How to become a sommelier: the routes, the levels and the real timelines

Every year, give or take in October, thousands of people in Italy sit down for the first time in front of an empty glass with a notebook in hand and a question on their mind: will I actually be able to recognise anything? Then the first wine arrives, someone starts talking about the “nail” and the “tears”, and the evening takes an unexpected turn. Becoming a sommelier in Italy is at once a profession, a mass hobby and a small rite of passage. It’s worth understanding properly how it works before you buy the set of glasses.

First things first: what “sommelier” actually means

Let’s start with a clarification that many people discover too late. In Italy there is no official professional register of sommeliers, and no university degree that confers the title by law. The “sommelier diploma” is awarded by private associations, which over the decades have built structured courses that the trade recognises. It is the market, meaning restaurants, wine shops and distributors, that gives that piece of paper its value, not a professional body.

This also explains why the routes are different and don’t always overlap. Choosing between them is not a matter of absolute prestige, but of what you want to do afterwards.

The Italian associations: AIS, FISAR and the rest

The oldest and largest is AIS, the Associazione Italiana Sommelier, founded in Milan in 1965. Its course is the template on which many others have been built: three levels, for a total of 45 lessons according to the association itself. The first level covers tasting technique, viticulture and basic oenology; the second Italy and the world’s main producing countries; the third food and wine pairing. At the end there is an exam to obtain the diploma. AIS puts the average time to get to the finish at around a year and a half, but a great deal depends on the local branch and its calendar: some take two years, others a little longer if they miss a session.

FISAR, the Federazione Italiana Sommelier Albergatori e Ristoratori, was founded in 1972 and follows a similar framework, also in three levels with a final exam. The name tells you where it comes from: a historic link with the hospitality world. Alongside these two there are other organisations, such as the courses that belong to the Bibenda universe, with comparable programmes.

How do you choose? Honestly, at first level the differences are more about style and teachers than substance. The venue matters a lot: how many places there are, what time the lessons start, who is teaching. A good lecturer is worth more than a good logo.

ONAV: the route for tasters

ONAV, the Organizzazione Nazionale Assaggiatori di Vino, is based in Asti and takes a different approach. The focus here is not service on the restaurant floor but sensory analysis: it trains tasters, people able to describe and assess a wine with method. The basic course, in the local editions we looked at, runs to around fifteen theory-and-practice sessions and ends with a tasting exam; those who pass join the organisation’s national register of tasters. From there you can climb to the levels of expert taster and master taster.

It is the natural route for anyone working in a winery, for a consorzio, on tasting panels, or simply for those who love judging wine more than the liturgy of serving it. ONAV has recently added a sommelier course too, though it is reserved for those who already hold the senior taster qualifications: a sign of how the borders between these worlds are becoming more porous.

WSET: the international lingua franca

If the idea is to work abroad, in import-export or for an international group, the name to know is WSET, the London-based Wine & Spirit Education Trust. Its wine qualifications run from Level 1 to Level 4, and they are taught in English but also in other languages, Italian included, at approved centres.

The difference from the Italian associations’ courses lies in the approach: less service, more knowledge of the global market, and a standardised tasting method that is the same everywhere. The first three levels can be tackled relatively quickly, from a few days to a few months each. Level 4, the Diploma, is another matter altogether: six units ranging from production to commerce, from sparkling wines to fortified ones, plus a written research assignment. Two or three years of part-time study is typical, and quite a few people resit an exam or two.

The summits: Master Sommelier and Master of Wine

Above all of this sit two titles that, in the wine world, ring like a black belt. The first is Master Sommelier, awarded by the Court of Master Sommeliers, founded in 1977 in the United Kingdom. The path goes through several stages, up to the final exam, split into theory, service and blind tasting. The people who have earned the title, worldwide, number fewer than three hundred: a tiny club.

The second is Master of Wine, from London’s Institute of Masters of Wine, founded in 1955 after the first exams had been held in 1953. Here the emphasis is less on the dining room and more on all-round knowledge: viticulture, oenology, the business of wine, contemporary issues, tasting, and a final research paper. To get in you need an advanced qualification, typically the WSET Diploma or a high-level sommelier title, plus experience in the trade. The programme takes at least three years, and in practice often a good deal more. There are a few hundred Masters of Wine in the world, around four hundred according to the latest public figures available, which should nonetheless be taken as indicative.

Neither title is necessary to do good work in wine. Both, however, are the most exacting yardstick the trade has ever devised.

Career or passion: two different courses, even if the textbook is the same

This is the point the brochures tend to skate over. Most people who take a sommelier course in Italy will never work as a sommelier. And that is perfectly fine. But anyone who wants to work on the floor should know that the diploma is a beginning, not a finishing line. The real craft is learned in service: managing a wine list, talking to a guest who doesn’t want to feel judged, knowing the cellar stock, keeping pace on a Saturday night. No exam measures the ability to recommend the right bottle to a table in the middle of an argument.

Those who study for pleasure, on the other hand, enjoy a luxury the professional doesn’t: they can pick a path according to curiosity. The more analytical ONAV approach appeals to those who want to understand why a wine is made a certain way. WSET to those who love the geography of the world. AIS and FISAR to those looking for a complete course and a community to share evenings and tastings with.

Our view is simple: the best course is the one that makes you taste a lot, and with method, in the company of someone better than you. The title will come later. And if, somewhere between one level and the next, you discover you’re more interested in drinking well than in explaining to others how to do it, you won’t have failed: you’ll simply have understood what the course was really for.

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