The 100 Best Places to Eat and Drink in Dubai

Fifteen seats, a rooftop on The Palm, and a tasting menu that moves you around the room as the courses progress, lights dimming on cue. Chef Himanshu Saini runs this intimate fine dining experience as a journey through Indian culinary history, regional and precise, with a service team that treats the whole thing as choreography. It holds three Michelin stars and a spot on the World's 50 Best list, and the room is small enough that it actually feels like a secret.

1. Michelin Guide 3 Stars
2. The 50 #27 · The World’s 50 Best Restaurants
3. The 50 #3 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants

Björn Frantzén holds three Michelin stars at three separate restaurants, and this is one of them. FZN is a 27-seat fine dining room inside Atlantis, The Palm, designed to feel like a private apartment: canapés in a Scandi sitting room, then a move to the open kitchen counter or one of four tables for a Nordic-Japanese tasting menu. Forbes Five Star, three Michelin stars, and a spot on MENA's 50 Best. Only 27 people per night get in, so plan accordingly.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star
2. Michelin Guide 3 Stars
3. The 50 #22 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants

Three Syrian brothers run this casual bistro on Al Wasl Road, with a two-storey open kitchen that makes the cooking the whole point of the room. Small plates pull from Syrian tradition, pan-regional Middle Eastern cooking, and whatever else the brothers feel like eating, which turns out to be quite a lot. The pastry team upstairs handles desserts with French technique and a straight face. It holds a Michelin star and sits on the World's 50 Best list.

1. The 50 #37 · The World’s 50 Best Restaurants
2. The 50 #4 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
3. Michelin Guide 1 Star

Jason Atherton's fine dining room on the 45th floor of Grosvenor House seats just 22 people and runs a 17-course French-Japanese tasting menu in three acts, moving guests between spaces as the evening unfolds. The chef's table, four seats facing the open kitchen, books out fast. Ankimo, uni, and soba carry the Japanese thread; French technique holds it together. It holds two Michelin stars and a Forbes Five Star.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star
2. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
3. The 50 #36 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants

A converted Jumeirah villa where the open grill isn't decor, it's the whole argument. This is a modern fine dining restaurant built around wood fire, with oak, hickory, and hay chosen for the specific character each one lends to meat, seafood, or vegetables. The room has that minimalist industrial look, the kitchen is fully visible, and the drinks list is zero-proof but seriously considered. It holds a Michelin star and a spot on MENA's 50 Best.

1. World's 101 Best #60 · World's Best Steak Restaurants
2. The 50 #14 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
3. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The terrace faces the marina, and on a clear evening it's the kind of view that makes you feel the bill was someone else's idea. This is a fine dining Italian restaurant inside the Bulgari Resort, holding two Michelin stars, where the team flies much of its produce in from Italy and the pasta and fish dishes carry that weight quietly. The room is sleek and intimate, the staff warmly Italian, and the tasting menu is the way to go.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

An old-school institution in DIFC where regulars rattle off their order without glancing at the menu, which tells you most of what you need to know. LPM is a French-Mediterranean restaurant and bar with white walls, bright art, and a Mediterranean breeziness that somehow survives the Dubai setting. The bar sits at No. 60 on The World's 50 Best Bars list, and the cocktail program draws on Jean Cocteau's life, which is a more interesting premise than it sounds.

1. The 50 #60 · The World's 50 Best Bars
2. The Pinnacle Guide 1 Pin
3. The 50 #27 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants

The bar program here landed at No. 36 on the World's 50 Best Bars list, which is a lot for a restaurant inside a Four Seasons to live up to, and yet the kitchen keeps pace. Mimi Kakushi is a contemporary Japanese dining room and cocktail bar where sushi, wagyu, and donabe rice pots share the evening with drinks that have made the global circuit. The crowd arrives dressed for it, and the room obliges.

1. The 50 #36 · The World's 50 Best Bars
2. The 50 #35 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Restaurant Bar – Middle East & Africa

A colonial-style mansion at the very tip of the Palm, with tropical gardens trailing down to a private dock, sets the tone before you've looked at a menu. This is a formal French fine dining restaurant from Yannick Alleno, holder of two Michelin stars, where the cooking layers classical technique with genuinely modern ideas. The room is opulent without making you sit up straighter, and the service reads the same way, polished but not stiff.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Doors slide open on their own as you approach, which sets the tone nicely for a fine dining room that takes itself seriously without apologizing for it. Heston Blumenthal's Dubai outpost runs the same menu as London, centuries of British cooking reimagined with very good ingredients. The Meat Fruit arrives looking like a mandarin. A pineapple spins on a spit in the open kitchen. It holds a Michelin star and a Forbes Five Star.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star

For the final course, the electric lights go off and the room is lit by moonlight, which tells you something about how seriously Solemann Haddad takes the whole thing. This 15-seat rooftop counter serves a 12-course tasting menu twice nightly, with each dish plated right in front of you. The kitchen threads Middle Eastern ingredients through Japanese technique in ways that feel personal rather than studied. It holds a Michelin star and a spot on MENA's 50 Best.

1. The 50 #10 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star
3. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

Sharks and stingrays glide past the floor-to-ceiling windows while you eat, which does make it harder to focus on the sommelier. Ossiano is a fine dining tasting menu restaurant inside the Atlantis on Palm Jumeirah, built around an aquarium housing tens of thousands of marine animals. The ten-course menu traces explorers who sailed the Atlantic, with courses finished tableside for effect. It holds a Michelin star and a Forbes Five Star.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Lattice screens, booth seating beside a backlit blue bar, and a soundtrack loud enough to count as a second course: this is Hakkasan's version of a Michelin-starred Chinese restaurant. The global chain's Dubai outpost leans into the party-venue energy without apologizing for it, serving reimagined Cantonese classics alongside a few Dubai-only additions. The room is moody and deliberately glamorous, and service keeps pace without breaking a sweat.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Anne-Sophie Pic's fine dining room sits in the cantilevered section of the One Za'abeel tower, 25 floors up, with a white marble bar at the front and an open kitchen behind. The Modern French cooking leans into delicate spicing and unexpected combinations, the kind of restraint that takes more effort than it looks. A Michelin star and a Forbes Four Star for anyone keeping score.

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

Thai food reimagined through a Dubai lens, Manāo is a mid-range sit-down restaurant that earned a Michelin star within five months of opening, which is the kind of overachieving that makes everyone else look bad. The team's background spans Thailand, India, and Syria, and somehow that collision produces something coherent and genuinely exciting. The room draws curious food lovers who actually did their research, not just people who wandered in off the street.

1. The 50 #9 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The name translates as "Maryam's dining table," and the room commits to that promise, with Palestinian art on the walls and bread baked fresh throughout service. This is a Levantine restaurant where sharing is the default and portions make that easy. The Michelin Bib Gourmand and a spot on MENA's 50 Best list follow the chef's reputation for threading centuries of Middle Eastern culinary tradition through genuinely inventive technique, including a labneh crème brûlée topped with za'atar ice cream.

1. The 50 #7 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
3. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

A small plates spot tucked into an old fishermen's building at Jumeirah Fishing Harbour, 3Fils does contemporary Japanese with a loose pan-Asian hand and a pared-back room that makes no attempt to impress you with its décor. The waterside terrace is where everyone wants to be, and the queue to get there is a known quantity. A Michelin Bib Gourmand and a spot on MENA's 50 Best list keep the wait honest.

1. The 50 #17 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
3. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

Kelvin Cheung's restaurant sits on the Boulevard with the Burj Khalifa filling the window, which seems almost unfair given how much is already happening on the plate. The cooking blends Chinese-Canadian, South Asian, and American threads into something that reads as its own thing: prawn toast with Singapore coconut curry, karaage and waffles, za'atar tempura. Teal marble, dark wood, bronze accents. A spot on MENA's 50 Best list.

1. The 50 #8 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

Neha Misra ran a sold-out ramen supper club from her home for years before the demand outgrew her dining room. Now it's a casual izakaya and ramen shop where the noodles are still made from scratch, the broth runs rich and creamy, and the duck ramen uses every part of the bird. A Michelin Bib Gourmand and number two on MENA's 50 Best list. The ramen counter, with a view of the kitchen, fills up fast.

1. The 50 #2 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Marble floors, a glass-fronted kitchen at the center of the room, and a window table with fountain views of Downtown Dubai make the setting hard to ignore. This Italian restaurant sits inside the Armani Hotel on the lower floors of the Burj Khalifa, and the cooking leans traditional, with Sicilian ingredients getting careful, colorful treatment. A Forbes Five Star property, and the kind of place where the tasting menu exists for a reason.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Rubber ducks cover every available surface at this Serkal Avenue sushi bar, which sets the tone nicely: serious craft, zero solemnity. The long counter puts the open kitchen front and center, and the hand rolls, made to order with yellowtail, scallop, or wagyu, are the reason to pull up a stool. It landed at number 15 on MENA's 50 Best Restaurants list, which the ducks seem unbothered by.

