Accurate evapotranspiration (ET) measurements are fundamental for improving the understanding of water-energy related processes and for validating model simulations. However, ET is inherently difficult to measure unambiguously. The surface renewal (SR) method, which describes the turbulence exchange process from a new perspective, has been successfully applied within affordable costs from crops to tall forest canopies. However, the SR method, with its significant practical potential, remains uncommon in measuring ET, likely because a semiempirical calibration coefficient (α) is needed. Therefore, this study evaluates the performance of the SR method without any calibration, and compares ET measurements between the SR and Bowen ratio (BR) methods to test which method is more robust. The results from a two-year experiment at an arid vineyard show the following factors: 1) Daily ET estimates by the SR method (ET_SR) without calibration (α = 1) agree well with those from the BR method (ET_BR), with determination coefficient (R2), mean absolute error (MAE), root mean square error (RMSE), and mean absolute percent error (MAPE) values of 0.83, 0.41 mm/d, 0.57 mm/d, and 22.22 %, respectively; 2) Compared to ET_BR, ET_SR values calibrated using a α of 1.2 (ET_SR∣α=1.2) contained the least error in terms of MAE (0.38 mm/d) and MAPE (19.64 %), followed by ET_SR∣α=1.3 and ET_SR∣α=1.1 without a significant difference; 3) ET_BR measurements were affected by abnormal BR value rejection criteria with wider rejection ranges associated with more significant differences between the ET_BR and ET_SR measurements; and 4) 61 % of BR values calculated from the SR-based fluxes were distributed in the range of −1 ∼ 1, whereas a maximum of 43 % were in the same range based on BR measurements under various abnormal BR rejection criteria. For the studied grapevine canopies, the uncalibrated SR method is more robust than the BR method, and it is easy, economic, and accurate for practical application.