What is really in the glass?

The honest arithmetic

Wine labels tell you the alcohol but almost never the calories, and the two are nearly the same fact. Alcohol carries 7 calories per gram, close to double what sugar does, so a wine’s ABV decides most of its count. The rest comes from residual sugar, which is why a bone-dry Brut Nature and a demi-sec from the same house can sit forty calories apart on the same shelf.

What the numbers mean

This calculator works from the actual physics: pour size, alcohol by volume, and the sugar left after fermentation. It reports UK units, where one unit is 10 ml of pure alcohol, and US standard drinks of 14 grams each, because the two systems disagree just enough to be confusing. If you are choosing between styles, the pattern is simple: lightness follows alcohol, not colour. When the count matters, pour the 125 ml glass, pick the 11 percent bottle, and make it one you will actually remember. Our pairing finder can help make the one glass count.

For a fuller look at UK units, read how many units are in a bottle of wine.

I cover glasses per bottle, calories per glass and lower-calorie, lower-alcohol wines in separate guides.