Primary Aromas (Fruit, Floral, Herbal, Spice)

On the WSET Level 3 Systematic Approach to Tasting (SAT), aroma characteristics are weighed under three headings: primary, secondary and tertiary. The supporting Wine-Lexicon (Issue 2, 2022) separates them by where they come from. Primary aromas and flavours are the ones contributed by the grape and created while yeast turns sugar into alcohol; secondary ones arise from winemaking after that, for example from oak or from yeast lees; tertiary ones develop as the wine matures. Some aromas come directly from the grape itself, and they are the reason different grape varieties smell distinct from one another. Grape skins, pulp and seeds contain hundreds of potential aroma compounds, and some remain hidden in the grape as aroma precursors, only revealing themselves after fermentation.

• Wine aromatics can be clustered into groups such as esters, pyrazines, terpenes, thiols and lactones
• Fermentation adds its own fruit notes: it creates fruity esters with aromas akin to apple, pineapple and banana, commonly found in young wines, and the Level 3 Wine-Lexicon counts banana and pear drop among its primary descriptors
• WSET presents its Level 3 Wine-Lexicon as a support for students rather than something to learn by heart, and its examiners will credit other descriptors provided they are accurate
• The Level 3 SAT applies the same three-way split twice, once on the nose and again on the palate
• WSET's Level 2 Wine-Lexicon (Issue 2.1, 2026) uses primary in the same sense, covering what comes from the grape and from alcoholic fermentation

Naming the fruit is only the start: on the nose, a taster also judges how ripe that fruit seems and how far the wine has developed. Aroma and flavour are detected by the nose, either directly when smelling the glass (orthonasal perception) or through the back of the throat when taking a sip (retronasal perception), which is why a wine often feels more expressive once it is in the mouth. Certain grape varieties return to the same aroma families repeatedly, across regions and styles, which is why professional wine tasters often start with grape variety.

• Fruit aromas carry a ripeness signal as well as an identity, running from tart and under-ripe through to jammy, baked or dried
• Flowers are another primary family, with rose and violet among the examples, and in Riesling, Gewürztraminer and Muscat the floral notes trace back to monoterpenes
• Green notes such as bell pepper, grass and tomato leaf point to methoxypyrazines, and the Level 3 Wine-Lexicon also files herbs such as mint and eucalyptus under primary aromas
• Black pepper is a primary spice note that comes from rotundone, and the same Level 3 lexicon even counts stony notes such as flint and wet stones as primary
• The Level 2 Wine-Lexicon covers similar ground to Level 3 with fewer example descriptors in each group
• The Court of Master Sommeliers Europe's own Deductive Tasting Grid takes a different layout: primary fruit aromas and primary non-fruit aromas sit on separate rows of its nose section, and its fruit row is split between white and red wines

Some aromas come directly from the grape and are the reason grape varieties smell distinct, and varietal character always begins with what is already present in the grape. Green notes show this well: Sauvignon Blanc, Cabernet Franc and their offspring Cabernet Sauvignon are well known for green, leafy aromas such as green bell pepper, tomato leaf and freshly cut grass. These notes come from methoxypyrazines, which are naturally present in these grapes and highly potent. Ripeness changes how pronounced they are: methoxypyrazine levels are higher in less ripe grapes and tend to decrease as ripening progresses. In cool climates, shaded vineyards or earlier harvests, green characteristics often dominate, while with greater warmth and sunlight the same varieties show softer herbaceous notes alongside riper fruit aromas.

• The aromas dominating newly made wines are typically fresh fruits, flowers and herbs, and these primary aromas can change or disappear over time
• Riesling's petrol note sits somewhere between a primary and a mature, tertiary aroma: it is linked to what is present in the grape but often intensifies with age
• Learning variety-aroma associations is a matter of building familiarity, not memorising tasting notes

Sauvignon Blanc's aromas include methoxypyrazines, which give green bell pepper, tomato leaf and freshly cut grass notes, and the varietal thiols 3-MH, 3-MHA and 4-MMP, well-known impact aroma compounds in Sauvignon Blanc and other white wines that give tropical, box hedge, grapefruit and passionfruit aromas. WSET calls Gewürztraminer one of the most aromatic grape varieties, often filling the glass with rose petal, Turkish delight and lychee; these aromas are linked to compounds such as geraniol and cis-rose oxide, and Gewürztraminer naturally contains higher levels of them. Syrah's peppery note comes from rotundone, a natural aromatic also found in black pepper and concentrated in the grape's skins; it tends to show most vividly in wines from cooler climates, and WSET contrasts a Côte-Rôtie Syrah with a warm-climate Barossa Shiraz. Muscat is among the few exceptions to the general pattern: most wines don't taste much like grapes at all, except for a small number made from certain white grape varieties, Moscato or Muscat being the most famous.