1. The 50 #15 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

Counter seats facing the chefs are the move at this fine-dining Japanese restaurant on Bluewaters Island, where a wagyu specialist and a sushi master share the kitchen. The omakase leans on A5 Kobe beef and uni flown from Toyosu, shifting with the seasons. The team even partnered with the UAE's Royal Family on a honey garden, because apparently that's just something you do. It holds a spot on MENA's 50 Best Restaurants list.

1. The 50 #23 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A Michelin-starred fine dining room perched on the 27th floor of the Burj Al Arab, where the floor-to-ceiling windows do a fair amount of the work before the food even arrives. The chef builds a French-rooted, Mediterranean-influenced menu around truffles, caviar, and precise sauces, with desserts that look almost too composed to eat. Staff explain every dish with genuine warmth, which helps when you're deciding whether to feel guilty about ordering a second one.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

A light green dining room in a Dubai Hills business park, with an altar-like pass where chefs finish each dish in full view of the tables, sets the tone for what follows. avatāra holds a Michelin star for its multi-course vegetarian Indian tasting menu, where each dish arrives with its own story, which the team delivers with enough warmth to make the ritual feel earned rather than rehearsed.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Boca was reportedly among the first restaurants in Dubai to serve Dibba Bay oysters, which tells you something about how seriously the team takes local sourcing. A modern Spanish restaurant in DIFC, it works with desert foragers and UAE farms alongside a 400-label wine list and a beverage program that gets as much attention as the food. It holds a spot on MENA's 50 Best Restaurants list.

1. The 50 #41 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

The name is French slang for "at mine," and the vibe follows through: a restaurant on The Palm that runs more like a very well-catered house party than a formal dining room. The chef trained under Robuchon and Passard, and the menu mixes modern French technique with flavors picked up across several continents. It landed on MENA's 50 Best Restaurants list, which tracks with the energy in the room.

1. The 50 #40 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

Chef Gabriela Chamorro spent years flying Emirates routes before trading the cabin for a supper club in her own home, which eventually outgrew the living room and landed here: a Central American restaurant inside the Anantara Downtown Dubai Hotel, ranked among MENA's 50 Best Restaurants. Terracotta walls, a birdcage bar, and an open kitchen carry the warmth of that original setup into something considerably more spacious, with pupusas and clay-pot short ribs doing the heavy lifting.

1. The 50 #43 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

Eighteen counter seats on the fourth floor of the Bulgari Hotel, overlooking the Dubai skyline, is about as understated a flex as you'll find in this city. Hōseki is an omakase sushi counter run by a sixth-generation sushi master whose knife work the team tailors to each guest using fish imported from Japan. It holds a Michelin star, and service arrives in traditional kimonos, which somehow doesn't feel like a costume.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Grand chandeliers and a plush cocktail bar set the tone at this upscale Indian restaurant, part of a small international group that has earned a Michelin star here in Dubai. The kitchen leans into prime ingredients and careful spicing, with the Bhatti Ka Octopus and a Sindhi goat curry among the dishes that show the range. Neighbors heading to the Dubai Opera use it as a pre-theatre spot, which should tell you something about the dress code.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

Fourteen seats around a single semi-circular table, an open fire, and a chef narrating every move: Dani García's intimate fine dining counter inside Leña runs what he calls "Fire Omakase," eleven courses built around live flame and grill. The room is deliberately dark, the pacing unhurried, and a Michelin star hangs over the whole production. Burnt pumpkin purée and mandarin sorbet close things out with enough confidence to make dessert feel like the point.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

The terrace infinity pool blurs into the Gulf beyond it, which sets the tone for this Michelin-starred Portuguese restaurant on the sixth floor of the Mandarin Oriental Jumeira. The kitchen leans into tradition, pastéis de nata and all, while nudging the flavors somewhere more contemporary. Service keeps the meal moving without making you feel managed, and the open kitchen gives the room a pulse.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The lakeside terrace, glass-enclosed and hovering over the water, sets the tone for a Levantine restaurant that treats home cooking as a serious project. Generational recipes share the menu with modern riffs on classic flavors, and the claypot dishes especially carry that slow, considered quality. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand and a spot on MENA's 50 Best list. The lunch soup-and-daily special is the kind of deal that turns a quick stop into a regular habit.

