White Grape · Veneto

Glera

Glera is the aromatic, high-acid white grape that becomes Prosecco: fermented sparkling in a sealed steel tank rather than the bottle, it gives Italy its everyday rush of green apple, pear, and white blossom under a soft, foamy mousse.

Glera is the white grape behind Prosecco, Italy's most celebrated sparkling wine. It grows mainly across the hills of Treviso in Veneto. It reaches its finest form in the Conegliano Valdobbiadene DOCG and Asolo Prosecco DOCG zones. There, south-facing slopes and big day-to-night temperature swings guard its delicate aromatics.

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Denominations

Clearing it up

One name, two different wines

vs
This is the grape

Glera

The white grape variety

  • An actual grapeA specific high-acid, low-tannin white variety, historically grown around the village of Prosecco above Trieste.
  • Plantable anywhereAs a grape it can be grown outside the zone, including in Australia and Argentina, which is exactly the loophole the renaming set out to close.
  • Renamed in 2009It was officially called Prosecco until 2009, when Italy revived the old synonym Glera to separate the plant from the place.
This is the place

Prosecco

The protected denomination

  • A place, not a grapeProsecco is a denomination fixed to nine provinces across Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia, not a variety you can plant at will.
  • Rules, not just fruitTo be Prosecco a wine must be sparkling, made by the Charmat tank method, and built largely from Glera inside that zone.
  • Named after a villageThe name traces to the hamlet of Prosecco near Trieste, which is what let it become a geographic name in the first place.

The anchor fact: They were once the same word. Glera is the grape; Prosecco is the protected place and its wine. Italy renamed the variety from Prosecco to Glera in 2009 so that only tank-method sparkling wine from the demarcated Veneto and Friuli zone could legally be called Prosecco.

Taste · Where it sits

What it’s actually like in the glass

Forget scores out of five. Here’s Glera described against grapes you already know.

BodyLight
DelicateFull

Featherlight and low in alcohol, carried by its bubbles rather than any weight: lighter than a structured Franciacorta or a vintage Champagne, and built for the aperitivo hour, not the dinner table.

TanninBarely there
SilkyGrippy

Effectively tannin-free, as a white sparkler should be: the bite you feel is the prickle of carbon dioxide and Glera's high acid, not the skin grip of a red like Sangiovese.

AcidityHigh
SoftRacy

Brisk green-apple acidity is Glera's backbone and the reason even off-dry Extra Dry Prosecco tastes fresh rather than sugary: livelier than a still Pinot Grigio, and the counterweight to all that fruit.

Fruit & sweetnessOff-dry
Bone-drySweet

Ripe pear and white peach lifted by a touch of residual sugar: confusingly, Prosecco's most common style, Extra Dry, is off-dry and sweeter than Brut, with Cartizze's Dry sweeter still, and none of it as bone-dry as most Champagne.

Key flavours

Green Apple
Crunchy green apple is the pulse of young Prosecco, the just-bitten fruit that Glera's high acidity sharpens into focus.
Pear
Williams pear is Glera's calling card, the succulent orchard fruit that defines Prosecco far more than any toasty, bready note ever could.
White peach
Downy white peach adds a soft sweetness, most pronounced in the riper hillside fruit of Conegliano Valdobbiadene.
Acacia
The white, honeyed acacia blossom is Glera's floral signature, the top note most tasters catch first in a glass of Valdobbiadene.
Lemon
A twist of lemon zest runs through the finish, the citrus edge that keeps the mousse clean and the aperitivo appetite-sharpening.
Melon
Ripe melon gives fuller Prosecco its juicy, summery middle, rounder and softer than the green-apple snap.
Honey
A faint honeyed roundness shows in the off-dry Extra Dry and Dry styles, hinting at ripeness without ever tipping into dessert-wine sweetness.
Racy · Crisp Round · Soft Light-bodied Bold · Full Chardonnay Vermentino Pinot Grigio Sauvignon Blanc Garganega Cortese
Glera

The map

Glera is light to medium, crisp, fresh acidity, mapped against other white grapes you can buy. The closer a grape sits, the more its weight and freshness resemble Glera.

Gleralight to medium, crisp, fresh acidity
Chardonnayfuller, rounder
Vermentinoa close match
Pinot Grigioa close match
Sauvignon Blanccrisper
Garganegaa close match
Cortesea close match

Is this for you?