• In an AWRI study of wines from different varieties, vintages and regions, the majority (62%) of the wines that contained rotundone were Shiraz, and above-threshold levels were often found in wines from cool climate regions
• Syrah's black pepper aromas can sometimes be detected in unfermented Syrah grape juice, and a Sauvignon Blanc grape might have some of the grassy, green pepper aromas familiar in its wines
• Riesling grapes never smell like petrol: the petrol compound TDN forms gradually from precursors linked to carotenoids, high sunlight exposure and riper grapes are strongly associated with higher TDN levels, and Rieslings from warmer, sunnier regions such as Australia often show more pronounced petrol notes than those from cooler climates like Germany
• WSET's 2026 aroma article opens on the lightbulb moment when a student finally smells strawberry in a Pinot Noir or cracked black pepper in a Syrah

Some important grape compounds are directly extracted into wine: rotundone (black pepper/spicy aroma), methoxypyrazines (green bean, capsicum and asparagus aromas) and the C13 norisoprenoid beta-ionone (raspberry, berry and violet aromas) are present in grapes and end up in wine without undergoing chemical changes. Monoterpenes such as linalool, nerol and geraniol give the floral or citrus notes of Riesling, Gewürztraminer and Muscat; floral varieties have a much higher concentration than non-floral varieties, but all grape varieties contain monoterpenes to some extent. Most of those monoterpenes are bound to sugars as glycosides, which renders them aromaless; in wine the glycosides slowly break down and release the aromatic monoterpenes, either through the side-activity of yeast or other microorganisms during fermentation or chemically through the acidic environment of wine. Varietal thiols follow a precursor route too: odourless thiol-amino acid conjugates form in the grapes, especially after crushing, following skin contact or with Botrytis infection, and during fermentation yeast enzymes release 3-MH and 4-MMP, while 3-MHA is produced directly from 3-MH by yeast metabolism.

• Rotundone is one of the few important grape flavour compounds found free in the berry rather than coming from flavourless precursors, so it can be tasted in grapes; it arises very late in ripening and is found in grape skins rather than pulp or seeds
• Glycosides can also break down in the mouth when tasting wine, giving a burst of monoterpenes and near-immediate floral flavour, though the ability to detect floral notes from this in-mouth breakdown differs widely between individuals
• Some yeast strains have been shown to be better at releasing 3-MH and 4-MMP than others, with some strains producing more 3-MHA
• Because minimal skin contact is common in white winemaking, a significant proportion of the flavour potential of white grapes is discarded within the grape marc

Primary aromas are not fixed. Once a wine is bottled its aromatics continue to change, due in large part to exposure to oxygen, heat and light, and the fresh aromas of youth typically lose intensity over time. Geraniol (rose) and isoamyl acetate (banana) are examples of compounds that tend to disappear, slowly breaking down in the bottle to form flavourless material. Other grape compounds are more durable: rotundone is very stable in wine with ageing and is not removed through absorption by closures, and monoterpene glycosides provide a pool of latent flavour that can evolve over time. Winemaking shapes the starting point as well: the fermentation vessel, temperature and type of yeast all have a role in which aromatics are enhanced or subdued during fermentation.

• Wines that can age tend to have plenty of flavour intensity and natural preservative qualities such as high acidity or high tannin levels
• On the nose, the taster also judges how far a wine has developed
• Rotundone levels in red must increase quickly early in fermentation, and no yeast-related differences in rotundone levels have been observed for several S. cerevisiae strains studied

Primary sources: https://www.wsetglobal.com/media/11766/wset_l3wines_sat_en_may2022_issue2.pdf, https://www.wsetglobal.com/media/19131/wset_l2wines_sat_en_aug2026_issue21.pdf, https://www.wsetglobal.com/media/3119/wset_l3_wines_sat_en_jun-2016.pdf, https://www.wsetglobal.com/knowledge-centre/blog/2026/strawberry-pepper-and-petrol-why-wine-smells-the-way-it-does, https://www.wsetglobal.com/knowledge-centre/blog/2023/march/21/why-do-we-age-wine, https://www.wsetglobal.com/knowledge-centre/blog/2025/what-gives-syrahshiraz-its-peppery-spice, https://www.wsetglobal.com/knowledge-centre/blog/2022/january/13/why-doesn-t-wine-taste-like-grapes, https://www.awri.com.au/industry_support/winemaking_resources/sensory_assessment/recognition-of-wine-faults-and-taints/wine_faults/, https://www.awri.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/06/240-June-2019-Technical-Review-Hixson.pdf, https://www.awri.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2019/12/243-December-2019-Technical-Review-Siebert.pdf, https://www.awri.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/01/1774-smith-WVJ-30-6-2015.pdf, https://courtofmastersommeliers.org/deductive-tasting-grid/, https://courtofmastersommeliers.org/wp-content/uploads/2024/03/Grid-no-OWNW.jpg. Last verified 2026-11-09