1. The 50 Sevenrooms Icon Award 2026 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants · Salam Dakkak
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

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

The elevator ride up 122 floors of the Burj Khalifa is its own kind of theater, and the fine dining room at the top leans into every expectation: muted tones, impeccable uniforms, and views that make the city below look like a screen saver. The menu runs French-modern, with caviar and Wagyu doing the heavy lifting. A Forbes Four Star restaurant where the altitude is part of the point, and nobody is pretending otherwise.

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

The Candy Room at the end of the meal is the tell: this is a place that thinks dessert deserves its own dedicated space. Brasserie Frantzén is a sleek, moody restaurant inside Atlantis The Palm, where the kitchen draws on Japanese, French, and Scandinavian traditions in a way that sounds like a pitch but lands on the plate. Deep seating, low light, and a bar for lighter bites if you want to ease in.

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

Sour cream and onion dip served with Ritz crackers in retro ceramic bowls is a confident opening move for a Lebanese comfort food restaurant. Set inside an AlSerkal Avenue warehouse, Middle Child has two floors of dining and an open kitchen visible through the glass front, so the energy hits before you're even through the door. It holds a spot on MENA's 50 Best Restaurants as One to Watch, which tracks for a place that makes unpretentious food feel considered.

1. The 50 One To Watch Award 2026 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai

A wood-fired oven anchors the open kitchen at this cozy, character-stuffed casual restaurant from the brothers behind Orfali Bros. The menu skips between Syria, Japan, France, and Spain without apology, landing on things like a wagyu cheeseburger in a Hokkaido bun or a pizza-pide hybrid with brown butter miso. Deep maroon walls, geometric floors, and vintage Arabic pop on the speakers give it a warm 1970s den feel. It holds a spot on MENA's 50 Best Restaurants list.

1. The 50 #29 · MENA's 50 Best Restaurants

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A self-playing piano and arched ceilings set the tone at this Italian restaurant perched above the FIVE Palm Jumeirah's pool, where warm lighting and a well-dressed crowd keep things firmly on the glamorous side. The menu runs from eggplant parmigiana to a dessert riffing on a Bellini cocktail, classic and playful in equal measure. When Dubai cools down, the terrace earns its keep.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The Pinnacle Guide 1 Pin
2. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Cocktail Bar – Middle East & Africa
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Bar Team – Middle East & Africa

A Damien Hirst octopus greets you on the ground floor before a glass lift delivers you to a dimly lit, seabed-themed dining room and bar where every surface seems to be doing something. The Japanese and pan-Asian sharing plates hold their own against the décor, which is saying something. The balcony terrace has sweeping DIFC skyline views, and the bathroom has its own fan base on Instagram, independently.

1. The Pinnacle Guide 1 Pin
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Bar Team – Middle East & Africa

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The terrace looks out over a lagoon where turtles are being nursed back to health, which sets an unexpected tone for what is otherwise a very polished Tuscan dining room: white tablecloths, warm lighting, grown-up crowd. The kitchen leans on estate-grown olive oil, honey, and vegetables from the original property in Tuscany, so the Italian provenance isn't just branding. A Michelin Selected restaurant.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

Ninive bills itself as a contemporary urban majlis, the traditional gathering space of Bedouin community life, and the room commits to the idea: low tables, deep sofas, lanterns, and enough lush planting to make you forget you're inside a tower hotel on Sheikh Zayed Road. It's a Middle Eastern restaurant that leans into atmosphere as hard as it does the food, which makes it a reliable pick for date nights or a long, unhurried dinner with a group.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

A DJ booth in a coffee shop is either a flex or a cry for help, and at Nightjar it reads as the former. This specialty cafe and roaster inside Alserkal Avenue's warehouse district does serious, geeky coffee alongside food that has no interest in playing it safe: lamb kheema toasties, house-cured salt beef sandwiches, rotisserie chicken. Black tiles, communal tables, and stickers on every surface set the tone before the flat white arrives.

1. Eater The 27 Best Restaurants in Dubai
2. World Coffee Map Best cafes for reading in Dubai

The name pulls double duty: 21 grams is the supposed weight of the human soul and the latitude of the Balkans, which neatly previews what the kitchen is doing. This casual bistro on the second floor of Meyan Mall keeps things straightforward by Dubai standards, with an all-Balkan team cooking food from home. The Michelin Guide gave it a Bib Gourmand, which tracks for a place more interested in the food than the spectacle.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Rugs on the floor, chandeliers overhead, and a menu built around the kabab shops of Tehran: Berenjak is a Persian grill that started in London's Soho and has since traveled well. The Dubai outpost at Dar Wasl Mall carries the same eclectic, slightly theatrical room and the same devotion to the skewer. The Michelin Bib Gourmand follows it wherever it lands. Open with a sharbat, a fruit-and-flower-petal Persian cooler, before the charcoal smoke takes over.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery
2. Difford's Guide Difford's Guide

A gastrobar on Dubai Creek Harbour's promenade, with the skyline doing most of the interior design work through floor-to-ceiling windows. Bright wood, an open kitchen that keeps things lively, and a menu built around unfussy comfort food at prices that won't require a moment of quiet reflection. The Michelin Guide picked it up for a Bib Gourmand, which tracks with a crowd that comes back often enough to have a usual order.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Blond wood, cream walls, and a ceiling tall enough to suggest the menu won't bankrupt you: DUO is a Bib Gourmand all-day gastrobar rooted in a St. Petersburg restaurant group, transplanted to Dubai Hills Business Park. The kitchen runs Asian and European ideas side by side without needing to explain itself, and the oxtail pie with Taleggio does most of the persuading. Breakfast through dinner, with the kind of pricing that makes ordering a second round feel reasonable.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Named after a mango variety, this compact Malay grill in Jumeirah earns a Michelin Bib Gourmand for food that traces back to the team's family hawker roots in Singapore. The menu roams across Southeast Asia, and dishes like a six-hour rendang built on twenty spices show the kitchen's patience. The room is genuinely small, so bring people, order widely, and let the staff talk you through it, which they will want to do.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

A casual Asian street food restaurant in JLT that grew out of a secret supper club, Hawkerboi channels the hawker markets of Singapore, Malaysia, Thailand, and Myanmar into a relaxed neighbourhood spot. The team walks you through the menu with the kind of patience that actually helps. Dishes are generous and herb-heavy, built on the logic that more aromatics is never the wrong call. It holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

A contemporary Indian brasserie tucked into a villa on Al Wasl Road, earning a Michelin Bib Gourmand for sharing plates built around the flavors of India's street food. The keema pao nods to a long-gone Bombay institution, the kulfi falooda arrives in a cloud of dry ice, and the drinks menu borrows its characters from Khadak Street itself. Loud, colorful, and a little theatrical, in a way that feels earned rather than performed.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

A ramen shop on the second floor of Mall of the Emirates, which is either a strange place to find serious Tokyo-pedigreed noodles or a perfectly logical one, depending on how you feel about air conditioning. The shoyu ramen is the draw, and the Michelin Bib Gourmand suggests the broth hasn't suffered from the journey. No reservations, but the counter usually has room, and service starts before noon.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Perched on Yas Marina with a terrace made for Abu Dhabi winters, Mika is a Mediterranean restaurant that earns its Michelin Bib Gourmand by doing the small things carefully: bread baked in-house, salmon cured on-site, limoncello made from scratch. The menu leans toward the Riviera, bright and unfussy, and the tiramisu named for Nonna arrives with the quiet confidence of something that has never once disappointed anyone.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Reif Othman's Wagyu Katsu Sando went viral before most Dubai restaurants had figured out Instagram, and the kushiyaki joint it anchors is the kind of bright, relaxed mall spot that punches well above its postcode. Robata-grilled skewers anchor the menu, but the room fills out with ramen and gyoza too. The Michelin Bib Gourmand and a sunlit terrace make the case quietly. Casual dress, lively crowd, and no need to book a month ahead.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

An Indian tapas bar sharing a wall with its fancier sibling avatāra next door, Revelry leans into cricket on the screens, cocktails named after India's seasons, and small plates priced to let you order broadly and figure out what you like. The cooking is contemporary and gently spiced, tradition nudged toward the modern without drama. The Michelin Guide gave it a Bib Gourmand. Save room: the desserts take an unexpected turn.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended

Olive trees in cobalt pots, blue-and-white stripes, and enough snowy linen to make you forget you're on a man-made island in Dubai. Alici is a Southern Italian seafood restaurant that leans hard into Amalfi coast aesthetics, with sustainably caught Mediterranean fish and a crudo selection that sets the tempo. The terrace at sunset, with mega yachts catching the last of the light, does most of the selling.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Three floors of tropical greenery in the middle of DIFC, where the Amazon rainforest aesthetic gets taken very seriously and the bar keeps pace with the dining room. The Latin American menu wanders from sushi to grilled meats, which sounds chaotic but tracks with the Amazon basin's many communities. First-floor tables face the open kitchen; the panoramic terrace is the move for a cocktail before or after.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Bar Team – Middle East & Africa

