Tracking a fermentation

Every wine in your cellar can have one or more fermentation batches. A batch records the gravity, vessel, yeast and timing of a single ferment, and MakeWine estimates alcohol automatically as it progresses.

Start a batch

1. Open your wine from My Wines, stay on the Batches tab and click + Start batch.
2. In the New fermentation batch form, enter the Original Gravity (required). The form immediately shows an estimate underneath, e.g. "Est. ABV at FG 0.998: 12.1%", so you can sanity-check your must before pitching. Set the Start date and, if you use a floating hydrometer, the optional Tilt angle (°).
3. In Lot & Vessel, accept or edit the auto-generated Lot number (formatted like L2026-CAB-001 for traceability), then optionally set Press fraction, Vessel type, Vessel name / ID and Vessel size (L).
4. In Yeast & Nutrition, record the Yeast strain (e.g. EC-1118), Manufacturer, Inoculation date and Nutrient protocol.
5. In Temperature & Style, set a Target temp (°C) and Punch-down / pump-over frequency, and toggle Skin contact / maceration with a duration if you're macerating.
6. Add any Notes and click Start fermentation.

The batch card shows a phase badge (PRIMARY, MLF, AGEING, FINING, BOTTLED) plus OG, FG, ABV and Day stats. On the free Cellar Hand plan you can run up to 10 active batches; every paid plan from Winemaker (€19/yr) is unlimited.

Record readings

• 🔬 Lab tab — click + Add reading to log Brix, pH, Titratable Acidity, Free SO₂ and more, with the measurement method and an optional batch link. Typical ranges are shown as placeholders.
• 📡 Hardware tab — connect a Tilt, iSpindel or similar sensor and gravity/temperature readings stream in automatically, charted over time.

ABV auto-calculation

You never calculate alcohol by hand: MakeWine derives the estimated ABV from original and final gravity and shows it on the batch card and on the fermentations list. While the ferment is still active, FG shows as "in progress".

The winemaking guide

Open Winery → Fermentations to see all batches across your cellar, with filter pills for all, active and completed. Under each batch card, click 🍷 Winemaking guide to open a panel built entirely from your logged data — no AI involved, just winemaking rules:

• The current stage (e.g. "Stage 3 of 8") with a progress bar and an estimated number of days until dry.
• Bench-trial guidance with suggested starting points and sources.
• Suggestions from your data — flagged issues ranked by severity, each with recommended actions.
• Next steps for the current stage, and what comes after.
• A Typical targets table comparing target ranges against your latest logged readings.

Click Hide winemaking guide to collapse it again. The panel updates every time you log new readings, so the more you record, the more useful it gets.