Nikolai Haram Svorte of Norway was crowned ASI Best Sommelier of the World 2026 in Lisbon on Friday 16 October, after a final staged before a live audience at the Coliseu dos Recreios. France’s Pascaline Lepeltier finished second and Japan’s Wataru Iwata third, Decanter reported. Sixty-six sommeliers, each representing a national member association of the Association de la Sommellerie Internationale (ASI), took part in the contest’s 18th edition, hosted by Portugal’s sommelier association, the Associação dos Escanções de Portugal (AEP). For the corridor, the result means that the world’s top-ranked sommelier works in the Norwegian wine trade, where Portuguese wine is sold through the state monopoly, and has just spent a week being tested in Lisbon.
| Contest | ASI Best Sommelier of the World 2026, 18th edition; Lisbon, 11–17 October |
|---|---|
| Final | 16 October, Coliseu dos Recreios; more than 600 spectators in the hall, about 3,000 viewers on ASI’s YouTube stream |
| Result | 1. Nikolai Haram Svorte (Norway); 2. Pascaline Lepeltier (France); 3. Wataru Iwata (Japan) |
| Field | 66 candidates; 20 semi-finalists named on 14 October |
| Host | Associação dos Escanções de Portugal (AEP), a founding member of ASI; second Lisbon edition after 1978 |
| Winner’s employer | Remuage by Moestue AS, Oslo, a Norwegian Champagne importer (product and sales manager) |
Sources: Decanter and Portugal Resident (October 2026); ASI; Brønnøysund Register Centre.
A week of tests, a final at the Coliseu
The competition opened with quarter-finals on 12 and 13 October, followed by semi-finals on 15 October and Friday’s final, Portugal Resident reported. On stage, the three finalists blind-tasted wines and spirits, served guests in simulated bar and restaurant settings, proposed food and wine pairings and corrected a wine list deliberately packed with mistakes, before a final task revealed only during the show. Haram Svorte went first. “I was nervous, but I was just trying to enjoy it,” he told Decanter before the result was announced. “I was very happy with the tastings. I think they were very clean and logical, and the menu tasks were good too.” He succeeds Latvia’s Raimonds Tomsons, who won in Paris in 2023.
“Returning to Lisbon after almost half a century reminds us how much our profession has evolved,” said Olivier Poussier, co-director of ASI’s contests committee and Best Sommelier of the World in 2000. Lisbon first hosted the contest in 1978. Northern Europe was well represented beyond the winner: the list of 20 semi-finalists published by Vinetur included Denmark’s Jonathan Gouveia and Finland’s Dmitrii Frolov, alongside candidates from Estonia and Lithuania.
Who the new champion is
Haram Svorte, 29 according to Norwegian media reports, has won the Norwegian Sommelier Championship four years running, from 2023 to 2026, and took the Best Sommelier of the Nordics title in 2025. He has worked as a sommelier since 2018 and was head sommelier at Speilsalen, the restaurant in Trondheim’s Britannia Hotel, before moving into the import trade. He is now product and sales manager at Remuage by Moestue, which Decanter describes as a Norwegian Champagne importer. Norway’s company register lists Remuage by Moestue AS (org. no. 926 851 195) at Bygdøy allé 23 in Oslo, registered in 2021 and briefly named Remuage Wines AS, with its stated activity as the import, sale and distribution of wine and spirits.
That is the limit of what is on the record. Remuage is a Champagne importer, and NorthSouth HQ found no source linking Haram Svorte or Remuage to Portuguese wine. The Norwegian connection to Portugal here is his week in Lisbon and the attention the title brings, not a buying commitment.
Why Portugal wanted the contest
The AEP bid for the contest about four years ago in Japan, its president Tiago Paula told Lusa in August, and its motive was commercial. “We have to think about less volume and showing more quality. We have a lot of quality, but we have to get it across abroad so that we are seen not as a country of cheap wines, but of quality wines,” he said (NorthSouth HQ translation). “The idea was to bring the possibility of entering as many markets as possible.” Lusa noted that many of the sommeliers travelling to Lisbon are also decision-makers, influencers and business owners, and that the programme included classes on the diversity of Portuguese wines. After the final, Paula told Portugal Resident that the week was a chance for Portuguese producers and businesses to strengthen international partnerships and to showcase Portuguese wines, other drinks and wine tourism.
Where Portuguese wine stands in Norway
In Norway every bottle reaches the public through Vinmonopolet, and importers decide which wines are offered to the monopoly’s tenders and order range. Portugal starts from a large base. When NorthSouth HQ read Vinmonopolet’s database on 13 September, it held 973 Portuguese products, the seventh-largest country in the catalogue. Douro and Porto alone accounted for 372 lines, and the median price was NOK 329.90. But only 66 of the 973 sat in the basis range that every store can stock; 863 were in the order range, which customers have to request.
Sales point the same way. Vinmonopolet’s first-half 2026 figures showed Portuguese white wine up 5.6% to 666,507 litres, overtaking Australia as Norway’s fifth-largest white wine origin. Across all four wine categories Portugal sold about 1.81 million litres, down 2.1% in a market that shrank by 2%. Portugal is holding its share and selling more white wine, which is where Norwegian demand is moving. The AEP’s “less volume, more quality” message fits a monopoly market where the hard part is winning a basis slot, not getting listed at all.
What to watch
For Portuguese producers chasing the Norwegian market, it is worth watching whether the AEP or Portuguese wine bodies follow up the Lisbon week with the Nordic trade, and whether Portuguese listings keep moving from Vinmonopolet’s order range into its basis range. ASI’s next events are a first Africa and Middle East contest in May 2027 and the Best Sommelier of Europe contest in Poland in September 2027. Portuguese producers already selling in the region are listed in the NorthSouth HQ directory of Portuguese companies in the Nordics, and Norwegian companies active in Portugal are in the directory of Norwegian companies in Portugal.
Sources: Decanter (16 October 2026); Portugal Resident (October 2026); ASI contest page; Vinetur (15 October 2026); RTP/Lusa (August 2026); Brønnøysund Register Centre; NorthSouth HQ Vinmonopolet census (13 September 2026) and H1 2026 sales analysis.