Non-alcoholic Champagne: does it exist and what to serve instead
Alcohol-free Champagne does not exist. Wine from the Champagne appellation usually has about 12% alcohol, and European Union law does not allow alcohol to be removed entirely from a wine with a protected designation of origin. Bottles sold as “alcohol-free Champagne” are fizzy drinks for children or dealcoholised sparkling wines from outside Champagne.
Does alcohol-free Champagne exist?
No: every Champagne contains alcohol, and alcohol-free drinks cannot legally bear the name Champagne.
Champagne is a wine that ferments twice: first in a vat, then in the bottle, where yeast turns the added sugar into alcohol and carbon dioxide, i.e. bubbles. The Comité Champagne, the organisation of the growers and Champagne houses, states that a bottle of Champagne usually has about 12% alcohol, and that regardless of the sugar level the strength differs between styles by at most about 0.7 percentage points up or down.
An alcohol-free drink has no right to the name Champagne, even if it looks like Champagne. The Comité Champagne pursues such cases outside the world of wine too: in 2023 it announced that, by order of a court in Paris, 34,968 bottles of a fizzy drink from Haiti with the word Champagne in its name had been destroyed. The committee's director, Charles Goemaere, said at the time that anyone who uses the name for anything other than wine from Champagne is breaking the law and is liable to penalties.
Can the alcohol be removed from Champagne?
Technically yes, but such a drink could not be called Champagne, because EU law does not allow a wine with a protected designation of origin to be fully dealcoholised.
Regulation (EU) 2021/2117 of 2 December 2021 regulated wines with reduced alcohol content in the European Union for the first time. Wine, sparkling wine and aerated sparkling wine with no more than 0.5% alcohol may be labelled “dealcoholised”. If there is more than 0.5% alcohol but less than the minimum for the given category of wine, the wine is described as “partially dealcoholised”. Alcohol is removed by evaporation under reduced pressure, through membranes or by distillation.
For Champagne one reservation matters most: wines with a protected designation of origin (PDO) or a protected geographical indication (PGI) may not be fully dealcoholised. Champagne is precisely a wine with a protected designation of origin. The rules of the Champagne appellation itself, i.e. the cahier des charges approved by the French institute INAO, make no provision for removing alcohol.
Children's Champagne: what is in the bottle
“Children's Champagne” is an alcohol-free fizzy drink in a bottle that looks like Champagne.
In Poland the best-known brand is Piccolo from the company Ambra, created in the 1990s. According to INNPoland, in 2016 Piccolo had about 70% of this segment. Drinks like these have nothing to do with wine. They can, however, be problematic: in 2024 parents complained to the Polish Ombudsman that shops display them next to alcohol, and the Ombudsman passed the matter on to the Ministry of Health.
The name “Champagne” is in this case just a colloquial shorthand.
Alcohol-free sparkling wine for adults
For adults there are dealcoholised sparkling wines: they are made like ordinary wine and then the alcohol is removed. They do not, however, come from the Champagne appellation.
Wines like these are made by sparkling wine producers in various countries. Henkell, the German producer that in 1935 came up with the 0.2 l bottle known as the piccolo, now also sells an alcohol-free version in this format. On the label you will then find the word “dealcoholised” (or its equivalent in another language) and an alcohol content of up to 0.5%. SZAMPAN.com.pl sells only Champagne, so there are no dealcoholised wines in our range.
How much alcohol is there in a glass of Champagne
A 125 ml glass of Champagne at 12% contains 15 ml of pure alcohol, i.e. about 12 g.
The arithmetic is simple: 12% of 125 ml is 15 ml of ethanol, and a millilitre of ethanol weighs about 0.79 g. A 0.75 l bottle therefore contains 90 ml of alcohol, roughly 71 g. We write in detail about the strength of Champagne in the guide Champagne's alcohol content.
What to serve instead of alcohol-free Champagne
For children and people who do not drink alcohol, serve an alcohol-free drink, and for those who simply want to drink less, a smaller bottle of real Champagne.
At a party where some of the guests do not drink, the simplest thing is to have two kinds of bottle: Champagne for the adults and an alcohol-free sparkling drink for the others, served in the same glasses. If the reason is moderation rather than giving up alcohol altogether, smaller formats will help. Moët & Chandon (pronounced mo-et ay shon-don) sprzedaje Brut Impérial (pronounced broot am-pay-ree-AL) in a 0.2 l bottle, for roughly two glasses. Deutz (pronounced duhts) has Brut Classic in a 0.375 l half-bottle, for a toast for two.
