Account

Welcome

Sign in to save places, build lists, and keep your score.

Search

The Best Places to Drink and Stay in the United Kingdom

Drink + Stay, change section

Departments

A department belongs to one section, so choosing one narrows the list to it.


  1. Rank 824. Jones and Sons

    British Café

    A marble-topped, oak-clad bar inside a former Victorian textiles factory in Dalston, Jones and Sons is a coffee-forward bar that skews grown-up in a neighborhood that usually skews otherwise. White walls, concrete, and salvaged light fittings land somewhere between Scandinavian spare and genuinely warm. The crowd arrives for good coffee and a proper drink, not to perform coolness at a venue with pretensions to grit.


  2. Rank 824. Kanaloa

    Polynesian Cocktail Bar


  3. Rank 824. Kettner's

    Champagne Wine Bar

    Fizz arrives first at Kettner's, a champagne bar in Soho that has been around forever and wears it well. The grade II-listed room has the kind of gilded, slightly threadbare grandeur that makes a glass of bubbles feel like a moral necessity. Pre-theatre drinkers pack in early, but the atmosphere stays looser than you'd expect. Oscar Wilde reportedly used the upstairs rooms for purposes the programme notes left out.


  4. A photo of a very young Sly Stallone holding a fish greets you somewhere near the bar, and that sets the tone nicely. La Perla is a Mexican cocktail bar in Covent Garden, nautical touches and a mermaid mural overhead, with most of the serious drinking happening up front rather than in the skylit dining room behind it. Margaritas are the obvious move, and the crowd tends to arrive knowing that already.


  5. Rank 824. Lanes of London

    Cocktail Bar

    A wrap-around bar divided by pillars sits at the center of this cocktail bar inside a Park Lane hotel, framed by aged brass, leather, marble, and a mirrored fireplace. The room is doing a very confident impression of a grand Edwardian gentleman's club, and mostly pulling it off. The cocktail menu takes its cues from the restaurant kitchen, which is a more interesting starting point than most bars bother with.



  6. Rank 824. Light Bar

    Cocktail Bar


  7. Pink flamingos and tropical foliage set the tone at this Bristol outpost of the London Cocktail Club, a high-energy cocktail bar that leans hard into a Peter Pan's Neverland theme and doesn't apologize for any of it. The vibe is unapologetically loud and playful, the kind of place where the décor alone commits harder than most people do on a Saturday night. Walk-ins welcome, which tells you all you need to know about the crowd.


  8. A neon parrot oversees the bar at this basement cocktail bar on Shaftesbury Avenue, where the décor splits the difference between a tiki lounge and a tattoo parlour. Rum anchors the cocktail list, which opens with a little editorial philosophy about the relationship between price and quality. The wallpaper looks expensive, because it probably was.


  9. A long white island bar runs down the centre of the room like a runway, which is fitting, because the Sanderson's cocktail bar is very much a place to be looked at while pretending you're doing the looking. Philippe Starck's fingerprints are all over it, including the chairs, which have literal eyes. The room is spare, pale, and almost aggressively unfussy, with candles and flowers doing the heavy lifting on warmth.


  10. Loose Cannon is a cocktail bar on Bristol's harbourside where local artists rotate work on the walls and the menu reads like a fever dream, pop-culture riffs on everything from Donkey Kong to Brexit. The drinks are inventive and aggressively garnished, the kind of place where your cocktail arrives wearing something. Students fill it most nights, and the energy leans young and loud in the best harbourside-dive-bar way.


  11. Rank 824. Loves Company

    Cocktail Bar

    A cocktail bar on City Road where an artist draws directly onto the walls, so the place you walk into isn't quite the place you walked into last time. It sits across from Nightjar, which tells you everything about the neighbourhood's ambitions and nothing about the vibe here, which runs lively and loose rather than theatrical. Two floors, a ruby-leaning colour scheme that shifts over time, and drinks that lean casual rather than ceremonial.


