17 of the best distillery tours in Scotland

Times

11 hours ago

History and romance, landscape and climate, celebration and commiseration. The sense of being connected to your destination by whisky is strong in Scotland, and for the blenders, maltsters and coopers, distilleries are no longer places but communities full of stories, heritage and meaning.
The problem is that this landscape is becoming increasingly crowded, so where do you start? The Scotch Whisky Association puts the number of distilleries in operation at 152, from Islayto Greenock and Shetland. Not all of them open to the public, of course, and those with visitor centres are busier than ever — the most recent figures put visitor numbers at two million annually.
Thankfully, the experience is keeping pace and evolving. Tutored tastings and warehouse tours are no longer geared only towards connoisseurs but embrace a wider audience with interactive and immersive encounters, while new distillery-owned accommodation is opening for full brand immersion. Other relationships, particularly between haute cuisine and single malt whisky houses, are flourishing — cue destination restaurants and cutting-edge architecture that would grace any world-class hotel or attraction. Here's our round-up of the best distillery tours in Scotland.
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££ | Best for haute cuisine
This is the oldest working distillery in Scotland, dating from 1763, yet you can see that it's arguably evolving faster than any other. The lightly peated smoked dram has been teased and primed for centuries, but bang up to date are the 60-minute tours and two-hour Whisky Maker experiences, culminating in the creation of your own bottle of amber bead. For something even more fabulous, insider tours of Warehouse No 9, home to the stillhouse's rarest drops, are offered each summer. The charm of a visit to the Glenturret is also in the cleverly contrived pleasure of visiting the Glenturret Lalique Restaurant, which has two Michelin star, as well as a Lalique glassware boutique. The sleight of hand is that the French luxury group has bankrolled the distillery's revival since 2019.
££ | Best for a sense of luxury
Owned by LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, Ardbeg is a bold, modernist dram — described by its chief distiller as a peat-rich paradox of soot and fruit. The distillery is also a full-bodied affair, offering a schedule of classic 75-minute tours (including three drams), longer warehouse tastings and drop-in whisky flights. The well-orchestrated set-up is helped by the Old Kiln Café and Ardstream Trailer, the most handsome food truck in Scotland (summer only). The boutique Ardbeg House hotel in nearby Port Ellen is expected to open in September 2025 and be in a similar vein to the four-star Glenmorangie House (also owned by LVMH).£ | Best for city centre sightseeing
This Edinburgh old town distillery released its first single malt, Arrival, in 2023 — with dried fruit, sticky toffee pudding and soft leather on the nose, and toffee and digestive biscuits on the palette. Founded in 2019 in a listed railway building in the shadow of Arthur's Seat, a few steps from the Royal Mile, it's the first distillery in the city centre for more than a hundred years. Tours include the Holyrood Highlights for those tight on time (with 15 minutes in the stillroom and a 15-minute tutored tasting) and the Journey to Whisky one-hour experience, which takes you through the whole process, with a guided tasting of four spirits (including new-make and aged-new-make spirits, as well as fully matured whisky).
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£ | Best for panoramic views
The first vertical distillery in the UK opened in 2023 in the dynamic docklands of Edinburgh. Founded by two old friends — the wine merchant Ian Stirling and the finance director Paddy Fletcher — the nine-storey, £12 million distillery was ten years in the making and inspired by the port's historical links to whisky production. The eye-catching architecture is a result of the limited size of the waterfront plot having required them to build up rather than out. The 90-minute tour tells the story of the distillery from pipe dream to dram. Visitors can fill miniature bottles of new-make spirit (the whisky, of course, is a while off) and taste their way through the distillery's production process in the quality-control tasting laboratory. You might not be able to enjoy its single malt just yet, but the top-floor mezzanine bar has 360-degree views over the city, a floor-to-ceiling whisky bar at the back and a mouth-watering menu of small plates showcasing Scotland's natural larder.
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£-£££ | Best for an immersive experience
Styled as a shiny, high-tech department store spread over eight floors, the Johnnie Walker experience in Edinburgh is an interactive extravaganza of light, sound, smell, music and special effects. Complete an online questionnaire before arriving to establish a personal flavour profile then sample specially tailored whisky cocktails during the tour. Watch the drama of Johnnie Walker's life unfold on stage — from young farmer to whisky pioneer and top-hatted dandy. For connoisseurs there's a vault in the cellar filled with old and rare whiskies. Don't miss the elegant rooftop bars with views to the Firth of Forth and Edinburgh Castle. Tours are also available of three Highland distilleries that have produced single malts included in Johnnie Walker blends over the past 100 years.
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£ | Best for a grain-to-glass experience
The entrepreneurial Stirling family, who have farmed this fertile stretch of the Angus coast for four generations, produce a climate-positive gin (made from homegrown peas that are then fed to the cattle), a potato vodka and a Scottish rye whisky. Made from grain grown on their 2,000-acre estate, the field-to-bottle single-estate Highland dram celebrates its terroir, in water taken from an underground lagoon on the land and the state-of-the-art distillery housed in a former barn. The 60-minute Whisky Experience tour starts, naturally, with a view over the fields and an overview of the farm's history, before heading to the old cowshed that contains the shiny copper stills and finishing with a tutored tasting overlooking a glorious sweep of Lunan Bay.
arbikie.com
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£ | Best for environmental production
Independent, organic and sustainable, this distillery was created in 2017 from an old farm on the west-coast Morvern peninsula. Nc'nean proudly proclaims its eco credentials as the first whisky distillery in the UK to reach net-zero emissions for its operations. Its name is Gaelic for 'goddess of the spirits' — appropriately, as this light, floral whisky is created by a female-led team under the watchful eye of the founder Annabel Thomas. Tours are informative but informal, and tea, cake and drams are all included. Nc'nean also has two moorings for visitors, so you can sail up in a yacht, if you so wish.
