Most casual rum drinkers associate rum with the Caribbean or Latin America, but it’s a truly global spirit. For proof, look no further than the 2025 Top Shelf Awardswhich honor the Best in Class and Best in Show winners of the esteemed San Francisco World Spirits Competition (SFWSC), organized by The Tasting Alliance. The Top Shelf Awards Gala, where the awards were handed out, marked the end of a weekend-long industry conference hosted by The Tasting Alliance. The event drew over 400 guests from around the world for educational sessions, networking opportunities, and exclusive tastings of spirits and ready-to-drink products.

The awards for Best Unaged Rum, Best Overall Rum, and Best In Show Unaged White Spirit all went to a distillery from Queensland, located in northern Australia, that remains largely unknown outside its continent.

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Burdekin Distillerywhich produced the award-winning Distillers Edition — Coral Sea Strength rum, has only been in production since 2020, when Tim Lamb, owner of a mineral water bottling business in North Queensland’s tropical region, decided to branch out into rum distilling. Burdekin is named after the region where it’s located, which is also happens to be Australia’s premier sugarcane-growing region.

Burdekin’s rums are in the agricole style, meaning they’re distilled from cane juice rather than molasses. Coral Sea Strength, unlike many “white” rums that are aged and filtered, has never seen the inside of a barrel.

Bottled at a hefty 54.5% ABV and described as having a “smooth yet grassy signature cane flavor,” its production is limited to 600 numbered bottles. Tracking one of them down outside Australia and the UK may be difficult due to Burdekin’s limited distribution, but rum enthusiasts will no doubt be up for the hunt.

The Top Shelf winner for Best Aged Rum went to Planteray’s Xaymaca Special Dry, a traditional Jamaican rum with a French twist. It’s a blend of 100% pot still rums from the legendary Clarendon and Long Pond distilleries, aged for an undisclosed period in ex-bourbon barrels in Jamaica, then transported to France for a year of aging in Ferrand Cognac casks. Bottled at 43% ABV, Planteray says Xaymaca revitalizes the style of “funky” traditional Jamaican pot still rums from the 19th century, with notes of black banana and flambéed pineapple.

Unaged, overproof rum is a key part of the Jamaican drinking routine, so it’s small wonder that the Top Shelf award for Best Overproof Rum went to a Jamaican distillery — in this case, the venerable Worthy Park, where rum has been distilled using estate-grown sugarcane since 1741, though the distillery as we know it today dates to 2005. The vast majority of Jamaican rum is distilled from molasses, but Worthy Park Overproof uses a blend of molasses and fresh cane juice, the latter of which the distillery claims is a throwback to the early days of Jamaican rum-making. The unaged, 100% pot still rum is bottled at the traditional Jamaican overproof strength of 63% ABV. The distillery describes its aroma as crisp and light, while on the palate it combines ripe tropical fruit flavors with notes of sweet cane sugar and a touch of honey.

The winner of the Best Aged Rum award employs the solera method typical of many South American rums, in which older and younger rums are vatted together. Ron Cartavio XO is produced at the Cartavio distillery in Peru. While the brand isn’t widely known among European and American rum enthusiasts, its history goes back nearly a century, with rum having been produced there since 1929.

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The XO expression was relaunched in 2020; aged in American, French, and Slovenian oak barrels, it claims an average age of 18 years, though thanks to the solera aging method, the blend contains both older and younger rums. Bottled at 40% ABV, the brand recommends enjoying it on the rocks, with intense aromas of spices, nuts, vanilla, and chocolate, and a fair amount of wood from the three types of barrels on the palate.

From Australia to Jamaica to Peru, this year’s Top Shelf Awards underscore just how varied — and geographically far-flung — the world of rum has become. Whether distilled from fresh cane juice or molasses, aged for decades or bottled straight off the still, these standout expressions reflect both deep-rooted tradition and bold innovation.