  12. Rank 824. Lowlander

    Beer Bar

    The tables here are mounted on tracks so staff can rearrange the room, which tells you something about how seriously this Covent Garden beer hall takes its setup. Modelled on the grand cafes of Brussels, it runs to 16 draught taps and over 100 bottles, all organised by style on a proper menu. Long dark wood tables, leather banquettes, and a zinc counter lined with polished chrome fonts complete the picture.


  13. Fleet Street's old Reuters building still has stories to tell, and the bar at Lutyens is a good place to hear them. The floor tiles are laid to mimic a stock ticker, a nod to the building's past that most people miss. It's a sleek, grown-up bar with charcuterie on hand, designed in that signature Conran way where minimalism somehow still feels warm. The crowd skews City, which tells you something about both the prices and the suits.


  14. Rank 824. Mahiki

    Tiki Bar

    Two floors of Polynesian-themed basement beneath Mayfair, where the "Lanai Lounge" comes lined with black bamboo and lauhala mats, and the "Aloha Party Room" below that pairs orange banquettes with 1970s lampshades. This is a tiki bar, not a quiet drinks spot, and the crowd arriving in evening wear to dance to funky tunes seems entirely unbothered by the contradiction. Come dressed for a party, because the room certainly has.


  15. A red-carpeted staircase lifts you out of the four-lane chaos outside and into a hotel bar that has somehow engineered genuine calm, with high ceilings, dim lighting, and soft music doing the heavy lifting. The focal point is a pillar plastered in readable postcards, which is either charming or a lifeline if the conversation has gone quiet. The mood runs warm and a little theatrical, all flickering red tea lights and hushed tones.



  16. A long wooden bar, inherited from a pan-Asian predecessor that didn't stick around, anchors this subterranean cocktail bar beneath Hixter in the City. The look is New York basement, done in leather seating, low lighting, and exposed brick, and it pulls off the warmth that look usually just promises. A solid place to disappear after the Square Mile empties out.


  17. Rank 824. Meat Liquor

    Cocktail Bar

    Graffiti covers every surface of this basement bar, which used to be a swanky Italian restaurant and now looks like someone handed the decorating contract to a very motivated teenager. The punk-meets-dive-bar vibe is deliberate, the cocktails are less of a joke than the décor implies, and the no-reservations policy means the queue outside is part of the experience whether you planned for it or not. Get there early.


  18. Rank 824. Meat Mission

    American


  19. Rank 824. Merchants Tavern

    Modern British

    Factory-style skylights flood the room by day; after dark the same space goes low-lit and conspiratorially dim. This bar and brasserie in Shoreditch is Angela Hartnett's place, and her presence here is itself a small sign of how far the neighborhood has drifted from its rough-edged origins. The room has the look of somewhere that's been around forever, which it hasn't, but the trick works. Come for a drink and stay longer than you planned.


  20. Rank 824. Merkaba

    Cocktail Bar

    Two giant underlit crystals flank the entrance, which tells you everything about the ambition level before you've ordered a drink. This hotel bar inside MyHotel Brighton leans hard into the theatrical: a ten-metre copper bar counter, eye-shaped aquariums set into the walls, plasma screens cycling local art, and a terrazzo floor in a shade of blue that has no business being that confident. A lot of rooms try this hard and lose; this one has the bones to carry it.


  21. Rank 824. Mint Leaf

    Indian


    Address
    Angel Court, (off Throgmorton St), London, EC2R 7HB, United Kingdom · London
    Hours

    Closed now, opens 5 PM

    Friday Noon–3 PM, 5 PM–11 PM, 5 PM–1 AM

    Online
    WebsiteInstagram
  22. Rank 824. Mojo Liverpool

    Cocktail Bar

    A cocktail bar inside a converted stables that once served the Lord Mayor, Mojo has the bones of a grand civic past and the playlist of someone who peaked during the Metallica years. The drinks list runs from Woo Woos to Corpse Revivers without apology, and a beer is equally welcome. The crowd spans suits and students, which is either reassuring or a warning, depending on how you feel about Metallica.


