A rapid HPLC-diode array detection (DAD) method was developed for the routine analysis of 16 anthocyanins in wine. Direct injection of filtered wine samples followed by selective detection at 520 nm allowed quantitation of these compounds in red wines. The method was linear for malvidin-3-glucoside over the range 5-250ppm, and the limit of detection for this compound was 0.18 ppm. A volatile mobile phase is used, which enables hyphenation to mass spectrometry (MS). With HPLC-MS, a total of 44 pigments could be identified in South African wines. Obtained mass spectra are discussed for a series of representative wine constituents and results are compared with literature references. An attempt was made to differentiate between different cultivars according to the anthocyanin content using stepwise forward linear discriminant analysis (LDA).