USA Today names Rogue Valley USA’s best wine region

Published 6:30 am Saturday, August 1, 2026

The Rogue Valley American Viticultural Area celebrates its 35th anniversary; ‘great wine and great people’

The Rogue Valley is home to the top wine region in the country, USA Today readers decided in the publication’s 2026 Reader’s Choice Awards, published Wednesday.

The No. 1 ranking comes a year after the Rogue Valley placed second in the nation on the same poll in 2025.

“To me, it means so much because it validates what we in the Rogue Valley know,” Carole Skeeters-Stevens, chief marketing officer with Travel Medford and co-owner of Ryan Rose Wine in Central Point, told the Rogue Valley Times on Friday.

“We believe that we are really a premier wine-growing region, and to nationally have people recognize that, it’s a true honor, and it’s really a testament to the hard work of the winemakers and the viticulturists and the hospitality professionals that make the Rogue Valley such a special place to visit.”

The Rogue Valley earned the top spot on USA Today’s Top-10 list, which contained five other West Coast locations, including Oregon’s Willamette Valley.

The Rogue Valley was praised for its “distinct wines” and for being a “versatile player in the North American wine scene” by USA Today’s expert panel.

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The region, known as the Rogue Valley American Viticultural Area, is a designated wine-grape growing region that stretches 60 by 70 miles, from around Grants Pass to Applegate and Ashland, Skeeters-Stevens said. This year marks the area’s 35th anniversary, she added, and it now boasts over 70 grape varieties and 80 wineries.

Skeeters-Stevens said the valley’s “Mediterranean-like” climate makes it ideal for vineyards.

“We have these hot summer days and then cool nights, and we have a really long growing season,” she said. “So it allows us to ripen those warmer climate varietals fully, and then we have these little microclimates here: little pockets of, if you will, growing areas that can grow these other unique varieties.”

Skeeters-Stevens said the valley can handle cool-climate grapes such as pinot noir as well as warmer-weather varieties such as petite sirah, leading to debates over what the region’s signature grape would be: “It’s amazing the gamut of what we can do.”

“This honor belongs to every grower, winemaker, tasting room, vineyard employee, and hospitality partner who has helped shape the Rogue Valley into the destination it is today,” Meghann Walk, vice president of the Rogue Valley Vintners Association, said in a Travel Medford press release.

Skeeters-Stevens emphasized that the collaboration between organizations such as Travel Medford, the Vintners Association, Oregon Wine Board and other state and local entities has been key in promoting the wine region, highlighting the support for the second-annual Savor Southern Oregon wine tasting event held last June at the Bigham Knoll Campus in Jacksonville.

“We’re just gaining more regional and statewide attention, and so we have a bigger platform to tell our story,” she said, noting that two upcoming area events, “Wine With Everything” and the Rogue Flavor Showcase, will celebrate regional wine over Labor Day weekend.

“This is really a collaborative effort, and it is just an acknowledgement of the hard work that the Rogue Valley wine industry has put forth for decades,” Skeeters-Stevens said of the USA Today honor. “It’s nice to finally have that third-party validation of what we’ve always known: that we have great wine and great people.”

Ryland Bickley is a 2026 Snowden intern for the Rogue Valley Times. Reach him at 458-488-2040 or ryland.bickley@rv-times.com.