  23. A cocktail bar inside Oxford's grand Macdonald Randolph Hotel, where the wood-panelled walls are lined with photographs of the late actor who played Inspector Morse, the TV detective whose cases were partly filmed here. The show has been off air for decades, which gives the shrine-like décor a pleasantly eccentric quality. Fortunately, the arched ceiling, ornate cornices, and stone fireplace make it a handsome room to drink in regardless.


  24. Rank 824. Mr Buckley's

    Dive Bar

    A split-level neighbourhood bar on Hackney Road, named for the man who burned the previous building down in 1883 after being refused entry. Arson as branding is an interesting choice, but it works. What was most recently a curry house is now a late-night drinking spot filling a gap in an area that wasn't exactly drowning in options, a short walk from Columbia Road.


  25. Rank 824. NeNe at Chrysan

    Modern Japanese

    The bar inside this modern Asian restaurant near Liverpool Street looks a little sparse in daylight, which is the kindest framing available. Come evening, the low lighting does the heavy lifting, and the cocktail list earns its keep regardless. The drinks lean into bold, unexpected pairings, the kind that make you wonder why nobody combined those two things before. Service keeps pace without fuss.



  26. Rank 824. North

    Beer Bar


  27. Rank 824. Novikov

    Pan-Asian

    The basement lounge bar beneath Novikov's two restaurants has a supperclub atmosphere that feels engineered to make you order another round. It's a cocktail bar built for Mayfair money, the kind of room where the lighting flatters everyone equally and the spending tends to follow suit. A Moscow restaurateur's first London outpost, the whole building runs on theatre, and some of that energy makes it downstairs.


  28. Floor 32 of The Shard is a lot of real estate to dedicate to a view, but Oblix earns the altitude. This sleek cocktail bar from the group behind Roka and Zuma arrives via a dedicated lift and a dark, scented entrance with water features, which is either very impressive or slightly airport lounge depending on your mood. On a clear London day the panorama stretches forever, and even on a grey one you'll find plenty to look at in your glass.


  29. Rank 824. One Canada Square

    Cocktail Bar

    The bar sits at the base of the Canary Wharf tower, tucked behind head-height dividers that carve out something warm and human from an otherwise very serious corporate lobby. A mezzanine bar upstairs has a quieter, more private feel and tends to get booked for events. Cocktails are the reason to pull up a stool, and the after-work crowd in good suits fills the place fast on weekdays.



  30. Rank 824. OXO Tower Bar

    Cocktail Bar

    The OXO lettering in the windows was a 1920s planning-permission workaround, and the building has been branded ever since. The bar itself sits on the 8th floor of that South Bank landmark, reached by an express lift, and the terrace views take in the Thames, St. Paul's, and a good stretch of London skyline. It's the kind of cocktail bar where the room does most of the work, and the room is very good at its job.


  31. Named for a G.K. Chesterton poem that makes the case against prohibition, this rambling Victorian pub earns its literary pretensions by actually being useful. Early in the week it's a quiet local boozer; by Friday the same room has pivoted to hip hop and live music. The building is enormous, all lounge bar, dining room, and outdoor space, with event rooms upstairs that suggest the regulars have very full social calendars.


  32. Rank 824. Paramount

    Cocktail Bar

    A wraparound copper bar sits at the center of this cocktail bar on the upper floors of Centre Point, with panoramic London views doing most of the decorating. The guest list is non-negotiable, so a casual drop-in won't happen; call ahead or the lift stays closed to you. It's the kind of place where the skyline earns its keep and the crowd has already made a reservation somewhere else afterward.


