About
Wine, translated
Terroir began with a simple frustration: a wine list in a foreign country tells you a village, a producer and a vintage — but almost never what the wine will actually taste like, or what to buy when you get home and want that feeling again.
Photograph
One picture of the label, taken in a shop, restaurant or tasting room.
Understand
Grape, region, body, sweetness and tasting notes in plain language.
Match
Two or three bottles sold in your home country that drink the same way.
Based in Paarl
We sit in Paarl, in the Cape Winelands, about an hour from Cape Town. It is one of the oldest wine districts in the country and one of the most varied: dryland bush vine Chenin Blanc on the Paardeberg, Rhône reds on the granite slopes of Paarl Mountain, and cool Chardonnay on the Simonsberg side.
That mix is exactly why the app exists. Visitors arrive knowing Sancerre or Rioja and leave without realising there is a Paarl bottle that scratches the same itch — and South Africans travelling abroad have the same problem in reverse.
How the matching works
The app reads the label with image recognition, identifies the wine style behind it, then compares it against our reference guide of classic wines and their equivalents. Matches are based on grape, body, sweetness, acidity and oak — not on price or scores.
It is a guide, not gospel. Vintages vary, producers vary, and a great winemaker can make a wine that breaks its own regional rules. Use it to narrow the shelf down from fifty bottles to three.
Your photos and data
Label photos are stored privately against your account and are visible only to you. Your saved cellar is yours; you can delete any scan at any time.