Rhône Valley vineyards are home to wines from the following AOPs: Côtes du Rhône (Regional, Villages and Crus), Costières de Nîmes, Luberon, Ventoux, Grignan les Adhémar, Côtes du Vivarais and Duché d’Uzès, along with Muscat de Beaumes de Venise and Rasteau vins doux naturels. They cover over 70,000 hectares in an area stretching from Vienne to Avignon and from Avignon to Uzès and Nîmes in the west to the Luberon Massif in the east, and boast 5,500 wineries and wine merchants. The Côtes du Rhône appellation spans both sides of the Rhône river across almost 55,000 hectares, 171 communes and 6 departments: Loire, Rhône, Ardèche, Drôme, Vaucluse and Gard. The vineyards here developed gradually, often taking the place of traditional crops such as olive groves and fruit trees, and their notoriety has grown as well, especially since AOP accreditation was granted in 1937. Controlled yields (at one of the lowest levels in France) have helped promote continuous improvements in quality.

The northern part of the Rhône Valley winegrowing region features 2 dominant grape varieties: Syrah for reds (in Cornas, Crozes-Hermitage, Côte-Rôtie, Hermitage, Saint-Joseph, and St Peray appellations), and Viognier for whites—in single varietal Château-Grillet and Condrieu, for instance. In the south, Grenache is the dominant variety, grown throughout the southern Côtes du Rhône appellations as well as in Ventoux and Grignan-Les Adhémar wines.

Source: Vins Rhone