Wine Squirrel will keep your wine fresher, longer

Do you like drinking wine, but not so much that you finish every bottle within a day or two of opening it? The struggle is real, judging by all the methods developers have proposed for extending the life of opened wine. Wine Squirrel, an $85 smart decanter launching today on Kickstarter, is the latest contributor to the trend.

Wine Squirrel wants to solve a simple problem: Once you open a bottle, air hits the wine -- and the more oxygen gets into it, the more the wine degrades. Developer Forever Products plans to confront this problem with an equally simple solution. Just pour the wine into the decanter, and when you finish drinking, seal it with a cap and plunger. Then when you're ready to break out the wine later, you can just take the cap off and pour.

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The cap itself is a clever device that should seal wine reliably, adjusting for the inevitable manufacturing differences between even mass-produced decanters. The trouble is, even if Wine Squirrel works, its solution fixes only the problem of ongoing oxygen-exposure, unlike the Synek Somm and the Kuvée Bottle.

If wine is exposed to air for a few moments then resealed, oxidation continues, albeit at a slower rate. So Wine Squirrel won't grant your wine eternal life -- probably just a few extra days. Whether that's worth the $45 (about £30 or AU$60) Early Bird deal on Kickstarter, or the $85 (about £60 or AU$110) final pricetag, will be up to you.

Wine Squirrel will ship in November 2016 if backers fully fund the project.