gone toe-for-toe price-wise in recent times but Hill of Grace moved to $1100 per bottle this year.
Penfolds Grange · Australian RRP · by release year
Five releases, one price
Grange's recommended retail has climbed in steps for two decades, holding flat then jumping. It has never held one price for five consecutive releases – until now. The 2022 Grange is the fifth straight release at $1,000.
Plotted by release year, not vintage – each Grange is released roughly four years after its vintage. The 2011 release ($625) is a provisional figure (shown as an open marker) and does not affect the run lengths, as it stands alone between two different prices. Source: Penfolds release material and Campbell Mattinson's archive.
2. SEVERAL BACKBONE WINES HAVEN'T MOVED IN SIX SETS OF RELEASES
St Henri ($135), Reserve Bin A ($125), Bin 150 ($100), Bin 28 ($50), Bin 138 ($60) have not changed price across six years of releases. This equals, as above, a steadily widening real-terms discount on the Penfolds range's spine.
3. YATTARNA WINS ON PERCENTAGE
Amid all this talk of static Penfolds pricing, it’s worth pointing out that Yattarna Chardonnay is the wine that has increased the most over the past six releases, in percentage terms (though Bin 128 runs it close). Yattarna’s price is static this year, true, but it jumped to $220 in the 2024 Collection (for the 2022 vintage) – a $45, or 25.7%, increase. And it's held $220 ever since. (Bin 128 rose from $60 to $75 – a 25.0% rise – across the 2024-2025 Collections).
4. NO ONE GOT A PRICE RISE
This Penfolds Collection 2026 is so very unusual. No wine rose in price. None. The graph at the bottom of this page shows recent movements – even last year, RWT Bin 798 went up $20 per bottle (to $220) and Magill Estate went up $15 (to $180). These and everything else remained steady this year. Which is un-Penfolds-like.
5. THERE’S A NEW PENFOLDS PROPRIETARY BOTTLE
Let’s give credit where it’s due and pat Penfolds on the back here: Penfolds is instituting a new proprietary bottle, and it looks pretty slick. It features a large Penfolds “P” on the shoulder of the bottle – actually, let me quote from the Penfolds presser itself: “Penfolds is introducing a refined proprietary bottle, aligned with its refreshed global brand codes, to enhance the presentation of select wines from the 2024 vintage. The updated 750ml proprietary bottle features a modernised embossed ‘P’ monogram and refreshed ‘Penfolds Est. 1844’ typography.” Penfolds releases are of course staggered over a variety of vintages, so the rollout runs over three years, arriving on select 2024-vintage wines first.
6. PENFOLDS OAKVILLE CABERNET
I’ve now seen two vintages of this wine, 2020 (linked below) and now the [2023 Penfolds Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon – Winefront]. It’s a single vineyard wine from the Napa Valley, California. This 2023 release was matured in 100% American oak for 16 months. “I don’t know the price of this wine but given the order of serving, I suspect that it’s not inexpensive” I wrote as the first words in my notes. I wrote these words because I didn’t much like the wine. I didn’t know, at the time, that Penfolds had switched from the 100% French oak treatment of the 2020 release to the 100% American oak treatment of this 2023. Penfolds is rarely a bastion of finesse but this wine is just too blunt an object. Its RRP is A$450. If you wanted to coin the phrase “Oakville Cabernet tastes like Over-oaked Cabernet” go ahead, you wouldn’t be wrong. [Penfolds Oakville Cabernet Sauvignon 2020 – Winefront].
For the records, Penfolds single vineyard releases out of the Napa have so far bounced around. Changes to the oak treatment don’t help with the picture.
2023 Collection: Oakville (2020) — the debut
2024 Collection: Howell Mountain Napa Valley Cabernet Sauvignon Cabernet Franc (2021) — a different single-vineyard wine
2025 Collection: none at all
2026 Collection: Oakville (2023) — back again.
7. COONAWARRA GLORY
It’s a A$300 wine but Bin 169 Cabernet Sauvignon has pretty much gone bang every time I’ve tasted it. I haven’t tasted every release – I’ve tasted 2008, 2010, 2016, 2018, 2019, 2021, 2022 and now the 2024 – and I haven’t been below 94+ on any of them. In fact my score of 96 for the latest release 2024 makes that five scores of 96 in a row (no Bin 169 was released in either 2020 or 2023). In a row. In short, Bin 169 is fast becoming a Coonawarra classic. It’s like Bin 707, from a single region, matured in French rather than American. Win-win-win.
8. BEST AUSTRALIAN GRENACHE
Is Penfolds – as a great South Australian wine producer with the greatest of Barossa and McLaren Vale vineyards at its disposal – really going to sit back and watch the great Australian grenache revolution pass it by? So far and still, Penfolds has missed this boat. Penfolds doesn’t appear in the [Best Australian Grenache] pages and in truth, it looks unlikely to. It’s mystifying. Penfolds is full of talent on all levels. It loves to champion Australian red wine on the world stage. It makes good grenache already, sure, and the 2024 Bin 138 GSM is a lovely win to drink. But there’s a great new-old Australian red wine style rallying on its doorstep and its range is effectively blind to it.
9. BEST AUSTRALIAN CHARDONNAY
Penfolds might be missing the grenache boat, but it’s been at the forefront of the modern, brilliant wave of Australian chardonnay for a decade or two now, and its excellence remains relentless. I've only added one of the three to the Best Australian Chardonnay page — but I scored all three of this year's Penfolds chardonnays (Bin 311, Reserve Bin A and Yattarna) at 94 or higher on the Winefront site, so any of them could have gone up there, as per usual. Kudos. Respect. Penfolds Chardonnay rocks.
10. THE FUN IS AT THE ‘LOWER END’
My note on the Penfolds Bin 23 Pinot Noir 2025 read (in part): “Strawberries, cherries, florals, hints of mace and woodsy herb notes, a slip of satin to the texture. 93, lovely, and well worth buying.” My note on the Penfolds Bin 311 Chardonnay 2025 read (in part): “fruit builds and flourishes as it moves through the finish. Very fine. Very good. So much polish.” I then wrote: “Penfolds Pinot Noir and Penfolds Chardonnay for the win.” These are two of the more affordable wines in the collection, at A$55. They’re both excellent. It’s not all about the top-end gear.
Go forth. Release date of Penfolds Collection 2026 is August 6.
Price history · Australian RRP · 2021–2026
The Penfolds Collection, by the dollar
Australian recommended retail (750ml) for every wine, across six annual Collection releases. Switch to Indexed to compare how far each price has moved in percentage terms, whatever its starting point.
How to read it. Each point is a Collection release, not a vintage year — the wine in each release is roughly four years older than the label on the chart. A gap means the wine skipped that year's Collection. Source: Penfolds Collection media releases, 2021–2026. 2021 was the Australia-only Collection, so the imported wines begin in 2022 or later.