  33. Rank 824. Pizarro

    Spanish

    The all-Spanish wine list at this Bermondsey Street bar runs to some serious bottles, which gives you a decent excuse to linger over a glass of something from the Iberian peninsula's less-obvious corners. José Pizarro's bigger follow-up to his nearby tapas spot leans comfortable and stylish, the kind of room where a copa of Pedro Ximénez feels entirely reasonable at midday. Small plates circulate for those who can't just drink.


  34. Rank 824. Plum + Spilt Milk

    Cocktail Bar


  35. Victorian bric-a-brac covers every surface at this Battersea cocktail bar, the kind of look that walks a fine line between car boot sale and curated chaos. London's serious cocktail scene rarely ventures past zone one, so finding a bar in SW11 that handles a shaker with conviction is its own small pleasure. Come for the drinks, not the decor, though the decor will absolutely try to distract you.


  36. Rank 824. Proof

    Cocktail Bar

    A cocktail lounge that planted itself deliberately in the suburbs and dared the city to come to it. Proof sits on a Chorlton corner that most bartenders would have walked past, and that's part of the point. The room leans upscale without the centre-of-Manchester attitude, which makes it a reliable neighbourhood find for anyone who'd rather skip the queue and actually get a drink.


  37. Rank 824. Purl

    Cocktail Bar

    Dry ice curling off a coupe is a reasonable way to announce a cocktail bar, and Purl commits to the bit with smoke guns, blow torches, and foams deployed without apology. The basement setting, all candlelit arches and tucked-away corners off Blandford Street, does the rest, giving the whole thing a genuinely speakeasy feeling rather than just the aesthetic. Busy most nights, which tells you the theatrics haven't worn thin.


  38. The church pew seating has been here since the Victorian era, and it does not pretend otherwise. This Farringdon wine bar sits inside an old-school institution, all chequered floors and panelled walls, with a list leaning toward interesting New World bottles and esoteric finds. The room rewards people who take their wine seriously but don't need a sommelier to prove it.


  39. Rank 824. Quo Vadis

    British

    A first-floor members' bar tucked above one of Soho's oldest dining rooms, in a building where Karl Marx once rented a dingy attic and, apparently, never bought a round. The room has the kind of worn, comfortable gravity that only old Soho townhouses carry, and the crowd skews toward people who know exactly where they're going, which is the whole joke of the name.


    Address
    26-29 Dean St, London W1D 3LL, UK · London
    Hours

    Closed now, opens 5 PM

    Friday Noon–2:30 PM, 5 PM–10 PM, 9 PM–2 AM

    Online
    WebsiteInstagram
  40. Rank 824. Reason and Mankind

    Cocktail Bar

    The cocktail bar inside what was once a notorious underground nightclub, Reason and Mankind pairs disco lights and dubstep with a serious drinks menu from the team behind Purl and Worship Street Whistling Shop. The room reads more bottle service than stirred and strained, but the cocktails lean inventive and molecular. A good place to feel slightly overdressed for the right reasons.


  41. A long zinc-topped bar anchors this cocktail bar just off the lobby of a posh, design-led Marylebone hotel, with its own street entrance on Mandeville Place for anyone who'd rather skip the front desk entirely. The back bar is carefully stocked without being showy, and the contemporary lounge furniture gives it a polished feel that will probably soften once the regulars stop treating the cushions quite so gently.


  42. The pink bedroom wallpaper still shows the ghost of a cross where it hung above the headboard, the paint faded around the outline of furniture long gone. That level of commitment to a bit tells you a lot about this underground lounge bar on Goodge Street, which runs with the premise that you're drinking in a cleared-out vicar's flat. The team behind Bourne & Hollingsworth built the whole thing, and the chipped, faded aesthetic holds throughout.


  43. Rank 824. Rick's

    Cocktail Bar

    The long marble bar and low tan chairs set the tone: this is a cocktail bar that runs from morning coffee through late-night drinks without ever raising its voice. Part of the Montpellier Group, so the drinks program is looked after, with a classics-led menu doing most of the heavy lifting. It shares an owner with the flashier Tigerlily nearby but keeps things deliberately quieter, which the after-work crowd in the low seats seems to appreciate.