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Hotel Bar – Middle East & Africa

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The white jackets on the waiters are the tell: this is a Cipriani, which means the whole operation traces back to Harry's Bar in Venice and carries itself accordingly. It's a full-service Italian restaurant in the DIFC, serving pasta, risotto, carpaccio, and veal Milanese to a crowd that likes its la dolce vita with a side of expense account. The Bellini, naturally, is on the list.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The pisco bar alone draws a crowd before anyone touches the ceviche menu. This Peruvian restaurant and bar sits inside the Four Seasons' outdoor Restaurant Village, where the room runs loud and candlelit and nobody seems to be eating alone. The kitchen works the Nikkei angle hard, with ceviches in several directions and a sweetcorn meringue pavlova that sounds odd until it doesn't. Cocktail credentials are no afterthought; the bar team placed among the regional top ten in the Spirited Awards.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Bar Team – Middle East & Africa

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The glass-brick DJ booth is the first clue that this is not your average hotel bar. Electric Pawn Shop is a neon-lit, music-forward cocktail bar on the ground floor of the H Dubai, dressed up in stainless steel, exposed brick, and a vague dystopian fog. The menu leans Asian-Mediterranean, but the real reason to come is the sound system, which takes itself very seriously, as it should.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

A Battle of the Burgers competition win prompted this husband-and-wife team to pivot from supper club to counter-service burger spot, which is either brave or completely logical depending on how good the burgers are. Eleven Green lands closer to a sleek casual diner than anything fast food, with green banquettes, polished wood, and booths lit low enough to feel like a choice. A Discovery on The 50 list.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The baobab-inspired ceiling shifts color above zebra-print cushions and a crystal-encrusted champagne bar, and that's before anyone's opened a menu. Flamingo Room by tashas is a full-on restaurant and bar that leans hard into the spectacle, though the kitchen earns its share of the attention too. Crab and lobster croquettes and a salmon Wellington make a reasonable case that the food isn't just set dressing. The phones come out early and often here.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

A 26-seat Peruvian restaurant tucked into JLT where ceviche is more or less the whole point. The chef built her approach around recipes from home, kept simple and original, and the fish arrives with the kind of acidity that makes you understand why Peru considers the dish a national treasure. The team checks your spice tolerance before you order, which is either hospitality or a warning, depending on how you answer.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Hotel Bar – Middle East & Africa

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Cocktail Bar – Middle East & Africa

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best New International Cocktail Bar – Middle East & Africa

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Hotel Bar – Middle East & Africa

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best New International Cocktail Bar – Middle East & Africa

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best International Hotel Bar – Middle East & Africa

Part café, part restaurant, part gallery, part library, Maisan15 sits in Al Barsha doing several things at once and pulling off all of them. Prints by David Shrigley and Dan Witz hang on walls where the art is also for sale, and the kitchen sends out a Levantine-leaning menu in a room that smells of coffee and good intentions. A Discovery on The 50 list for Dubai.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best New International Cocktail Bar – Middle East & Africa

The dough ferments for 48 hours before it ever sees the oven, which tells you how seriously this Neapolitan-style pizzeria inside Dar Wasl Mall takes what is, at its heart, a very simple thing. Moon Slice built its reputation on inventive topping combinations and an interior made for photographs, and the room still draws a crowd happy to play along. A casual, affordable slice of Naples via Al Wasl Road.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best New International Cocktail Bar – Middle East & Africa

The glass-and-wood steakhouse inside the Four Seasons where Nusret Gökçe, better known as Salt Bae, built his empire on beef and a single viral moment. The theatrics are very much part of the offer, but behind the internet fame is a family of butchers going back generations. Come for a proper splurge on a steak cut tableside, and expect a room that takes both the meat and the moment quite seriously.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The Barcelona original put cocktails inside a fridge; this ninth-floor outpost swapped the fridge for a circus. A cocktail bar inside the Five Luxe JBR, Paradiso Dubai goes big on spectacle: candy stripes, circus motifs, and drinks that arrive as set pieces, one served inside a miniature steam engine under sesame foam, another glowing green thanks to riboflavin and something billed as an electric liqueur. A named spot on The 50 Discovery list.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery