Good nonalcoholic wine is hard to make — and find. Here are the best.

No one ever said making responsible choices would be easy.

If you’re among the many people who are either moderating how much they drink or ditching booze entirely, an array of nonalcoholic wine awaits. Unfortunately, you have to sift through a lot of lackluster bottles to find ones that deliver. (I could say the same thing about traditional wines, too.)

It’s not for lack of options. As audiences for zero-proof drinks continue to grow, so do investments in NA winemaking and the variety of bottles on shelves. But wine’s chemical complexities and high alcohol content make it particularly challenging to create satisfying NA iterations.

“When you remove alcohol, especially when you remove it completely to make nonalcoholic wines, in order to replicate wine, you have to find out how to add in volatile aromas and viscosity,” said Laura Barrett, winemaker at Clif Family Winery in St. Helena, California. Otherwise, you’re left with something thin and sour-tasting.

In earlier waves of the enduring NA boom, some winemakers tried to restore flavor and texture by mixing in sugars and other additives. The resulting bottlings could be treacly, like spooning up canned fruit cocktail instead of biting into a fresh pear.

Thankfully, NA technologies continue to improve. Still, perceptions of what NA wines are or should be complicate the category even as it expands. Here’s how to navigate what’s going on outside and inside the bottle — and how to find NA wines you’ll enjoy.

The slow march of progress

The best NA wines are expressive, thoughtfully made and capable of creating meaningful connections among everyone at the table, regardless of whether they drink alcohol.

“I find that people are generally pleasantly surprised at the high quality of nonalcoholic wines, especially if they’ve had an experience in the past with an NA wine that was lacking,” said Michael Markarian, the sommelier and wine director at Oyster Oyster in D.C.

On the other end of the spectrum lie bottles that are so manipulated, you’d be forgiven for forgetting they’re supposed to resemble wine. Some of the issues come from the multistep processes needed to turn something with a relatively high proof — especially when you compare wine’s alcohol by volume to beer, for example — into a nuanced NA beverage.

“The technology has gotten better, but it’s still flawed,” said Evyn Cameron, a Napa, California-based winemaker who has created alcoholic and NA wines.

One persistent challenge is retaining typicity. For those who don’t spend their free time scrolling wine-related subreddits: Typicity is the idea that a well-made wine expresses its variety and place of origin. It’s why a sauvignon blanc from France’s Loire Valley tastes different from one from New Zealand. And why both are distinct from an Italian pinot grigio or Oregonian chardonnay.

That’s a tall order for NA winemakers. Because dealcoholization removes many of the aromatic and phenolic compounds in wines, some producers add wine-grape-based concentrates to boost flavors and create a winelike consistency. Unfortunately, those additions take the resulting liquid further away from its variety and region, too.

Forward-thinking winemakers are developing techniques to tackle these types of issues, Cameron said. “I’ve worked with scientists from Copenhagen who are trying to come up with bacterial and yeast strains that target sugar but don’t produce ethanol,” because that would eliminate the need for dealcoholization, she said. “It’s fascinating. People are trying, but we’re not there yet.”

Who’s drinking nonalcoholic wine?

The big tent of audiences for NA beverages complicates how bottles are perceived, too. Most people who buy NA wine fall into two categories, Markarian said. On the one hand, there are those who don’t like or drink wine. Typically, they hope their NA purchases taste nothing like it.

Others love traditional wine and are simply substituting an NA option to decrease or moderate the amount of alcohol they drink. This group is usually looking for facsimiles of their go-to wines. “You’re serving two very different markets,” Markarian said.

In either case, whether that person enjoys their NA wine has more to do with expectations than experience. Put another way, when I order a veggie burger, I don’t anticipate it will taste like beef. If I did, I might be disappointed.

As a result, some drinks professionals believe we’re thinking about NA wines all wrong. Many sommeliers and retailers prefer to focus on fermented teas and wine alternatives until NA winemaking technology improves. Others suggest repositioning NA wines to separate them from their boozy brethren.

“We shouldn’t market these things as wine,” Cameron said. “We need another word.”

How to find a great nonalcoholic wine

In my experience, certain segments of the NA wine world are reliably stronger than others. Sparkling bottles tend to be more successful than still ones because bubbles create the sort of texture that dealcoholization can erase.

Aromatic white varieties like riesling often make good NA wines because they’re naturally expressive and start out with less alcohol than a muscular cabernet sauvignon. “There’s less to build back up after you take out the ethanol,” Cameron said.

Satisfying NA red wines exist, but I find they’re often the trickiest nuts to crack. I’ve had luck with producers like Chavin Zéro, the NA arm of France’s Maison Chavin, and Swedish stalwart Oddbird. Both are nationally available and sold online.

5 nonalcoholic bottles to try

Leitz Eins Zwei Zero Sparkling Riesling

Markarian is partial to this vibrant, citrusy bottle from Germany. When he pours it at Oyster Oyster, “for a lot of people, it’s a surprising experience because it’s such a good product — reminiscent of sparkling wines they may have had in the past, like a sekt or a prosecco or a blanc de blancs,” he said. Pair it with grilled chicken, roast tofu or spicy noodles. ($24 from Boisson)

Lautus Non-Alcoholic Sparkling Rosé

Bubbly and bright, this ballet-pink South African sparkler is balanced and has a very crisp finish. Pop it open at happy hour and sip it alongside a cheese or charcuterie board, crunchy crudités or barbecue potato chips. ($26 from Boisson)

Oddbird Grenache Syrah Mourvèdre

This silky red wine has tart cherry notes and gentle tannins. While it’s not a replica of a traditional grenache-syrah-mourvèdre blend from the southern Rhône, it holds its own at the dinner table, especially when roasted root vegetables, turkey burgers or duck are on the menu. ($24.99 from The Zero Proof)

Unified Ferments Snow Chrysanthemum

This fermented tea falls firmly into the wine alternative category. It’s satisfyingly layered, with floral, herbal characteristics and balanced tannins that are a good match for peanut noodles or jackfruit or chicken tinga tacos. ($29 from Unified Ferments)

French Bloom Le Rosé

While it’s on the pricey side, French Bloom is widely considered the crème de la crème of NA wines. This certified-organic bubbly rosé has fresh raspberry and rose petal flavors, plus minerally complexity. Serve it any time you’re celebrating, or alongside grilled shrimp, crisp salads or fried chicken. ($44 from French Bloom)