The Paul John Christmas Edition 2025 is here. It’s the eighth release in the much-loved annual limited edition (every previous bottling has sold out on Master of Malt), and is also the oldest whisky that the distillery has ever released.
Made from a base of unpeated malt, the Paul John Christmas Edition 2025 is aged for five years in bourbon casks. But the headline detail is this: two additional years in cream sherry 250-litre casks – oloroso and Pedro Ximénez (PX) sherry. Then a further year where the whole thing is vatted together and aged.
Cream sherry? Very Christmassy indeed. There are 6,254 bottles as part of this release, but the UK has just 420 bottles. So get your bottle while we have them. Once they’re gone, they’re gone! Heemanshu Ashar, global brand ambassador for Paul John, advises you to buy three: one for you, one to share, and one to save. Reasonable counsel.
As with all Paul John whiskies, the 2025 Christmas Edition is non-chill-filtered with no additives. Another interesting detail about this one is that it was bottled at 48% ABV, higher than the typical 46% ABV. Every little helps.
Paul John whisky is the leading Indian single malt
Paul John: India’s No. 1
Ashar understands why people might raise an eyebrow at an Indian distillery producing a Christmas whisky. But Goa’s history makes the idea far less surprising. Its long Portuguese influence means it has one of India’s highest Christian populations, and Paul John himself is a Christian. More importantly, he’s a distiller who sees a Christmas release as part of a wider legacy, a way of placing Indian single malt on the same global stage as the established whisky nations.
That ambition lands at a moment when Indian whisky is gathering momentum. Production is doubling roughly every five years, and Indian drinkers are increasingly curious about homegrown single malt. But the industry only filled around 400,000 casks last year. It takes time to build a category. Japan and Taiwan set the modern standard for Asian whisky, and Paul John aims to follow that path. It’s already India’s most awarded single malt, and its whisky Nirvana is the country’s top-selling homegrown single malt. At home, it’s often served in highballs, because that’s how whisky needs to behave in Goan heat.
The Christmas Edition fits into this broader push for identity. Each year brings a new profile, but the backbone begins with bourbon casks. Since Sazerac took a stake in Paul John, bourbon cask supply has become steadier, building on earlier relationships with a cooperage supplying Heaven Hill, Four Roses, Maker’s Mark and Jack Daniel’s. The partnership runs both ways. Paul John bottles Fireball and Southern Comfort in India, Buzzballz is on the way, and Sazerac distributes Paul John internationally. It gives the distillery the infrastructure and reach it needs. A solid foundation, and exactly the kind of platform required for a brand determined to make Indian whisky part of the global conversation.
The Paul John warehouse, underground to help manage the climate
Managing the Goa climate at Paul John
If Paul John wants to stand apart in a crowded whisky world, it has to lean into what makes it unmistakably Indian. That identity begins with its six-row malted barley. It carries higher protein and enzyme levels than European two-row barley, which pushes the spirit toward tannic structure and bright fruity, floral character. Then comes the environment itself. Goa is hot, humid and relentlessly sunny, with a dry season running from October to May and a thunderous monsoon from June to September. Temperatures rarely drop below 25°C, with 300 days of sunshine in a year. You have to manage that kind of climate when ageing whisky.
The pace of maturation in Goa is astonishing. Extraction runs high, influence arrives quickly, and a single year can behave like three to five Scottish years. It doesn’t replicate the effect of slow maturation, but it creates its own style, full of vitality and impact. Casks can transform in a matter of weeks. Angel’s Share sits at around 10% in year one and 8% after that, which means long ageing in a single barrel is simply not an option.
Underground cellar warehousing
In Goa’s humidity, the wet air craves alcohol rather than water, whereas the opposite is true in Scotland. This makes the ABV drop instead of rising as it matures. That affects how the spirit pulls flavours from the wood, which compounds it extracts, the mouthfeel and weight, how quickly tannins appear, and how sweetness or sharpness balances out during maturation.
To navigate that environment, Paul John uses underground cellars beneath the visitor centre. They aren’t temperature-controlled, but two air conditioners keep the air circulating and clean. Arriving casks don’t come in wet either. Travel and climate dry them out, so the distillery receives small samples of the seasoning liquid to understand what the wood has been holding. At the cooperage level, sherry casks receive two years of seasoning, and Port casks get four before they’re sent to India.
Paul John also begins every new project with 25 casks as a controlled trial before scaling up to around 250. Master distiller Michael D’Souza signs off every cask.
The 2023 Paul John Christmas edition
Tasting the Paul John Christmas range
A tasting at Colonel Saab in Holborn offered a whistle-stop look at the series from 2020 onwards. Earlier editions from 2018 and 2019 are either long gone or swirling around the secondary market. Here’s the brief flavour tour.
Paul John Christmas Edition 2020 – Peat here brings umami savouriness, the bourbon cask adds sweet fudge, and then sherried spice brings some of the Xmas feeling. The oloroso casks were thought of so highly that they are now permanent expressions.
Paul John Christmas Edition 2021 – Saltier, earthier, nuttier, and richer in spice than the 2020. Top notes of marmalade, coffee, dark chocolate, and dark fruit.
Paul John Christmas Edition 2022 – Closer to 2020, with a very decadent bourbon cask sweetness. Also, a little Cognac floralness, honey, coconut, and cinnamon.
Paul John Christmas Edition 2023 – Darker, drier, and delicious. It’s got heaps of Black Forest Gâteau character as well as vanilla ice cream, caramel, mocha, and cinnamon pastries.
Paul John Christmas Edition 2024 – You would know this is a rum cask without reading the label. It’s so buttery with toffee and tropical in fruit. Notes of Bounty chocolate, lassi, honey, almonds… I hear the rum cask previously held Caroni, no less. Very cool.
Paul John Christmas Edition 2025 – Cream casks led us to a different side of Paul John. I got much more orchard fruit, butterscotch, apricot… It’s lighter and brighter and really compelling thanks to that extra pinch of ABV. Lovely.
Get your bottle now!
Paul John Christmas Edition 2025 Official Tasting Note:
Nose: Ripe plum, dark cherry, candied orange peel, and orange blossom honey, complemented by soft toffee, cocoa, and nutmeg
Palate: A refined balance of apple, stone fruits, caramel, roasted nuts, and tropical sweetness, enhanced by notes of spiced rum, butterscotch, and dark caramel
Finish: Long and creamy, with lingering tones of sweet oak, molasses, dried berries, and a subtle hint of Christmas cake — a fitting tribute to the season’s spirit