An honest gut-check

Reach for it when…

A bold red that just works

  • You want an aperitivo or a spritz base: chilled, low in alcohol, and made to open the appetite rather than dominate the table.
  • You are eating spice, salt, or fried food: the bubbles and off-dry fruit tame chilli heat and cut grease better than most still wines.
  • You want celebration fizz without Champagne's price or weight: everyday sparkling that tastes of orchard fruit, not brioche.

Maybe skip it if…

You’re after something else tonight

  • You crave the toasty, biscuity depth of bottle-fermented wine: the Charmat tank method keeps Glera fruity and fresh, never bready.
  • You want to lay a wine down: Prosecco is built to drink young and loses its charm within a year or two, so cellar Franciacorta or Champagne instead.
  • You need a serious, structured white for a main course: this is a light, frothy aperitivo, closer in weight to a spritz than a Soave.

Serving guide

Pour it at its best

Serve at

6-8°C

Serve it well chilled, around 6 to 8C: the cold tightens the mousse and keeps the fruit crisp, while a warm glass turns Prosecco flabby and foamy.

Decant

No

Glass

Tulip Glass

Reach for a tulip glass, not a narrow flute or a coupe: the tapered bowl gathers Glera's delicate pear and acacia aromatics that a flute throws away.

Drink within

1-2 days

Drink it as young as you can, ideally within a year of the vintage or straight off the shelf for non-vintage: freshness is the entire point.

Cellar

1-2 years

Do not cellar it: unlike vintage Champagne, tank-method Prosecco gains nothing from age and only tires, so buy it fresh and pour it fresh.

On the table

What to eat with Glera

Start with the home-table matches that made the grape, then browse the full cuisine library.

Baccala Mantecato

The hometown cicchetto

Baccala Mantecato

Whipped Venetian salt cod on grilled polenta is the classic bacaro snack, and Glera's brisk acidity and CO2 cut clean through its rich, salty creaminess exactly as the locals intend.
Polenta e schie

Straight from the lagoon

Polenta e schie

Tiny grey lagoon shrimp on soft white polenta is pure Venetian estuary cooking, and Prosecco's lemon-and-pear freshness flatters the sweet shellfish without ever burying it.
Salt and pepper squid

Fried, meet fizz

Salt and pepper squid

Crisp, salty fried squid is textbook fritto territory: the mousse scrubs away the oil and the high acid resets the palate for the next bite, the same trick Glera pulls on any fritto misto.
Korean fried chicken

Sweet heat's best friend

Korean fried chicken

Sticky, gochujang-glazed fried chicken is where off-dry Extra Dry Prosecco shines: its whisper of residual sugar softens the chilli burn while the bubbles lighten the deep-fried crunch.

Browse every pairing

Korean Korean
Rice & Bibimbap 5 Barbecue & Grilled Meats 4 Noodles 4 Stews & Hot Pots 4
Chinese Chinese
Dim sum 5 Meats 3 Stir-fries 3 Fish & Seafood 2
Mexican Mexican
Desserts 5 Tacos & Antojitos 5 Vegetarian 5 Soups & Stews 2

Buy it · three to start with

Not sure which bottle? Start here

A curated trio across the price range, then every Glera on sale in the UK right now.

Entry · everyday

Prosecco DOC Extra Dry "I Fossili" - Cantina Colli Euganei

Prosecco DOC Extra Dry "I Fossili" - Cantina Colli Euganei

Prosecco

1 retailer

£12.02

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Why this one: A straightforward Prosecco DOC Extra Dry from the Veneto flatlands: this is the everyday, tank-method, gently off-dry style that made Prosecco a household name, all pear and green apple.

12 of 77 bottles

Denominations

Where it earns a name on the label

The appellations where Glera plays a starring role.

ProseccoDOC Asolo ProseccoDOCG Conegliano Valdobbiadene ProseccoDOCG

Where it grows

The places it calls home

Veneto

Italy's largest wine region by volume, where Prosecco hills, Valpolicella ridges, and Soave's volcanic plain shape three different Italian classics. Read more

838 wines · 41 denominations

Friuli Venezia Giulia

Italy's white-wine heartland, where Friulano, Ribolla Gialla and skin-contact orange wines meet alpine air, Adriatic light and the cooking of San Daniele and Read more

273 wines · 18 denominations

The terroir

Prosecco is a tale of two landscapes. Most of the wine on supermarket shelves is grown on a flat, fertile plain, while the finest, most mineral Glera clings to a wall of steep hills between Conegliano and Valdobbiadene, farmed by hand and now a UNESCO World Heritage site.

