Brännvin is a Swedish liquor distilled from potatoes, grain, or (formerly) wood cellulose. It can be plain and colourless, or flavoured with herbs and spices. Beverages labelled brännvin are usually plain and have an alcohol content between 30% and 38%. The word brännvin means "burn[t] (distilled) wine". It is cognate with Danish brændevin, Dutch brandewijn, English brandy(wine), Finnish viina, German Branntwein, Icelandic brennivín and Norwegian brennevin. A small glass of brännvin is called a snaps (cf. German schnapps), and may be accompanied by a snapsvisa, a drinking song.

Outside Scandinavia

In the US, a Chicago producer makes a bitter brännvin (beskbrännvin), called Jeppson's Malört. "Malört" is the Swedish word for the plant Artemisia absinthium, wormwood, often used as an ingredient in absinthe.

In Scandinavian culture

Brännvin was central to the semi-mythical world in the songs of swedish composer Carl Michael Bellman. For example, in Fredman's Epistle no. 1, the first verse begins: