Compare The Best Places to Buy Wine Online

Written by Madeline Puckette

What are the best places to buy wine online? We selected 9 top online wine retailers in the US and compared them based on selection, pricing, quality, features and site experience.

best-places-buy-wine-onlinebest-places-buy-wine-online

Compare The Best Places to Buy Wine Online

klwines.com

klwines.com wine buying online review
klwines may have old school looking site, but it’s lightning fast and easy to navigate for what you want (if you know what you’re looking for)

Selection: over 10,000 wines
Focus: California, Bordeaux, Burgundy, Rhône and Oregon
Value: Good
Pricing: 66% of wines are over $30
Features:

  • largest wine selection available in the US
  • over 2000 wines under $25
  • Sort by clearance, direct buys, organic and wine scores
  • old and rare wines
  • tasting notes
  • auctions
  • wine clubs ( at $20, $30, $50 and $70/mo)
  • personal sommelier service
  • will ship to select storage facilities

Shipping: $13 for 2, $25 for 6 (cross-country Fedex Ground). Many shipping options
Location: Redwood City, CA
Summary: At first look, K&L Wine Merchants has a circa 2001 look, but once you get browsing you begin to realize that it offers more wine than any other online retailer. The selection is clearly curated, even on the low sub-$10 end where it looks like they are very careful to avoid fake relabeled bulk juice wines. One neat search feature is the ‘Direct Buy’ sort which shows wines that K&L Wines import. The site is quick to load and a pleasure to gawk at.


winebid.com

Winebid feels like the ebay of online wine buying. It’s appealing to wine collectors.

Selection: over 7,500 wines
Focus: fine, rare and collectible wines
Pricing: 82% are over $30
Value: varies
Features:

  • ebay-like wine auction
  • Buy it now wines
  • tasting notes
  • Cellar management tools ($30/year)
  • Sell your wine collection

Shipping: market rate
Location: n/a
Summary: WineBid is like the ebay of online wine buying. The site is populated with wines from collector’s cellars and importers/distributors wanting to sell directly to customers. The user experience isn’t flashy but it is fast and easy to navigate. One exciting feature is the ‘Buy it Now’ wines which offer sub-$20 options that are screaming deals. All in all, winebid.com is designed for experts and no-doubt feels immense and daunting for the novice. Before you dive in, keep in mind that sales are final.


totalwine.com

totalwine large selection of cheap wine online
Online and in stores Total Wine has a massive selection of American wines.

Selection: over 7,500 wines
Focus: American wines and super values.
Pricing: 72% are under $30
Value: Average to Good
Features:

  • Large selection (1900+) of wines under $10
  • Sort by Ratings
  • Tasting notes available on most wines
  • Cigars, Beer and Accessories
  • Event calendar for classes, tastings in store
  • Local store pick up available in 15 states
  • Shipping to all 50 US states

Shipping: $15 for 2 or 6 bottles (cross-country UPS ground). Many shipping options.
Location: Maryland
Summary: This site is geared toward value-seeking, bold red wine drinkers offering a large selection from California, Washington and Bordeaux. Since the selection is designed for low prices, it does have a large number of average-to-low quality wines which requires savvy shopping to buy wine online. Still, Total Wine is the only online wine store that ships to all 50 states! The site user experience does feel a bit clunky with slow page loads but checkout is easy.


wine.com

wine.com review buy wine online
wine.com is an all-around ingratiating shopping experience, complete with on-call sommeliers who can text with you. It might not be the cheapest option, but it’s a great choice for those who need help selecting wine.