  44. The bar at Roast sits above the stall-holders' cages of Borough Market, inside a space built around the old Floral Hall portico salvaged from Covent Garden's Royal Opera House. It's a dedicated bar area within a larger restaurant, so you can drink without committing to a full meal. Bar snacks and cocktails are the move, with the Saturday morning market crowd browsing obliviously below.




  45. Rank 824. Santa Chupitos

    Cocktail Bar


  46. Rank 824. Scout

    Cocktail Bar


  47. A cocktail bar that moonlights as a bartending school, so the person shaking your drink may have literally just learned how. By night it settles into something more relaxed, a cocktail-led pub with a long dark wooden bar, leather stools, brass lamps, and a belt-driven ceiling fan that all point firmly at a Victorian drinking den. A mural of bartending legends, Ada Coleman, Jerry Thomas, Trader Vic, keeps watch from the far end.


  48. Rank 824. Shenkman Bar

    Cocktail Bar

    A neon Tracey Emin original reading "Keep me safe" guides you through the Royal Academy's courtyard and into a lift that opens straight into this cocktail bar, tucked in the old Keeper's House wing. The room is small and the setup is serious, with botanically driven drinks and service that manages to feel genuinely warm without trying too hard. An easy place to lose an evening, or an afternoon, for that matter.


  49. A wall of antique Japanese brewing vessels sets the mood before you've ordered anything. This subterranean cocktail bar sits beneath Roka on Charlotte Street, and shochu is the point, whether you want it straight, infused with cherry blossom or green tea, or folded into something the bartender's thought harder about than you have. The crowd skews fashionable, which makes sense given the Zuma connection upstairs.


  50. Floor-to-ceiling windows on the third floor of the Royal Festival Hall frame the Millennium Bridge, the Gherkin, and a wide sweep of the north bank. The bar sits on a raised island in the middle of a vast room hung with five bronze chandeliers, each ringed with fins. It's a cocktail bar that happens to come with one of the more theatrical views in the city, and the room itself is doing a lot of the work.


  51. Named for the Howlin' Wolf track, this two-floor bar and micro-club in Leeds wears its blues obsession on its sleeve. An unpromising staircase leads to a first-floor lounge with banquette seating, and later in the week the attic opens up, revealing a beamed ceiling, a second bar, and a dance floor where DJs keep things moving. Orleans funk, Harlem jazz, and Chicago blues set the tone, so dress accordingly and don't arrive expecting quiet conversation.



  52. The white weatherboarded building juts so far into Spaniards Road that traffic through Hampstead Heath has been yielding to it for centuries, and both the pub and the old toll keeper's cottage opposite are listed, so that's not changing. This is a classic English pub on the edge of the Heath, the kind where a long walk through the trees earns a pint at a very old bar. Dick Turpin drank here, allegedly, which every old London pub says but fewer can almost prove.



  53. Rank 824. The Atlas

    Gastropub

    A corner pub just off Lillie Road, The Atlas has been a Fulham fixture long enough to outlast the Earls Court exhibition halls it once neighbored, which is a longer run than most. The neighborhood is mid-redevelopment and slightly adrift, but the pub itself feels settled, the kind of gastro pub that draws a regular crowd who know exactly what they came for and don't need a reason to check the menu twice.



  54. Rank 824. The Blues Kitchen, Shoreditch

    American Cocktail Bar

    The centerpiece is an island bar with a tiled mosaic that anchors a huge open room somewhere between American diner and grungy music venue. It's a cocktail bar leaning hard into bourbon, with a short list of well-made classics and one of the more serious American whiskey collections in the neighborhood. Come early enough and you can actually perch at the bar before the live music takes over and the volume becomes non-negotiable.


