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4mo ago

U.S. Breweries Dominate 2025 World Beer Cup With Over 300 Medals

The prestigious global competition awarded 349 medals across 117 categories, with Colorado and Arizona breweries making notable showings.

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The beautiful tap room at River North Brewery on Nov. 7, 2022 in Denver. The popular brewery has two taprooms, one in RiNo on Blake street and the other, River North Brewery, located at 6021 North Washington Street. It is known for its barrel-aged beers along with fresh pilsners, IPAÕs, Belgian-inspired beers and their high ABV beers. Barrel aging beer is a centuries-old tradition born most out of necessity. In the modern craft era, it's a way to add woody character to bold styles like stouts or develop complexity in a nuanced style like a sour. The brewery uses whiskey, wine, tequila, sherry and rum barrels to age their beers. Malloy has been aging the Dark Sorceress for ten months and used 1500 pounds of malt and grain to produce only eight barrels of the finished beer. After a five-hour boil, Malloy said the porter took on huge chocolate, dark and roasty flavors while the Colorado Single Malt barrel added rich, smooth vanilla notes making it a well-rounded strong porter. The brewery says that Dark Sorceress is meant to be a sipping beer at 15.9% ABV and will be available on draft as well as in 375ml bottles for $18 at the taprooms while the limited small batch lasts. The brewery says that Òalthough no real spells will be cast on you, Dark Sorceress will present to you like magic.Ó The brewery was opened by founder Matt Hess in 2012 who turned his love of engineering and home brewing into the popular brewery that it is today.
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Overview

  • The 2025 World Beer Cup featured 8,375 entries from 1,761 breweries across 49 countries, judged by experts from 37 nations.
  • U.S. breweries secured over 300 medals, showcasing the strength of the domestic craft beer industry; Japan and Canada followed with 13 and 9 medals, respectively.
  • Colorado breweries matched their 2024 success with 21 medals, led by River North Brewery’s three wins and six first-time winners from the state.
  • Arizona breweries returned to the podium after a 2024 shutout, earning five silver and bronze medals across diverse categories.
  • The Brewers Association highlighted five especially competitive categories, including Juicy or Hazy India Pale Ale and German-Style Pilsener, which drew hundreds of entries each.