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Beer is the most consumed alcoholic beverage in the world and the third most popular beverage after water and tea. Emerging health-oriented lifestyle trends, demographics, stricter legislation, religious prohibitions, and consumers’ preferences have led to a strong and steady growth of interest for non-alcoholic beers (NABs), low-alcohol beers (LABs), as well for craft beers (CBs). Conventional beer, as the worlds most consumed alcoholic beverage, recently gained more recognition also due to its potential functionality associated with the high content of phenolic antioxidants and low ethanol content. The increasing attention of consumers to health-issues linked to alcohol abuse urges breweries to expand the assortment of conventional beers through novel drinks concepts. The production of these beers employs several techniques that vary in performance, efficiency, and usability. Involved production technologies have been reviewed and evaluated in this paper in terms of efficiency and production costs, given the possibility that craft brewers might want to adapt them and finally introduce novel non-alcoholic drinks in the market.

The sensory, volatile, and physiochemical profiles of nineteen commercial non-alcoholic pilsner-style beers produced by different production techniques were analyzed and compared with a dry-hopped non-alcoholic IPA. NABs made only with either physical dealcoholization or restricted fermentations differed significantly in chemistry and flavor. Generally, NABs produced by restricted fermentations were the most worty, thick, and sweet, whereas NABs that were physically dealcoholized had the lowest taste/aroma intensities and were the sourest, most thin, and least sweet. Interestingly, the method of dealcoholization had a minor impact on the flavor profile. The use of maltose intolerant yeast as well as the implementation of combined treatments, such as blending dealcoholized beer with beer containing alcohol, were the techniques found to produce NABs with more harmonious and multifaceted chemical and flavor profiles. NABs with increased hop aroma volatiles were the most harmonious, particularly highlighted by the NA IPA reference. Even though dry-hopped character might be atypical for pilsner-style beer, dry-hopping appears as a simple application to produce NABs with more harmonious flavor.

This study investigated compositional changes in red wines resulting from wine alcohol removal by reverse osmosis-vaporative perstraction (RO-EP) and provides insight into the physical and chemical changes in reduced alcohol wine (RAW). Trial 1 involved RO-EP treatment of three wines that were analyzed pre-treatment, post-treatment, and post-treatment with alcohol adjustment (i.e., addition of ethanol to achieve the original alcohol content). Trial 2 involved partial dealcoholization of two wines and analysis of samples collected during RO-EP treatment, i.e., wine in, wine out, retentate, permeate (pre- and post-EP treatment) and strip water. Wine color was analyzed by spectrophotometric methods, while other compositional changes were determined by WineScan, high performance liquid chromatography (HPLC) and gas chromatography–mass spectrometry (GC–MS) analyses. In general, RAWs were slightly more concentrated than pre-treatment wines, which resulted in greater color intensity and increased phenolics and organic acids. However, partial dealcoholization resulted in lower concentrations of some fermentation volatiles, particularly ethyl esters, which may reflect ester hydrolysis following ethanol removal.

This study investigated the effect of different degrees of dealcoholization on volatile compounds, phenols and sensory characteristics of red wine (cv. Montepulciano d’Abruzzo). The wine with an initial alcohol content of 13.2% v/v was partially dealcoholized by membrane process with a decrease of alcohol degree as follows: − 4.9; − 6.3; − 7.8, − 9.2 and − 10.5% v/v. Osmotic distillation has proved effective in preserving a satisfactory odorous profile, as samples with an alcohol residue of 8.3% v/v (− 4.9%) and 6.9% v/v (− 6.3%) showed good esters retention: more than 84% and 82%, respectively. Similarly, colour and taste, evaluated by flavonoids and phenolic compounds, remained almost unchanged in all dealcoholized samples. Lastly, the trials highlighted that dealcoholized wine up to an alcohol content of about 5.4% v/v (− 7.8%) was still perceived as acceptable by the tasters.

The attention of some winemakers and researchers over the past years has been drawn towards the partial or total dealcoholization of wines and alcoholic beverages due to trends in wine styles, and the effect of climate change on wine alcohol content. To achieve this, different techniques have been used at the various stages of winemaking, among which the physical dealcoholization techniques, particularly membrane separation (nanofiltration, reverse osmosis, evaporative perstraction, and pervaporation) and thermal distillation (vacuum distillation and spinning cone column), have shown promising results and hence are being used for commercial production. However, the removal of alcohol by these techniques can cause changes in color and losses of desirable volatile aroma compounds, which can subsequently affect the sensory quality and acceptability of the wine by consumers. Aside from the removal of ethanol, other factors such as the ethanol concentration, the kind of alcohol removal technique, the retention properties of the wine non-volatile matrix, and the chemical-physical properties of the aroma compounds can influence changes in the wine sensory quality during dealcoholization. This review highlights and summarizes some of the techniques for wine dealcoholization and their impact on wine quality to help winemakers in choosing the best technique to limit adverse effects in dealcoholized wines and to help meet the needs and acceptance among different targeted consumers such as younger people, pregnant women, drivers, and teetotalers.