ncnean.com
£-££ | Best for style and design
Perched in a remote glen on the edge of Cairngorms National Park, the Glenlivet was recently refurbished to create an elegant new visitor space that is more akin to a luxury hotel. Step through the main doors to be greeted by a plush, subtly lit space with a huge chandelier made from dried wildflowers. Learn about Glenlivet whisky through an immersive experience that delves into the production and history. Later, repair to a private room to experience old and rare whiskies, or try the astonishing cocktail capsules that melt on the tongue, followed by whisky-chocolate pairings. You can hand-fill your own cask-strength bottle of the Glenlivet too.
theglenlivet.com
£-££ | Best for tradition
A whisky suffused with the briny, earthy notes of this windswept Inner Hebridean island, Lagavulin is one of the most beloved Scottish peaty whiskies — and it's also the favourite of the Parks and Recreation character Ron Swanson (aka the actor Nick Offerman). One of the older and more traditional distilleries on Islay, Lagavulin is famed for its distinctive red chimney, unusual pear-shaped stills and gorgeous views over the bay in front. For those who find the strong, smoky flavour a little too robust, younger, lighter expressions of Lagavulin are available too.
malts.com
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£-££ | Best for a nature experience
In the heart of rural East Lothian, the Glenkinchie distillery creates a light floral whisky within a smart, newly refurbished red-brick Victorian building overlooking a charming wildflower garden pollinated by the bees of three hives. Its visitor centre offers a hi-tech multisensory 'flavour journey' that will delight, as will the enormous model that captures the distillery in miniature, built for the 1924 British Empire Exhibition. Afterwards head upstairs to the Scandi-influenced bar with elegant Ercol furniture and lovely garden views to enjoy a dram or two.
malts.com
£-£££ | Best for striking views
A long, narrow winding road overlooking the glorious Paps of Jura leads to Bunnahabhain, the most remote distillery on Islay. It's visitor space, built in the style of a traditional boathouse, brings an array of tours during which aficionados can admire the tallest 'swan-neck' stills on the island and enjoy tutored tastings overlooking the stunning Sound of Islay. Unusually for an Islay whisky, Bunnahabhain's signature style is unpeated, although in keeping with its roots the distillery does produce some peated whiskies for those who like a smoky hit.
bunnahabhain.com
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£-£££ | Best for stunning architecture
This £140 million flagship distillery and visitor experience is housed in a spectacular award-winning building on the Easter Elchies estate in Speyside. The antithesis of the traditional pagoda-style distillery, the Macallan is a semi-subterranean operation with a gently undulating roof that echoes the shape of the surrounding hills and is topped with wildflowers. There's also a bar, brasserie and boutique, as well as private tours that include a tutored tasting in Macallan's iconic 'cave privée' and a dram with the head ghillie in the estate's fishing lodge.
themacallan.com
£ | Best for a revival of tradition
The Isle of Harris Distillery is best known for the product that it's making while waiting for its first whisky to mature: gin. Reviving a whisky-making tradition lost 170 years ago, the first lightly peated Hearach (Gaelic for a Harris islander) was released in 2023 and has been created using soft Hebridean water running over some of the oldest rocks in the world. Visitors can learn about the people and processes creating this special whisky, which expresses the deep elemental nature of this wild and lovely landscape on the edge of the Atlantic.
harrisdistillery.com
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£ | Best for the journey
A spectacularly beautiful island dominated by the Paps — its famed mountains — Jura has one road, one shop, one terrifying whirlpool and one distillery. Take the long way round via a CalMac ferry to neighbouring Islay or nip across in 45 minutes on a foot-passenger cruiser from the mainland at Tayvallich. Both are unforgettable journeys, and the distillery at the end is the icing on the cake. Take a tour and learn how this little distillery has risen from the ashes to create its distinctive island brand. Every September the distillery celebrates Jura and its whisky with a festival of traditional music, dancing and a few drams.
jurawhisky.com
£-££ | Best for picturesque charm
Established in 1786, Strathisla is the oldest working distillery in the Highlands and the single malt at the heart of Chivas Regal blends. As pretty as pie, with its pagoda-style roof, the beautifully kept Strathisla stands in a bucolic setting on the banks of the River Isla. Tours exploring the ancient craft of distilling and blending are led by expert but informal guides, and include everything from a stroll around the distillery grounds and local landmarks to a cask-strength tasting, creating a personal blend and sampling limited-edition single malts.
maltwhiskydistilleries.com
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£ | Best for community spirit
Almost singlehandedly reviving this island community, Raasay started with gin in 2019 while maturing its first whisky. In the process it created a distillery, visitor centre, shop, bar and charming whisky hotel, while arresting population decline on this tiny streak of land off the east coast of Skye. Setting out to emulate some older styles of Hebridean malts, the result is its flagship Raasay single malt, which is lightly peated with dark-fruit flavours. Tastings and tours are for connoisseurs and the curious alike, while enjoying one of the most dramatic views in Scotland, across to the Cuillin mountains on Skye.
raasaydistillery.com
£ | Best for groundbreaking innovation
Presided over by Dr Bill Lumsden, sometimes called the Willy Wonka of whisky, Glenmorangie is firmly looking to the future with its science and architecture. Marvel at the Lighthouse, the distillery's magnificent glass innovation centre/whisky lab, towering over the surrounding Victorian stone buildings with views over the Dornoch Firth. An award-winning master distiller, Lumsden was the genius responsible for finishing Glenmorangie's whiskies in sweet wine casks, helping to produce their signature light, fruity, spicy flavours. Stay nearby at the delightful 17th-century Glenmorangie House and your distillery tour will be complimentary.
glenmorangie.com
Additional reporting by Mike MacEacheran
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