Federal alcohol permits · city ranking

Top US cities by alcohol permits

U.S. cities ranked by federal alcohol permit holders, wineries, distilleries, importers, and wholesalers that list the city as their premises in the TTB List of Permittees.

Napa
#1 city
1,811
Permit holders
24.6%
Share in top 50
11,126
Cities covered

The leaderboard in one line

Napa, California leads all U.S. cities with 1,811 federal alcohol permit holders; the #50 cutoff to make this list is 162 (Lompoc, California).

1,811
#1 · Napa
162
#50, the cutoff to make this list
24.6%
of holders in the top 50
11,126
U.S. cities covered

Source: TTB FOIA List of Permittees, August 2026.

According to the U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau (TTB) List of Permittees, published August 2026, 84,273 federal alcohol Basic Permits are on file across 11,126 U.S. cities. These 50 cities concentrate the most permit holders; each links to its full local directory. See the methodology for how cities are attributed.

State concentration in the top 50

How many of the 50 leading cities sit in each state.

California 19 cities Florida 5 cities Texas 4 cities Washington 3 cities New York 2 cities

Top 50 cities by permit holders

# City Permit holdersWineriesImportersWholesalers
1 Napa, California 1,811 797 235 755
2 Miami, Florida 1,235 9 662 550
3 New York, New York 1,117 7 555 553
4 Los Angeles, California 848 9 367 460
5 Houston, Texas 790 60 322 378
6 Chicago, Illinois 694 21 291 362
7 Brooklyn, New York 666 15 272 343
8 Paso Robles, California 645 465 34 130
9 Santa Rosa, California 625 258 78 281
10 San Francisco, California 579 58 179 331
11 Portland, Oregon 559 73 134 324
12 Healdsburg, California 540 312 42 175
13 Seattle, Washington 538 61 149 297
14 San Diego, California 501 34 192 252
15 Saint Helena, California 493 213 46 231
16 Sonoma, California 479 229 58 186
17 Las Vegas, Nevada 454 1 203 242
18 Denver, Colorado 443 19 140 258
19 Raleigh, North Carolina 437 7 111 313
20 Austin, Texas 419 36 177 190
21 Atlanta, Georgia 352 19 146 166
22 Washington, District of Columbia 350 10 166 160
23 Dallas, Texas 335 26 143 153
24 Calistoga, California 330 167 25 134
25 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 279 23 93 137
26 San Antonio, Texas 279 16 133 116
27 Doral, Florida 262 1 141 119
28 Walla Walla, Washington 260 221 8 24
29 Louisville, Kentucky 255 10 61 143
30 Orlando, Florida 247 8 115 117
31 San Jose, California 238 14 82 137
32 ST. Helena, California 235 132 20 78
33 Sebastopol, California 213 114 13 82
34 Woodinville, Washington 213 156 16 30
35 Tampa, Florida 211 10 88 99
36 Oakland, California 210 9 74 123
37 Charlotte, North Carolina 210 8 70 118
38 Lodi, California 208 113 20 70
39 Phoenix, Arizona 206 2 82 109
40 Newberg, Oregon 198 101 12 79
41 Nashville, Tennessee 190 15 42 115
42 Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania 184 22 53 92
43 American Canyon, California 181 28 59 92
44 Buellton, California 181 140 11 28
45 Cincinnati, Ohio 173 29 49 75
46 Baltimore, Maryland 165 17 55 81
47 Temecula, California 164 108 19 29
48 San Juan, Puerto Rico 164 3 76 73
49 Jacksonville, Florida 163 4 69 82
50 Lompoc, California 162 114 8 37

Counts use the city listed on each TTB permit. Wine-region cities rank high because wineries cluster around growing regions; distribution-hub cities rank high on importers and wholesalers.

More rankings

Most permits by state
States ranked by total permits
Permits per capita
Densest states by population
All rankings
The full rankings hub

Source: TTB FOIA List of Permittees, published August 2026. City assignments use self-reported premises addresses. Federal permits reflect licensing, not operational status; confirm any record against the official TTB Public Permit Search.

According to the U.S. Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau's List of Permittees, the August 2026 List of Permittees source contains 84,273 federal Basic Permit records. PlainAlcohol renders those records directly from the source; no figure is typed in by an editor. This ranking is rendered directly from the TTB List of Permittees, no figure is typed in by an editor. See our editorial standards & corrections policy, the methodology behind these numbers, the data & editorial changelog, or report a data error.