Although present in concentrations in microgrammes per litre level, aldehydes, in particular those derived from Strecker degradation, are known to majorly contribute to the undesired wort flavour of alcohol-free beers. In order to improve currently available products, one needs to understand the underlying cause for the over-prevalence and identify leverage points and methods to selectively reduce the aldehydes in alcohol-free beers. This work gives a short overview on relevant flavour-active wort flavours identified in alcohol-free beer and on their involved chemical formation pathways. Consequently, aldehyde removal technologies in general and in brewing industry are presented. Adsorptive removal of off-flavours by aldehyde-scavenging groups is already widely exploited in the packaging industry and may achieve reduction of these components to near depletion, depending on the process conditions. Its principles are adaptable to recovering off-flavours before filling. Also, supercritical CO 2 extraction has been successfully applied to separate flavours from food matrices. In brewing, the focus has been set to biologic conversion by restricted fermentation steps, but the reduction of key components of more than 70% is not achieved. Newer developments focus on thermal separation techniques that not only include non-specific physical dealcoholisation but also more selective technologies such as pervaporation, where aldehydes are reduced to near depletion. However, for most unit operations, selectivity and capacity are not yet investigated. Future research should explore the shortcomings of current techniques and overcome bottlenecks either by developing more specific methods for aldehyde removal and/or a clever combination of unit operations to optimise the separation and process integration.

Nowadays, the interest in manufacturing non-alcoholic or low alcoholic content beverages from alcoholic beverages is a current challenge for food technologists; this is due to the fact that huge consumption of alcoholic beverages may produce health problems in the costumers. In principle, the post-fermentation ethanol removal from alcoholic beverages is carried out by means of evaporation or distillation. Such current dealcoholization methodologies are efficiently removing the ethanol, however, some organoleptic compounds can also be lost during the process. This makes the dealcoholization process highly sensitive in order to preserve the quality properties of the beverages. Thereby, membrane-based technologies, which use perm-selective barriers for the separation, have been highly promoted for such purpose. Pervaporation (PV) technology is indeed one of these technologies aimed for ethanol removal. Herein, the goal of this review is to provide a compelling overview of the most relevant findings for the production of non-alcoholic beverages (such as beer and wine) by means of PV. Particular attention is paid to experimental results which provide compelling feedback about the accurate ethanol removal and minimal changes on physicochemical properties of the beverages. Moreover, some theoretical basis of such technology, as well as key criteria for a more efficient dealcoholization, are also given.

The reduction of alcohol content in wines has two main objectives, the former is decreasing the wines’ strength and the latter is producing new low alcohol beverages. To accomplish the latter, in this study, we focused on the dealcoholization of a white wine (cv Falanghina, 12.5 vol%) obtained from an ancient Italian grape variety that has recently aroused a renewed interest. It was dealcoholized at various alcohol content levels ranging from 9.8 to 0.3 vol% through the osmotic distillation process, and the main quality parameters of the obtained dealcoholized samples were evaluated. No significant differences (p < 0.05) in total phenols, flavonoids, organic acids and total acidity were observed among the wine samples at different alcohol content levels. On the contrary, the volatile compounds content decreased with increasing alcohol removal. Specifically, almost 50% of higher alcohols with acids and lactones were preserved in dealcoholized wine at 9.8 vol% alcohol content, but this percentage reduced to 30% in the sample at 6.8 vol%, and was even lower in the dealcoholized wine with lower alcohol content. It was argued that the transport of volatile compounds through the membrane, beside the membrane selectivity, is highly correlated with the Henry constant (R2 > 0.8021 for 9.8 vol% of dealcoholized wine). Moreover, results of the sensory evaluation indicated a significant change in terms of acidity, odour, sweetness and body taste in dealcoholized wine (0.3 vol%), giving an overall perceived imbalance and unacceptable taste with respect to the original wine. Therefore, in order to balance acid sensation and enhance body and aftertaste, an attempt was made to formulate an alcohol-free wine-based beverage with enhanced odour and sweetness, by adding some floral wine flavours, up to the amount present in the original wine.

Reverse osmosis (RO) and nanofiltration (NF) membranes are traditionally employed in wine and beer production for concentration, clarification, and stabilization. Their applications now extend to dealcoholization, addressing rising demand for low-alcohol beverages. RO/NF selectively reduce ethanol while retaining volatile aromas and non-volatile flavors, outperforming thermal methods that degrade sensory profiles. This review examines RO/NF roles in alcohol adjustment, sugar modification, and by-product recovery, emphasizing mechanisms and efficiency. Operational challenges such as membrane fouling (polysaccharides, polyphenols), selectivity–permeation flux trade-offs, and energy costs are assessed. By balancing tradition with innovation, RO/NF technologies offer transformative potential for meeting health and sustainability goals in beverage industries. However, gaps in standardization, sensory consistency, and cost-effectiveness necessitate targeted research to optimize industrial adoption and consumer acceptance.

Non-alcoholic alternatives are gaining growing significance within the German beverage sector. In this context, the German wine industry is increasingly focusing on non-alcoholic wines, whose market has developed dynamically in recent years. While the technologies used, the sensory characteristics and the marketing of the products are frequently addressed in the literature, the consideration of sustainability impacts has so far been largely neglected. This applies in particular to the view of all three dimensions of sustainability. These are examined more closely in this review with regard to tradeoffs, which indicate that positive aspects in one dimension go hand in hand with a loss in the other. It can be shown that tradeoffs in the production and marketing of non-alcoholic wines arise both within and between the three sustainability dimensions. Exemplary of this is the increased use of resources in the course of alcohol removal. At the same time, an emerging market segment holds positive aspects from an economic perspective. Ultimately, the consideration of social sustainability is marked by the health science and political debate around the reduction in alcohol consumption and the simultaneous increase in the consumption of non-alcoholic alternatives.