The 100 Best Places to Drink and Stay in Denver

A cocktail bar that calls itself a nerdy cocktail bar, a natural wine bar, and your favorite dive bar, and then has the audacity to be all three. The Old Bay Martini landed it on Esquire's radar and the Spirited Awards named it the top U.S. cocktail bar, but the room itself is the tell: hot dogs share menu space with wine you've never heard of, and nobody in here seems to think that's unusual.

1. Spirited Awards 2024 · Winner · Best U.S. Cocktail Bar
2. The 50 #67 · North America's 50 Best Bars
3. Esquire The Best Bars in America

The Rocky Mountain views from this downtown luxury hotel are so insistent, staring back at the Rockies from nearly every room, that forgetting you're in Denver takes real effort. Earth tones and a modern-residential feel keep the aesthetic grounded rather than fussy. The Four Seasons holds a Michelin Key and a Forbes Four Star, and the staff's habit of anticipating what you need before you ask is the thing guests tend to mention first.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide 1 Key
3. The 50 2025 · Most Admired Hotel Group Award

The conceit here is that every night out feels like a dinner party at a sommelier's apartment, right down to the records spinning in the background. Bobby Stuckey, the master sommelier behind Frasca, built this wine bar around the idea that great wine and great music belong together. Wednesday flights pair pours with a specific artist's catalog, moving from Billie Eilish to Hendrix depending on the week. A James Beard semifinalist for its beverage program.

1. Wildsam The 50 Most Essential Bars in America
2. Esquire The Best Bars in America
3. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America
2. 5280 The 25 Best Restaurants in Denver
3. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. Huckberry The 50 Best Dive Bars in America
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver

Rooms here start at 500 square feet, which in downtown Denver is its own kind of statement. The Ritz-Carlton is a full-service luxury hotel dressed in navy, cream, and dark wood, with Frette robes, deep soaking tubs, and rainforest showers doing the heavy lifting. Elway's steakhouse runs from breakfast through dinner on the ground floor. The Forbes Four Star property draws suits on weekdays and the charity-gala crowd on weekends, with staff sharp enough to handle both without missing a beat.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The martini here gets shaken with both vodka and gin, which is either a provocation or a correction depending on your religion. Death & Co is a cocktail bar that started in New York and landed in RiNo, bringing the same intricate, unhurried approach to drinking. The room is loungey and deliberate, the kind of place where settling in for three rounds feels like the obvious move rather than a guilty one.

1. Esquire The Telegraph · The Best Martinis in America
2. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
3. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver

1. Wildsam The 50 Most Essential Bars in America
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Punch Best New Bartenders · Mak Kelly
2. Westword 2024 · Best Bar for Girls’ Night · Best of Denver
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Bar

1. Punch The Who’s Who of Beer Cool
2. Westword 2023 · Best Beer Service · Best of Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

Blowfish sculptures and boats hanging from the ceiling set the tone before you've ordered a thing. Adrift is a full-commitment tiki bar on South Broadway, with bamboo walls, fishing-net lights, and totem carvings doing their best to convince you Denver isn't landlocked. Cocktails arrive in coconuts, flaming punchbowls, or funky mugs, running from Zombies and Singapore Slings to seasonal originals leaning on cachaca, sherry, and cacao. Spam musubi keeps things honest.

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver
3. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

Tucked next to chef Johnny Curiel's flagship, this agave bar doubles as a serious kitchen, and the two halves push each other into strange, good territory. The mezcal list is long and thoughtful, the cocktails inventive, and the food pulls from Mexico City's restless energy with Japanese and other detours woven in. A Michelin star and a New York Times nod followed quickly. Plan around the bar counter if you can.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. Punch Best New Bars
3. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants

1. Punch The Who’s Who of Beer Cool
2. Westword 2025 · Best New Brewery · Best of Denver

A wine bar in RiNo that keeps fried chicken and tinned fish on the menu alongside Khikhvi, Nerello Mascalese, and a Mencía from Oregon that has no business being that good. The list leans hard into natural, biodynamic, and small-production bottles, and the staff can talk you through all of it without making you feel like a student. Grape nerds and people who just want a glass with snacks coexist peacefully here.

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver
3. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

The bookstore on the corner of Tejon is not a bookstore. Push the right shelf and you're inside one of Denver's favorite cocktail bars, a speakeasy that takes both halves of the conceit seriously: a library of over 500 spirits backs a menu of originals alongside some 60 classics. No standing room means the wait is part of the deal, so arrive with patience and someone to talk to while you queue.

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

A portrait of an imperial bulldog greets you at the door, which is a fair warning. Pony Up is a cocktail bar in LoDo that earns its personality through drinks like a tequila-shochu-sherry situation spiked with Korean chili paste, and shots of George Dickel chased with roast-beef jus. That jus comes from the kitchen, which runs French dips as its signature, an odd pairing that somehow makes complete sense by the second round.

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key
2. Westword 2025 · Best New Building · Best of Denver

Tucked below the Dairy Block, this cocktail bar serves its menu on a deck of playing cards, which tells you everything about the room before you've ordered. Plush banquettes, leather chairs, patterned wallpaper, and cabinets of rare vintage bottles conspire to make it feel like a speakeasy that never quite left. The martini section alone could occupy an evening, and the reserve cocktails lean into vintage spirits for those feeling loose with their wallet.

1. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

The menu at this Uptown Mexican restaurant isn't fully translated into English, which the staff treat as a feature rather than a bug. Chef Erasmo Casiano's cooking runs from dry-aged hamachi crudo to duck carnitas tacos, and the cocktails lean on prickly pear, tomatillo, and jicama. Esquire named the Martini Cochinero among the best martinis in the country, which tells you something about where the bar program sits.

1. Esquire Martini Cochinero · The Best Martinis in America
2. Westword 2025 · Best New Restaurant · Best of Denver
3. 5280 The 25 Best Restaurants in Denver

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key
2. Westword 2025 · Best Place to Park in Cherry Creek · Best of Denver

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver

The lobby doubles as an active train station waiting room, which makes check-in feel like a minor performance art piece. The Crawford is a boutique hotel tucked inside Denver's restored Beaux-Arts Union Station, holding a Michelin Key, and sitting at the center of the LoDo neighborhood's comeback. The 112 rooms sit above the bustle of one of the city's genuinely communal gathering spots, with rail passengers and cocktail drinkers sharing the same grand hall below.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. Westword 2023 · Best Pickle Shots · Best of Denver

Southern cooking and a cocktail program that pours buttermilk and benne seed into the glass share equal billing at this casual Five Points restaurant and bar. The chef runs with heirloom grits and collard greens but also hot-and-sour catfish and sorghum-tamarind pork shoulder, so the kitchen respects the tradition without being hostage to it. The team behind the preeminent cocktail bar Yacht Club runs the drinks side, which explains the ambition in a room that looks relaxed about the whole thing.

1. 5280 The 13 Best New Places to Eat and Drink in Denver
2. Eater The Best New Restaurants in Denver
3. Westword 2026 · Best New Bar · Best of Denver

1. Westword 2026 · Best Secretly High-Tech Cocktails · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Top 10 Nominee · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar

1. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. Eater Johnny burger · Denver’s 20 Most Iconic Dishes

1. Westword 2024 · Best Satanic Gay Tiki Bar · Best of Denver
2. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2023 · Best Bar Decor · Best of Denver
2. Westword 2025 · Best Neighborhood Bar That Feels Older Than It Is · Best of Denver
3. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

A boutique hotel in LoDo, steps from the restored Union Station, with rooms that balance mountain-lodge warmth against proper city-hotel polish. The common spaces lean into it: Citizen Rail does wood-fired cooking downstairs, and Tavernetta handles pan-Italian next door. The neighborhood does the rest, since LoDo has quietly become one of those districts where you barely need to plan anything.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver
2. 5280 Best for a Big Night Out · The 23 Best Bars in Denver
3. Westword 2023 · Best Use of a Leopard Speedo · Best of Denver

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

A downtown Denver hotel that manages to be colorful without leaning on spurs and tumbleweeds. The rooms pull off local flavor with some actual restraint, and the Spa Rooms add soaking tubs for anyone who wants to edge toward full luxury. Kimpton's daily hosted wine hour is a genuine institution across their properties, and the in-house Italian restaurant, Panzano, punches well above hotel-dining expectations. The Michelin Guide has it among their selected hotels.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The atrium lobby rises eight stories, all wrought iron and stained glass, and has been doing so since presidents started treating the place as a second home. This grand old Denver hotel has hosted every commander in chief since Teddy Roosevelt, plus Elvis, John Wayne, Buffalo Bill, and at least one burlesque star, which covers a decent range of American ambition. The rooms are exactly as formal as the history suggests.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

