Spoiler: You’re Probably Storing Your Wine Wrong

If you love wine, you should invest in a wine rack. No, not because of the space-saving potential or how good it will look in your kitchen. It will make your wine last longer and taste better.

According to Lifehacker, the proper way to store a bottle of wine is on its side, at least if the wine has a cork. That's because if you store a bottle upright, the cork can dry out. When a bottle is stored sideways, there's always liquid coming into contact with the cork. This keeps the cork expanded, ensuring the bottle's tight seal. If the cork dries out, it can shrink, letting air get into the wine, causing it to age prematurely and taste less than delicious.

Note that this only applies to bottles with real corks. You can store your screw-top wine bottles any way you'd like, since you don’t have to worry about the seal.

The sideways method does have its critics—notably, a major cork producer in Portugal recently questioned the storage technique's efficacy, saying that the humidity within the bottle will keep the cork moist no matter what. However, other wine experts maintain that sideways is the way to go.

Wine aficionados have a few other tips when it comes to storage. Essentially, you want to mimic the environment of a wine cellar as much as possible. You want to keep your wine in a cool place away from light. The environment should be humid, helping to keep the cork sealed tight. Vibrations can also affect wines, so you want to keep your bottles from clanking around.

Once you've opened a bottle of wine, you want to make sure it stays fresh. If you're not going to drink it all in one sitting, make sure to replace the cork. While it's much easier to stick the clean side back in the bottle first, make sure to replace the cork as it was, meaning the stain side down. The top of the cork has been exposed to the elements for the bottle's entire lifespan, so it may be tainted, and you don't want that coming into contact with your wine. (Or just invest in a wine stopper.) And, because wine likes cool environments, make sure to stick it in the fridge once it's opened—yes, even if it's a red.

[h/t Lifehacker]