15 best ciders to buy, tried and tested 2025

Happily this has changed in recent years, with a wave of exciting new producers that champion the sophistication of the category, creating seasonal, small-batch, naturally fermented ciders made with 100% apple juice that easily rival wine and beer when it comes to nuance and complexity – and often in the process doing sterling work when it comes to reviving lesser-known British apple varieties and conserving the country’s many ancient cider orchards.

Best ciders to try at a glance

• Best winter cider: DukesHill whisky cask cider, £31/12 x 330ml
• Best champagne alternative: The Newt in Somerset The Winston Sparkling Cyder, £38/750ml
• Best cider for everyday drinking: Henry Westons Medium 1880 Vintage Cider, £2.80/750ml
• Best perry: Sandford Orchards Perry, £42/6 x 750ml
• Best cider for autumn: The General cider, £40.60/12 x 500ml
• Best Mexican cider: Sagrado blanco cider, £14.99/6 x 330ml
• Best cider for cheeseboards: Biddenden Ice Cider 2021, £14/500ml
• Best pink cider: Sassy Cidre Rosé, £5.50/750ml
• Best smoky cider: Hogan’s Peaty Deep & Smoky Cider, £3.75/500ml
• Best rosé wine alternative: Galipette Rosé Cidre, £2.50/330ml
• Best French cider: Wignac Cider Rose, £35/12 x 330ml
• Best value cider: Westons Old Rosie Cloudy Cider, £6.30/2l
• Best cider to drink with food: Little Pomona Table Cider, £10/750ml
• Best swap for prosecco: Sandford Orchards Katja Prosecco-Style Cider, £51.50/6 x 750ml
• Best keeved cider: Pilton Somerset Keeved Cider, £9.49/750ml

What styles of cider are there?

Cider is now made across the UK but traditionally there is a rough geographical divide when it comes to style. Producers in the west of the country (Somerset, Devon, Herefordshire, Monmouthshire, Gloucestershire and Worcestershire) make ciders from bitter, tannic cider apples – either in a blend or as a single-varietal drink. There are hundreds of cider apple varieties, many of them evocatively named, from Kingston Black and Somerset Redstreak to Foxwhelp and Dabinett. Ciders made in the West Country style tend to be full-bodied and richly fruity, with complex tannins.

While the West Country has historically long been associated with cider, there’s an equally robust cider-making scene in eastern counties such as Kent, Sussex, Suffolk and East Anglia. Here, mainly sweeter eating and cooking apples are used (think varieties that you’d find in the supermarket such as Cox and Gala), resulting in crisp, sharp, acidic ciders. As well as this, cider has also traditionally been made across Europe, from Brittany in France to Galicia in northern Spain.

There are many ciders to explore across the country, but here are a few of our favourites…

Best ciders to try 2025

DukesHill Whisky Cask Cider

• Available from DukesHill (£31/12 x 330ml)

Best winter cider

Matured for six months in single malt scotch whisky casks, this is a lovely cold-weather cider, lush and warming, with notes of oak, honey and subtle spice.

Available from:
DukesHill (£31/12 x 330ml)

The Newt in Somerset The Winston Sparkling Cyder

• Available from The Newt in Somerset (£38/568ml)

Best champagne alternative

Packaged in an imperial pint bottle in honour of Winston Churchill's fondness for the same-sized bottles of champagne, The Winston is a rather classy cider. Made using the traditional method (like champers) and matured for two years, it has delicate mousse, crisp green apple notes and refined dryness. Drink as you would a glass of fizz (it's got a similar ABV of 11.5%) – this would make a fine aperitif. Keep an eye out also for the Newt's excellent Fine Rosé Cyder. Released every summer, it's made with crimson Red Love apples that tinge the cider a pretty blush pink. With delicious strawberries and cream notes, it's the perfect warm weather tipple.

Available from:
The Newt in Somerset (£38/568ml)

Henry Westons Medium 1880 Vintage Cider

• Available from Tesco (£2.80/750ml)

Best cider for everyday drinking

Westons make crowd-pleasing, reliably tasty ciders and this new release, celebrating their 145^th anniversary, is inspired by an old family recipe. It’s enjoyably chuggable, richly fruited and rounded.