A boutique hotel planted steps from Coors Field, The Rally is what happens when a city's downtown revival actually takes hold. The LoDo neighborhood around it fills with bars, restaurants, and a game-day crowd that knows exactly where it's going, and the hotel sits at the center of McGregor Square's mix of shops, event spaces, and nightlife. A Michelin Selected Hotel, so the rooms won't let the location down.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The cast-iron and red-brick facade fits right into Denver's River North Arts District, but the interiors take a sharp left turn into the salon of a 17th-century French marquise. This boutique hotel pulls it off without apology. Rooms run contemporary and plush, the staff dress the part, and the building houses Death & Co's Denver outpost alongside a pan-Latin restaurant from James Beard winner Dana Rodriguez.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Rolling garage-door windows that open flush to the Colorado air are the detail that makes this RiNo boutique hotel click. It sits on an old ironworks site in Denver's River North arts district, and the 100 rooms lean into that industrial past with polished concrete, Baltic birch, and spare Japanese-influenced furniture. The neighborhood's warehouse-and-mural energy is right outside, which is exactly why people book here instead of downtown.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Sitting at 16th and Market, this boutique luxury hotel puts you within walking distance of Union Station, Coors Field, and most of Denver's better dinner decisions. Rooms lean into a retro-inflected modern sensibility that the Thompson brand does well. Ludo Lefebvre's French restaurant Chez Maggy is downstairs, and the rooftop bar Reynard Social has a Rockies view that makes it hard to go back inside.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

RiNo has been through its artist-loft-to-restaurant-row arc, and the Catbird arrived as the boutique hotel chapter. The rooms run studio and loft sizes, but the design packs in more considered comfort than the square footage should allow, with a modernist sensibility that reads less Denver and more Amsterdam. The Michelin Guide has it among its selected hotels, which tracks for a neighborhood that treats "evolving" as a permanent state.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

A boutique hotel in Denver's Highlands district, where the exterior is clean and contemporary and the interior pivots hard into Victorian detail, a nod to the neighborhood's founding era. LoHi is one of those corners of Denver that's still figuring out what it wants to be, with galleries and breweries trading space with new builds, and this property sits comfortably in the middle of that negotiation.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Westword 2026 · Best Culinary-Inspired Cocktails · Best of Denver
2. Spirited Awards 2026 · Top 10 Nominee · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

East Colfax is Denver's longest, most mythologized strip, and this mid-century motor hotel conversion settles into it like it never left. The 54 rooms spread across three color palettes named Rosewood, Sagebrush, and Robin's Egg, with kilim rugs and green-tiled bathrooms keeping things coherent. An all-day café handles breakfast through cocktails, and a Mediterranean restaurant opens onto a wine garden out back. The Michelin Guide has it among its selected hotels.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

The rooftop pool looks straight at the Rocky Mountains, which sets the tone for everything below it. Halcyon is a boutique hotel in Cherry Creek North, the quieter, shop-lined neighborhood a short drive from downtown Denver, and it threads a needle the area usually fumbles: the design is genuinely glamorous without feeling like it's trying to impress you. A couple of ambitious restaurants and activity-focused perks round it out.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

A hotel in Cherry Creek named for the French inventor who mechanized the loom, which tells you something about the neighborhood's self-image. The neon chandelier and floating staircase set the tone in the lobby, guest rooms run to glass walls, and the rooftop bar stretches a 180-degree mountain panorama from Longs Peak to Pikes Peak. The crowd dresses for it, and at sunset, they're not wrong to.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

Named after the Claret Cup Cactus, a Colorado native, this Kimpton sits in the business-park flatlands of Belleview Station, which makes the 19th-floor rooftop bar's Rocky Mountain panorama feel like a minor miracle. Rooms run generous, several with mountain views, and the interiors lean into textured fabrics and warm neutrals without tipping into corporate beige. The ground-floor restaurant handles Italian-influenced American cooking when you'd rather not leave.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. James Beard Awards 2024 · Nominee · Outstanding Restaurateur · Erika Whitaker and Kelly Whitaker - ID EST
2. 5280 Best for Filling Bellies · The 23 Best Bars in Denver
3. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West

An old brickworks turned boutique hotel in Golden, where the Denver suburbs give way to the Rockies and people seem genuinely unsure which world they're in. The Eddy Taproom & Hotel has a rooftop patio, firepits, and a full bar attached, so you can debrief after a trail without going far. The Michelin Guide has it among its selected hotels, which tracks for a place that reads more like a well-designed escape than a highway stopover.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels

1. The Pinnacle Guide 1 Pin
2. Sunset Better Bars · Where to Eat and Drink

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver

A cocktail lounge called Ok Yeah tucked into the back tells you everything about the vibe here. Hey Kiddo is a playful, Asian-inflected restaurant and bar on the third floor of a Tennyson Street building, with a rooftop deck most people don't find on the first visit. The menu runs on shareable plates, and the team behind it earned a James Beard Outstanding Restaurateur semifinalist nod. The room skews young and loud in the best way.