  55. A backstreet pub tucked where Battersea quietly becomes Clapham Old Town, with big windows facing a residential side street and no particular ambition to be discovered. The team behind it runs a small group of pubs across the capital, all saved from obscurity and gently smartened up without losing the plot. Good food, decent service, and a wide bar area that still feels like a local rather than a concept.


  56. A corner pub on Northcote Road with bare wooden tables and plank walls that give it more country-inn energy than Battersea terrace. The glass-roofed dining room out back has an open fireplace for winter and air-conditioning for summer, which covers the meteorological bases as well as any London pub can. Pavement tables with heaters and an awning stretch the outdoor season considerably. Part of the Three Cheers group.


  57. The red lights behind the bar are a relic from when this corner pub had a rather different clientele. These days it draws theatre-goers heading upstairs to the Canal Cafe and Maida Vale professionals who've discovered that oak panelling and an open fire beat a wine bar. It sits a step from the Regent's Canal in Little Venice, mismatched chairs, ornate cornices, and all the cosy warmth of a pub that knows exactly what it is.


  58. A big, bright gastropub sitting on the south side of Hammersmith Bridge, with painted panelled walls, mismatched chairs, and the occasional coach bench to make the scale feel cosy. Ales on draught, a wine list that outruns the average local, and a Sunday roast that handles its business without fuss. When the weather behaves, French doors open onto a raised sun-deck and walled garden, which closes at nine, so plan accordingly.


  59. Rank 824. The Builders Arms

    Modern British

    A fireplace, Dalí prints on the panelled walls, and the kind of worn-in sofas that make you stay for a third pint. Tucked into the Georgian residential streets between Fulham Road and King's Road, this Chelsea pub has held onto its neighbourhood-local feel while the rest of the postcode drifted upmarket. The clientele dresses well and knows the barman's name, which is exactly the Chelsea equilibrium.


  60. Stuffed birds, stacked crockery, and several lifetimes of collected oddities cover every wall and ceiling of this old Morningside pub, making it feel less like a bar and more like a Victorian curiosity shop that somehow got a liquor license. The shelves behind the larger bar hold what may be Edinburgh's deepest whisky selection, and Caledonian and Belhaven come on draught for anyone who finds the malt list overwhelming, which is fair.


  61. Rank 824. The Cow

    Seafood

    Oysters at the bar keep this Notting Hill pub from feeling like anything it isn't. The room is genuinely small, with mustard walls, red lino underfoot, and rippled glass that softens the light just enough. The food is better than it has any right to be for a place this unpretentious, and the crowd tends to dress up slightly without meaning to. An old-school neighbourhood pub that never needed to announce itself as one.





  62. The Guinness record for Britain's smallest bar hangs over a room barely bigger than a generous wardrobe, tucked immediately to your right as you walk in. This old Fuller's pub has been on the Thames at Hammersmith forever, and the back terrace looks straight over the river, which makes it the unofficial headquarters for Boat Race day. Finding it requires following the north bank, crossing a small park, and taking a narrow alley that seems designed to test commitment.


  63. Rank 824. The Easton

    British

    Corner site, large windows, maroon banquette seating, and not a whiff of charm in the surrounding streetscape. The Easton is a straightforwardly unfussy Clerkenwell pub that puts its energy into the plate rather than the room: Sunday roasts, scotch eggs, ham hock croquettes, and the kind of hearty gastro-pub cooking that makes the unattractive setting feel entirely beside the point.


  64. Tucked between the Electric Cinema and Brasserie on Portobello Road, this members' bar is the Notting Hill outpost of the Soho House group. A staircase coiled around a lift shaft delivers you into a long, loft-style room with pitched ceiling and roof lights, the look landing firmly in the seventies: whitewashed walls, chunky pale teak, industrial pendant lights. The kind of bar where everyone seems to know someone across the room.


  65. Fresh-cut flowers on the tables and colourful walls set the tone at this glammed-up Primrose Hill gastropub, a short walk from Camden Lock along the canal. Light and airy, it pulls in the kind of locals who own small dogs and treat them as plus-ones. Gwyneth Paltrow is reportedly a regular, which tells you roughly everything about the postcode.


  66. Named for a French racehorse, this gastro pub near King's Cross and St Pancras runs on Anglo-French logic, with bistro food, a decent fromage selection, and an upstairs cocktail lounge that quietly upgrades the whole operation. The embossed tin ceiling and mismatched chairs keep things grounded on the ground floor, but head up and the mood shifts. Eurostars waiting for their trains have clearly discovered it, which tells you something about the vibe.


  67. Rank 824. The Fox and Hounds

    Mediterranean

    The Victorian corner pub on Latchmere Road reads like a straightforward Battersea local until you notice the food. It's a gastropub, part of a small group run by the brothers behind The Atlas in Fulham, and the kitchen leans Mediterranean in a way that outlasts the trend. Regulars who could recite the menu from memory still come back, which tells you something about the room as much as the cooking.



  68. Rank 824. The Ginger Pig

    Modern British

    The revolving oak door that greets you once belonged to a hotel, and it still carries itself accordingly. Inside, the old mock-Tudor pub has been opened up into a roomy gastropub with Chesterfield armchairs up front and a dining room that knows its place behind. The wine list leans into Sussex sparkling, with Ridgeview among them and over twenty pours by the glass, plus a compact cocktail menu for anyone not in a wine mood.


  69. A proper pub tucked into a Bermondsey backstreet, The Grange has had its original brickwork and floorboards stripped back and cleaned up, which is a nicer way to gentrify than most. The ales are kept well, the Bloody Marys arrive with real heat, and once the weather turns, the garden and wood-fired pizza oven become the main event. A neighborhood local that hasn't forgotten what a neighborhood local is supposed to be.


  70. Rank 824. The Gun

    British

    The rear terrace looks straight across the Thames to the O2, which is either atmospheric or a conversation starter depending on your mood. The Gun is a Grade II-listed gastropub on the Isle of Dogs, old enough to feel genuinely weathered, tucked into a stretch of Canary Wharf's edge that still manages to feel like it belongs to a quieter London. The kind of place people make a small effort to reach, then stay longer than planned.


    Address
    27 Coldharbour, London, E14 9NS, United Kingdom · London
    Hours

    Open now, until midnight

    Friday 11:30 AM–Midnight

    Online
    Website

  71. A curtain just inside the door does a surprising amount of heavy lifting, shifting the mood from Stoke Newington high street to somewhere vaguely central European. This Hackney ale and cider house packs its tables with people in their late twenties and thirties who take the draught list seriously, and they have reason to: real ales, craft beers, stouts, lagers, and ciders stretch across a bar that nearly spans the room.



  72. Hanging baskets and a plant-lined terrace make this Notting Hill pub look like it was lifted from a country village and dropped, somewhat incongruously, opposite a police station. Inside, cream panelling and dark green carpet keep the cottage illusion going. Tables fill every corner, shared willingly among regulars who clearly consider the place their living room. A proper neighbourhood pub tucked down a quiet back street away from Portobello's weekend chaos.


  73. A bar on a quiet Notting Hill street that somehow pulls off elegant without trying too hard, The Lonsdale has a long, sweeping counter running the full length of a ground-floor room that leans retro without committing to a theme. It draws a weekend crowd that fills up fast, so arriving early secures a table at the back. The late license keeps things going well past the point when sensible people head home.


  74. The corridor just inside the front door is lined with framed glowing reviews, which is either very confident or very self-aware, and at The Lord Clifden it's probably both. This Jewellery Quarter pub has Banksy prints, exposed brick, beautiful wood panelling, and an enormous beer garden out back. The bar straddles two rooms and the whole thing has the unhurried feel of a proper British boozer. Ale, scampi fries, pub grub.


