What Is Baijiu? China’s Iconic Spirit Explained

Baijiu (literally “white liquor”) is China’s national spirit, distilled primarily from fermented sorghum, though rice, wheat, and other grains are sometimes used depending on regional style. Thanks to sheer domestic demand, it consistently outsells whisky, vodka, and every other spirits category worldwide, despite limited export presence.

What makes baijiu unusual is its fermentation process: solid-state fermentation using a starter culture called qu, packed with a complex mix of yeasts, moulds, and bacteria, often carried out in underground pits or earthenware jars over weeks or months, far longer than the liquid fermentation used for most Western spirits.

Baijiu is generally grouped into aroma categories rather than aging categories — sauce aroma (jiangxiang), strong aroma (nongxiang), light aroma (qingxiang), and several others — each produced with different techniques and delivering dramatically different flavour profiles, from savoury and umami-rich to floral and clean.

Kweichow Moutai, made using the sauce-aroma method in Guizhou province, is the most famous and valuable baijiu brand globally, regularly cited as one of the most valuable spirits companies in the world by market capitalisation — a reflection of both its cultural status in China and genuine collector demand for aged and limited releases.

For newcomers, baijiu is best approached with an open mind: its fermented, savoury, sometimes soy-sauce-like aromatics are genuinely unlike anything in Western spirits, and it rewards being tasted the traditional way — in small measures, at room temperature, often alongside food.