1. Westword 2023 · Best New Restaurant-and-Bar Combo · Best of Denver
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. 5280 The 25 Best Restaurants in Denver

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver

1. Thrillist The Best Bars in Denver

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

The entrance is a walk-in freezer door at the back of an ice cream shop, which sets the tone perfectly. Behind it is a sci-fi cocktail lounge with a glowing backbar and B movies running on the wall, where the drinks are named after cult films and built with ingredients that require a moment to process. The kind of bar that rewards people who ask questions.

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. The Infatuation The Best Bars In Denver

The 12th-floor balcony of this penthouse lounge looks out over RiNo, and the room inside, all emerald banquettes and moon-like pendant lights, is doing its level best to compete with the view. Cocktails lean botanical and a little precious, saffron gin and rose water that kind of thing, which fits the vibe perfectly. The snacks are luxe and unapologetic. Eater named it among Denver's best bars, and the crowd tends to dress for the occasion.

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

Siouxsie and the Banshees memorabilia shares wall space with He-Man tiki mugs at this 1980s-themed cocktail bar on South Broadway. Lava lamps, vintage arcade games, and old music videos running on mounted TVs make it the kind of place where you stop checking the time entirely, which is probably the point. Pizza rolls show up on the snack menu, as they should. The crowd dresses accordingly, or wishes they had.

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. Eater The Best Bars in Denver

1. VinePair Brewer of the Year · The Next Wave Awards · Kelissa Hieber

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
2. Westword 2024 · Best Philly Cheesesteak at an Iron Maiden Bar · Best of Denver
3. 5280 Cheesesteak · The 17 Best Sandwiches in (and Around) Denver

1. Westword 2025 · Best New Neighborhood Bar · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2026 · Best Brewery Upgrade · Best of Denver
2. Westword 2024 · Best Brewery to Take Visitors · Best of Denver
3. Westword 2023 · Best Beer to Drink Ringside: Helles · Best of Denver

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2024 · Best Vintage Beer List · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. 5280 Pork Tenderloin · The 17 Best Sandwiches in (and Around) Denver

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
2. Westword 2023 · Best Patio for Tortured Writers · Best of Denver

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2025 · Best Place to Get a Warm Beer on Purpose · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2024 · Best Bar to Visit Alone · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. Westword 2023 · Best Dive Bar With a View · Best of Denver

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2025 · Best New Bar Where Everything Is $5 · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

The concept here is a Japanese jazz kissa, a vinyl-focused listening bar, filtered through a chef who thinks huitlacoche and yuzu belong on the same plate. The food runs "Nikkei-Mexa," meaning Mexican and Japanese ingredients trading places freely, and the cocktails follow the same logic: sotol meets sake, charanda meets shochu. A taco cart parks out front most nights. Small room, big sonic ambitions, and a crowd that showed up for all of it.

1. Eater The Best New Restaurants in Denver
2. Westword 2026 · Best Dessert With Salmon Roe · Best of Denver
3. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in Denver

1. Westword 2024 · Best New Bar · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword @ the Stockroom · The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2025 · Best Distillery for Cocktails, With or Without Booze · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2023 · Best Punk Bar · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. Westword 2024 · Best Surprisingly Vegan Bar Food · Best of Denver

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2026 · Best Bar Programming · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2025 · Best Bar Decor · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now

1. Westword 2024 · Best Bar on a Snowy Night · Best of Denver
2. Westword The Top 50 Bars in Denver Right Now
3. Westword 2023 · Best Bar/Restaurant for a First Date · Best of Denver

1. 5280 Best for a Big Night Out · The 23 Best Bars in Denver

1. 5280 Best for Day Drinking · The 23 Best Bars in Denver
2. 5280 The 43 Best Places to Brunch in Denver
3. Westword 2024 · Best Place to Drink With a View · Best of Denver

1. 5280 Best for Day Drinking · The 23 Best Bars in Denver

1. 5280 Best for Slow Sipping · The 23 Best Bars in Denver