The Danish whisky distillation industry is still in its infancy, but the early signs have been very promising indeed, though rockier times may be ahead.

The first two Danish whisky producers were the Braunstein and Stauning distilleries. Braunstein was founded earlier, in 2005, but did not produce whisky until 2007; Stauning was founded in 2006 and claims to be Denmark's first specialist whisky distillery.

Both of these distilleries were originally micro-distillers and Braunstein has remained so despite becoming the first distillery to release a Danish single malt whisky in 2010.  Stauning took a different route, expanding rapidly after attracting a $10m investment from Diageo's future development fund Distil Ventures in 2015.

Originally a crowd-funded DIY operation created by nine small investors, Stauning took Diageo's cash and used it to build a much bigger version of their original distillery, complete with 24 small direct-fired stills and an increased capacity of nearly 1m litres per annum, making it comfortably Denmark's largest distillery.

The new Stauning distillery opened in 2018, but Diageo's 2025 decision to halt funding of Distil Ventures operations has thrown the distillery's future into doubt. Thankfully, the success of Braunstein and Stauning has inspired further aspiring Danish whiskymakers, with significant distilleries such as Thy Whisky (founded 2009) and Copenhagen Distillery (2014) operating alongside over a dozen small producers.