Head to head · unusually close flavour match
Johnnie Walker Blue Label vs Monkey Shoulder
These two are not in the same bracket: £532 a litre of pure alcohol for Johnnie Walker Blue Label against £100 for Monkey Shoulder.
Compiled by WhiskeyCask Editorial · Last verified 2026-07-30
Specifications side by side
| Johnnie Walker Blue Label | Monkey Shoulder | |
|---|---|---|
| Category | Blended scotch | Blended malt |
| Origin | Scotland | Speyside, Scotland |
| Age | No age statement | No age statement |
| Strength | 40% ABV | 43% ABV |
| Cask | Not disclosed | Not disclosed |
| Bottle | 700 ml | 700 ml |
| RRP observed | £149 | £30 |
| Per 10cl | £21 | £4.29 |
| Per litre of alcohol | £532 | £100 |
| Chill-filtered | Not stated | Not stated |
What separates them
Both from Scotland.
Johnnie Walker Blue Label is a blended scotch, Monkey Shoulder a blended malt.
Neither carries an age statement, so neither discloses its youngest spirit.
Neither producer publishes cask types.
Neither states chill filtration.
What the price buys
Johnnie Walker Blue Label is £119 dearer a bottle than Monkey Shoulder.
Strength keeps that ordering: £100 a litre of pure alcohol for Monkey Shoulder against £532.
Across the 32 bottles we can cost this way, Johnnie Walker Blue Label is 31st cheapest and Monkey Shoulder 4th cheapest.
Flavour, compared
View as table
| Axis | Johnnie Walker Blue Label | Monkey Shoulder |
|---|---|---|
| Peaty | 3 | 1 |
| Sweet | 7 | 7 |
| Fruity | 6 | 6 |
| Spicy | 5 | 5 |
| Woody | 5 | 4 |
| Sherried | 5 | 3 |
| Cereal | 5 | 6 |
| Oily | 7 | 6 |
No axis reaches the 3-point gap we call meaningful. Widest is peaty, 3 against 1.
Identical on sweet, fruity and spicy.
Each bottle in its own right
Johnnie Walker Blue Label
Silky, honeyed and faintly smoky. Immaculately made, and priced for the box as much as the liquid.
Diageo's own page states no age at all, framing selection by rejection rate instead — only one cask in 10,000 qualifies — with some components from closed 'ghost' distilleries.
Full record →Monkey Shoulder
Vanilla, orange and malt, built to survive ice and ginger ale. An honest cocktail malt.
William Grant & Sons does not name the three constituent malts anywhere on its own site — the widely repeated Glenfiddich, Balvenie and Kininvie attribution is unofficial. The 43% we list is the producer's US figure; no UK strength is published at all.
Full record →No overlap in what we list them for: Johnnie Walker Blue Label for gift and occasion bottle, Monkey Shoulder for cocktails, highball and value.
Where these specifications come from
Producer and retailer pages for Johnnie Walker Blue Label and Monkey Shoulder: thebar.com, monkeyshoulder.com. Figures are what those pages published when we last checked them, on 2026-07-30.