  75. Rank 824. The Luggage Room

    Cocktail Bar

    Marble surfaces, dark wood, and low leather seating fill this basement cocktail bar beneath the Grosvenor Square Marriott, where a 1920s soundtrack sets the mood and a speakeasy entrance, complete with spy hole, keeps things theatrical. You reach it via a side door on Duke Street, knock, and wait to be appraised. The door from the hotel lobby is less cinematic but works just as well. Either way, the cocktails are the point.


  76. Rank 824. The Mercer

    Cocktail Bar

    A Victorian banking hall on Threadneedle Street, all soaring ceilings and white linen that still feels vaguely capable of financing a railway. The cocktail list and crisp service quickly establish this as a serious cocktail bar, not just a power-lunch backdrop. City workers fill it noisily through the day, then the room empties fast when the commuter trains call. Come early evening for elbow room that, an hour later, would be genuinely hard to believe.


  77. The old Packman table in the corner sets the tone for this deliberately scruffy pub near London Bridge. Garishly painted booths, mismatched furniture, and a live music stage draw trainee medics from Guy's Hospital and anyone else who'd rather not be somewhere with a dress code. Gourmet hotdogs made with Bermondsey sausages are the kitchen's one serious move. A proper boozer wearing its rough edges without apology.


  78. Rank 824. The Narrow

    British


  79. Rank 824. The Orange

    Farmhouse French

    Stripped pine, distressed plaster walls, and sturdy oak tables give this Belgravia gastro pub the feel of a French farmhouse that somehow ended up on one of London's most expensive postcodes. The ground floor bar draws a neighbourhood crowd who look like they own the neighbourhood, and the Sunday roast pulls people upstairs into the dining rooms. A small hotel sits above it all, in case you'd rather not leave.


  80. Tucked in the basement beneath a Mexican restaurant on Brewer Street, this compact cocktail bar organizes its drinks menu around tequila and rum, divided into Batidas, Margaritas, Daiquiris, and the catchall "Gringos." Dick Bradsell, who invented the Bramble and the Vodka Espresso, has been known to hold court here, which is the kind of detail that makes a basement bar feel like a discovery rather than an oversight.


  81. Rank 824. The Rake Bar

    Beer Bar



  82. The curved corner frontage wraps around Great Dover and Trinity Streets like the prow of a ship, and inside the Roebuck earns its old back-street boozer status without apology. Mismatched wooden tables ring an island bar, with a slightly loungy back room for when you need to feel less like you're in a pub but still want to be in a pub. Cask ales on handpump, Meantime on keg, and Cotswold cider cover the bases.


  83. Rank 824. The Rose Leaf

    Cocktail Bar


Browse a location

Current Location

Metros

Eat Score

The score comes from the awards it's won, weighted by who gave them: a Michelin star outweighs a listicle. When you sort by what's nearby, distance changes the order, never the score.

    How we score →

    Drink Score

    The score comes from the awards it's won, weighted by who gave them: a Michelin star outweighs a listicle. When you sort by what's nearby, distance changes the order, never the score.

      How we score →

      Stay Score

      Four fifths of the score is the awards it's won, weighted by who gave them: a Michelin Key outweighs a listicle. The last fifth is where it is: the ranked places to eat and things to do around it, and how safe the country is. When you sort by what's nearby, distance from you changes the order, never the score.

        How we score →

        Do Score

        The score comes from the awards it's won, weighted by who gave them: a Michelin star outweighs a listicle. When you sort by what's nearby, distance changes the order, never the score.

          How we score →

          Best Place Score

          The Best Place Score rates the area around a point, not any one place. The places are 60% of it: the best of what's within reach, weighed by distance. The setting is the other 40%: how life goes in that country (how people rate their own lives, how long and how well they live, how safe they are) and what it's like right there (the air, and the weather). If the score looks low, we probably haven't found enough critics out here yet.

          Near Me

          Sign in to see the best places near you

          Near Me ranks what's around you, wherever you are.

          Sign in with email

          New here? Create an account

          Or see the full worldwide list