Prosecco DOC

The broad, flat plain spread across nine provinces of Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia.

High-volume, machine-harvested Glera made into soft, fruity, mostly Extra Dry fizz by the Charmat tank method.

Conegliano Valdobbiadene Superiore DOCG

A ridge of impossibly steep, hand-farmed hogback hills north of Treviso, the UNESCO-listed heart of quality Prosecco.

Finer, more mineral and structured Glera, including single-slope Rive bottlings named for individual hills.

Superiore di Cartizze

A coveted hill of just over 100 hectares inside Valdobbiadene, shared between roughly 140 growers.

Glera's grand cru: its ripest, most perfumed expression, traditionally made in the slightly sweeter Dry style.

Editorial

About Glera

The grape known today as Glera was called Prosecco for centuries. The name is linked to the village of Prosecco, near Trieste in Friuli Venezia Giulia. Some vine experts trace it further back, to the Roman era. They identify it with the "vinum pucinum" that Pliny the Elder praised as a reviving wine from the northern Adriatic coast. Between the 17th and 19th centuries it became one of the most widely planted white grapes across the Trevigiano. It flourished on the well-drained hillsides between Conegliano and Valdobbiadene.

Prosecco's magic is a tank, not a cellar. Its second fermentation runs inside one giant sealed steel tank, an autoclave, rather than bottle by bottle like Champagne, which is why it is quicker and cheaper to make, and why it stays all fresh pear and green apple instead of turning bready and toasty.

The Charmat tank method, first devised in Italy by Federico Martinotti

In 2009 Italian authorities split the grape name from the place name. The aim was to protect Prosecco as a controlled denomination. The variety was officially renamed Glera, which brought back an old Friulan synonym. "Prosecco" became a place-based wine name only. The change created the broad Prosecco DOC, which spans nine provinces in Veneto and Friuli Venezia Giulia. Alongside it sit the more prestigious Conegliano Valdobbiadene Prosecco DOCG and Asolo Prosecco DOCG.

On flat, high-yielding land, Glera makes fairly neutral wines. On south-facing slopes, with yields held down, it gains real depth. Expect white peach, Bartlett pear and acacia blossom over a stony, almost salty finish. Nearly all Prosecco is made by the Charmat (Martinotti) method. The second fermentation happens in steel tanks under pressure, not in single bottles. That keeps the grape's own fruit character and fresh aromatics far better than traditional bottle fermentation.

Glera is also a parent of two Manzoni crossings bred at the Conegliano research station. They are Manzoni Bianco (Glera x Cabernet Sauvignon) and Manzoni Rosa (Glera x Cabernet Franc). Both are grown in small amounts across north-eastern Italy.

Good to know

Frequently asked

Glera is the grape variety, while Prosecco is the wine and the place name. Before 2009 the grape and the wine shared the name Prosecco. Italian authorities renamed the grape Glera to protect Prosecco as a controlled denomination under EU law.

Most Glera grows in the hills of Treviso province in Veneto, above all between Conegliano and Valdobbiadene. It is also grown across Friuli Venezia Giulia. The grape likely began there, near the village of Prosecco outside Trieste.

Wines from Glera are light-bodied, with high acidity. The aromas run to green apple, pear, white peach and acacia blossom. Grown on hillside vineyards with controlled yields, they show greater depth, with a stony, almost salty finish.

The vast majority of Glera goes into Prosecco spumante and frizzante. Still wines from the grape do exist. They are labelled under IGT designations, and tend to be light, crisp whites with orchard fruit character. They are far less common on the market, though.

Prosecco from Glera pairs well with seafood antipasti, frittura mista, prosciutto crudo and light vegetable dishes such as fiori di zucca fritti. The grape's high acidity and bubbles make it work well as an aperitivo, or alongside salty, fried foods.

The Charmat (or Martinotti) method ferments the wine a second time in large steel tanks under pressure, not in single bottles. This keeps Glera's fresh fruit aromatics and floral character better than the traditional bottle fermentation used for Champagne.

Explore by style

Wine styles made from Glera

Jump to the editorial guide for each style this grape turns up in.

Keep exploring

More white grapes