Available from:
Tesco (£2.80/750ml)

Sandford Orchards Perry

• Available from Sandford Orchards (£42/6 x 750ml)

Best perry

As well as apples, cider can also be made from pears, called perry. However, perry can be harder to find as good-quality perry pear harvests are rare. This makes this limited-edition release from Devon-based cidermaker Sandford Orchards all the more special. Light and delicate – we’d suggest treating more like a wine to be sipped – it’s got lovely fragrant and floral pear notes with citrus and tropical hints. A delicious drink for summer and spring.

Available from:
Sandford Orchards (£42/6 x 750ml)

The General cider

• Available from Sandford Orchards (£40.60/12 x 500ml)

Best cider for autumn

This vintage cider from Devon’s Sandford Orchards scooped gold at 2023's International Cider Challenge, aged for six months in oak and using a blend of evocatively named apples including Tremlett’s Bitter, Dabinet and Yarlington Mill. It’s a rich, autumnal cider with baked apple, spice and dried fruit flavours. Lush with a long finish, it would make a lovely sipper alongside a roast pork dinner.

Available from:
Sandford Orchards (£40.60/12 x 500ml)

Sagrado blanco cider

• Available from Sagrado (£14.99/6 x 330ml)

Best Mexican cider

Sagrado is a Mexican drinks brand inspired by the ancient Aztecs. Sagrado Blanco is the world's first Mexican cider alternative made from 100% Blue webber Agave. Its lightly sparkling, refreshingly sweet and at 4.3% ABV perfectly sessionable. Showcasing notes of pineapple, apple, coconut and tequila.

Available from:
Sagrado (£14.99/6 x 330ml)

Biddenden Ice Cider 2021

• Available from Biddenden Vineyards (£14/50cl)

Best cider for cheeseboards

Made by freezing freshly pressed apple juice, this ice cider has intense sweetness balanced by lively acidity and gentle tannins. Delicious with a cheeseboard.

Available from:
Biddenden Vineyards (£14/50cl)

Sassy Cidre Rosé

• Available from Majestic (£5.50/750ml)

Best pink cider

Made with 18 different apple varieties, this Normandy cider is delicately refreshing, with fresh red fruit and apple flavours, and a hint of funk.

Available from:
Majestic (£5.50/750ml)

Hogan’s Peaty Deep & Smoky Cider

• Available from The Whisky Exchange (£3.75/500ml)

Best smoky cider

We loved this full-bodied cider and its rounded, seductively smoky, earthy character – an essential bonfire or campfire tipple.

Available from:
The Whisky Exchange (£3.75/500ml)

Galipette Rosé Cidre

• Available from Waitrose (£2.50/330ml)

Best rosé wine alternative

Made with red-fleshed Pommes à Chair Rouge apples from Normandy and Brittany, this pretty pink cider makes for a lovely low-ABV alternative to rosé wine, with lots of tart summer berry flavours. Do also try their Brut Cidre, a winningly juicy cider with lots of lively apple flavour, a crisp, clean character and gentle bubbles.

Available from:
Waitrose (£2.50/330ml)

Wignac Cider Rose

• Available from Amathus Drinks (£35/12 x 330ml)

Best French cider

A French cider made in the Ardennes from 100% apple juice, this gets its pretty blush hue from a touch of pure grape juice. It's juicy and tart, with bags of apple flavour.

Available from:
Amathus Drinks (£35/12 x 330ml)

Westons Old Rosie Cloudy Cider

• Available from Ocado (£6.30/2 litres)

Best value cider

Crisp, dry and gently tangy, this crowd-pleasing cider is one for those who prefer traditional scrumpy-style varieties. Widely available, it’s a great option if you’re looking for a decent cider in a hurry.

Available from:
Ocado (£6.30/2 litres)

Little Pomona Table Cider

• Available from Little Pomona (£10/750ml)

Best cider to drink with food

Released in rolling seasonal batches, this is designed to be drunk with food and you can expect juicy fruitiness, a little funk and pleasing tannins – natural wine lovers will have a particular affinity with this. Listen to Little Pomona founder Susanna Forbes chat all things cider on the olive magazine podcast.

Available from:
Little Pomona (£10/750ml)

Sandford Orchards Katja Prosecco-Style Cider

• Available from Sandford Orchards (£51.50/6 x 750ml)

Best swap for prosecco

A fresh and elegant fizzy single-variety cider made from Katja dessert apples, with summery green apple and strawberry notes.

Available from:
Sandford Orchards (£51.50/6 x 750ml)

Pilton Somerset Keeved Cider

• Available from Pilton Cider (£9.49/75cl)

Best keeved cider

Made using a traditional method of naturally sweetening cider called keeving, this elegant, toffee-hued cider has lusciously mellow, stewed apple flavours. Would be delicious with a cheeseboard.

Available from:
Pilton Cider (£9.49/75cl)

Learn more about cider...

Founder of The Fine Cider Company, Felix Nash, deep-dives into cider, including the history of the drink, the perfect cider season and the ultimate pairing with food.

What is the origin of cider?

Just as there’s a garden in New South Wales that has the first Granny Smith apple tree, and a garden in Nottinghamshire that has the first Bramley, all domesticated apples can be traced back to the apple forests of the Tien Shan mountains in Kazakhstan.

The fruit from these forests was carried along the Silk Road and into Europe. In the 17th and 18th centuries apple juice became prized by the English gentry and was used to make fine ciders. As John Evelyn, a diarist of the time and a peer of Samuel Pepys’ said, cider was “the native English wine”.

It was drunk from cider flutes, decoratively etched and engraved, and the best vintages could fetch 60 times the price of common cider. There were even blind wagers, pitching the finest ciders against the best wines available, in which cider often won.

What is the best season for cider making?

The cider-making process begins in spring, with blossom season. After the blossom is pollinated the fruit grows and basks in the summer sun and ripens through autumn and winter.

The apples are then pressed for their juice, which becomes cider over the winter months. As the weather varies year to year, so do the apples, and each season’s cider is slightly different in the same way that vintages of wine are different.

What type of apples are used to make cider?

Today there are known to be over 7,000 apple varieties in the world and many 100s if not 1000s of them are cider apples

These varieties are not good for eating or cooking, but are perfect for cider-making. Just as the small array of apples we know from the supermarket are named, so cider apples have names such as Foxwhelp, Dabinett, and Yarlington Mill.

They’re like wine grapes, each with its own character.

Some are acidic, others mellow, some wonderfully tannic.

What are the different types of cider?

There are many different styles of cider: still and sparkling, dry and sweet. Often the method of production in a certain region has arisen from the properties of the local apple varieties. Where fine cider is concerned, sparkling will be naturally sparkling rather than carbonated.

The methods to make cider sparkle naturally go back to the 17th century, before even champagne, when the first glass was created that could take the pressure that sparkling drinks exert on a bottle.

It was invented in western Britain and the French titled it ‘verre Anglais’. Aristocrats then began to experiment with making cider and wine sparkle, using cork from Portugal to seal bottles.

What is pear cider?

The true name for pear cider is perry. And just as there are apples for making cider, there are pears for making perry, for example Thorn and Blakeney Red.

Perry pear trees can be over 200 years old and the perry from their fruit exquisite: it was once called the ‘English champagne’ by Napoleon.

What to serve with cider?

Cider pairs with food perhaps better than any other drink. The marriage of its succulent acidity with the fats in pork is well known, but the same rules apply to a wealth of combinations: cider and cheese, cured meats, shellfish, even game.

Serving

I like to drink ciders as though they’re summer wines. Being lower in alcohol, they are wonderful with lunch and into the afternoon. They’re made slowly and should be enjoyed slowly.

For the perfect pour, chill them, but remove them from the fridge 5-10 minutes before drinking, as you will lose taste if they’re too cold. And never use ice, as this will simply water-down the taste.

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