Selection: over 7,000 wines
Focus: California and New World wines
Pricing: 45% are under $30
Value: Low
Features:

  • Free shipping membership for $49/yr
  • Chat with an expert
  • Sort by reviewer, rating, flavor profile, charitable wines, etc
  • Advanced wine search
  • Daily Deal site
  • Wine Club options
  • Large accessories selection
  • Blog with educational topics and bottle sales links
  • Tasting notes, vintage rating comparisons and flavor profiles on nearly all wines
  • Shipping: $15 for 2 bottles, $22 for 6 (cross-country UPS ground). Many shipping options.
    Location: San Francisco
    Summary: This site is fun to explore because of all the different ways to sort, search and explore wines. The selection is geared toward the bolder fruit-loving palate with tons of California, US and New World wines from Australia, Argentina and Chile. Below $15, the US wine selection should generally be avoided. After texting several people who offer guidance on the ‘Chat with an Expert’ pop-up, we confirmed that they are indeed knowledgeable and work on-site in San Francisco. The checkout is easy and tells you when the order will ship (e.g. ‘will ship today if you order in the next 1 hour’). The only unfortunate thing about wine.com was that the prices seemed high for what you get, particularly in the sub-$20 realm.


    winelibrary.com

    winelibrary.com wine buying site online
    The famed marketer Gary Vaynerchuk got his start in the wine business and built Wine Library up from the ground floor. Wine Library features great prices on old world wines.

    Selection: over 3,000 wines
    Focus: Napa Valley and Burgundy
    Pricing: 50% are under $30
    Value: Very Good
    Features:

    • Tasting notes on most wines
    • Sort by Reviewer, Free-Shipping wines, 90+ wines
    • Fun wine sales-geared blog
    • Daily Deal site
    • WineLibraryTV
    • – 1000 episodes (2006–2011)

    Location: New Jersey
    Shipping: $15 for 2 bottles, $22 for 6 (cross-country UPS ground). Many shipping options.
    Summary: Overall, site has a great selection of still wines priced over $15. There are also many high end wines over $30 that were very low priced for what they were. Below $15, the US wine selection should generally be avoided. We did, however, spot several sub-$15 gems from other regions like Portugal, Greece, Germany, Argentina, South Africa and Australia. The shopping and browsing experience is easy and logical with many ways to sort. At the shipping screen, the site even had a ‘poor weather warning’ indicating that they would hold shipments for free until it was safe to ship.


    astorwines.com

    astorwines.com in NYC buying wine online
    Astor Wines is perfect for the millennial whose looking to get off-the-wall wines at pretty decent values. Old world wines feature prevalently along with unique finds like natural wines.

    Selection: over 1,500 wines
    Focus: Affordable French and Italian wines
    Pricing: over 50% are under $30
    Value: Average
    Features:

    • Additional 10% Off when you buy a case
    • Tasting notes on most wines
    • Educational notes on wine varieties and regions

    Location: New York
    Shipping: ~$20 for cross-country UPS ground shipping. Free for first time orders over $100.
    Summary: A fun selection of unique and affordable European wines along with a few New World wine choices. The user experience is a little overwhelming with several drop down menus requiring that you really know what region/varietal you want. Of course, if you know what you want, it’s workable. However, if your search returns more than 100 results they are truncated to just 100 wines, which is annoying if you like to browse. Checkout experience is good and offers a shipping calculator but only ground as a shipping option.

    Is this a good customer UX to buy wine online? We think no. However, they have stuff you can’t find in many other places.


    italianwinemerchants.com

    high end fine italian and french wine online
    A wee bit hard to use but still some of the best high-end Italian wines and rare finds you can get in the States.

    Selection: about 1,200 wines
    Focus: high-end Italian wine
    Pricing: most wines are over $100
    Value: Average
    Features:

    • Accessories, glassware, wine boxes and misc. antique corkscrews
    • A ‘daily deal’ of super premium wine
    • high end Italian wine clubs prices from $99–280/mo
    • Cellar management services, Wine Investment Portfolio Management
    • A personable blog

    Location: New York
    Summary: High end Italian wines offered at moderately fair values. Wine selection is small but is clearly curated by people who care and who are in-the-know. The user experience is not fun, because of difficultly finding and sorting wines.


    Buy Wine Online – It’s the Future

    Local retailers are amazing, but we can see how brick-and-mortar stores are drying up in place of online marketplaces. This is happening with wine too. As long as the US can sort out wine shipping. Fortunately, the more we buy wine online (and are picky about quality and value), the more local retailers will move to the digital space.

    Written byMadeline Puckette

    James Beard Award-winning author and Wine Communicator of the Year. I co-founded Wine Folly to help people learn about wine. @WineFolly