Pressing

Step 2 · cuvée and taille

Whole bunches are pressed gently and the juice is split into fractions.1 In Champagne a 4,000 kg press load (marc) gives 2,050 L of cuvée and 500 L of taille, within a legal limit of 102 L of settled must per 160 kg of grapes.2,3,1

Fractions in Champagne

The Champagne rules require gentle, progressive pressing with the juices kept apart.1 The traditional press load, the marc, is 4,000 kg of whole grapes.5,3

FractionVolume per 4,000 kg
Cuvée (first juice)2,050 L2,3
Taille (second juice)500 L2,3
Total2,550 L2

The 2,550 L and 4,000 kg figures come from the Comité Champagne and the UMC; the cahier des charges itself sets the ratio of 102 L per 160 kg (INAO drafts under national opposition).1,4 The last pressings, the rebêches, are sent to distillation by law, and the specification sets a minimum extraction of 0-10% of settled must.3,1

Champagne presses hold from 2,000 kg to 12,000 kg of whole grapes, and manual presses are still 18% of those in use.5 Pressing centres are approved and inspected at regular intervals.5

Limits elsewhere

  • EU Crémant: no more than 100 L of must per 150 kg of grapes.6
  • Cava: up to 1 hl per 150 kg; Paraje Calificado 0.6 hl per 100 kg.7
  • Sekt Austria Reserve: whole-cluster pressing, yield at most 60%; Große Reserve at most 50%.8,9

The juice then goes to débourbage. The previous step is the harvest.

See also

HarvestMethodsDébourbageMethodsTraditional methodMethodsChampagneRegionsCavaRegions

Sources

  1. Cahier des charges de l'AOP « Champagne » - modifications approved by the INAO national committee on 11 September 2024 (national opposition procedure text) (2024-09-11)
  2. Comité Champagne / champagne.education. L'élaboration du Champagne (fiche) (2024)
  3. Union des Maisons de Champagne. Pressing
  4. Cahier des charges AOP Champagne, proposed modifications approved by INAO national committee 18 June 2026 (2026-06-18)
  5. Comité Champagne (champagne.fr). Pressing
  6. EUR-Lex. Commission Delegated Regulation (EU) 2019/33 (consolidated text), Articles 47, 48, 49, 53, 54 and Annex III Part A (2023-12-08)
  7. Ministerio de Agricultura, Pesca y Alimentación (Spain). Pliego de condiciones de la Denominación de Origen Protegida «Cava»
  8. RIS (Austrian Federal Chancellery). Sektbezeichnungsverordnung, BGBl. II Nr. 30/2022 idF BGBl. II Nr. 191/2023, § 3 (Sekt Austria Reserve) (2023-06-24)
  9. RIS (Austrian Federal Chancellery). Sektbezeichnungsverordnung, BGBl. II Nr. 30/2022, § 4 (Sekt Austria Große Reserve) (2022-01-27)

Facts checked on 2026-10-19