The 81 Best Places to Drink and Do in Los Angeles

The dining room is styled after a yacht interior, which could read as a gimmick but lands as a mood. Providence is a three-Michelin-star seafood tasting menu restaurant on Melrose, where Michael Cimarusti builds multi-course meals around wild-caught American fish and whatever the farmers market offers that morning. The James Beard Award for Outstanding Hospitality is on the wall, and the front-of-house earns it. North America's 50 Best lists it at number 32.

1. AAA Five Diamonds
2. Michelin Guide 3 Stars
3. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

Jon Yao's tasting menu restaurant lives in the Row DTLA, where polished concrete and an open kitchen set a spare stage for cooking rooted in Taiwanese heritage and San Gabriel Valley muscle memory. The ten courses are not shy about seasoning, and the drinks program, a James Beard winner in its own right, pulls equal weight. Kato holds a Michelin star and a spot on North America's 50 Best, and Yao won the James Beard for Best Chef: California.

1. Michelin Guide 2 Stars
2. James Beard Awards 2026 · Winner · Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program
3. The 50 #49 · North America's 50 Best Restaurants

Twelve acres of canyon greenery swallow the Hotel Bel-Air so completely that the spa visit feels less like a city errand and more like a disappearing act. The grounds are famously labyrinthine, with tucked-away paths and canopy cover that make it easy to lose track of both time and, apparently, fellow Beatles. A Forbes Five Star spa in a setting that does most of the work before you even lie down.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star
2. Vogue 100 Best Spas in the World

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Five Star

Money-green walls and brown leather set the tone at this approachable cocktail bar where Filipinotown, Echo Park, and Downtown all bleed together. The crowd reflects the neighborhood mix, and the bar leans into that, keeping menus short and descriptive so nobody feels lost. Seasonal cocktails share space with a Frozen of the Month, which is exactly the kind of menu that means everyone leaves happy. A James Beard Outstanding Bar semifinalist and on North America's 50 Best Bars list.

1. The Pinnacle Guide 2 Pins
2. The 50 #92 · North America's 50 Best Bars
3. The 50 Sustainable Bar Award

1. The 50 #44 · North America's 50 Best Bars
2. Punch Best New Bars
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Best New Bar

The newspaper-themed menu doubles as a history lesson on the Sunset Strip, which fits, given the leather booths and vintage vinyl setup of this dimly lit neighborhood cocktail bar. Signature drinks are named for local landmarks, the Viper Room, the Beverly Hills Hotel, and the like, and priced like someone actually wants you to have a second one. Named to Wildsam's 50 Most Essential Bars in America, it trades the Strip's usual gloss for something considerably more worn-in.

1. Esquire Olive Drive · The Best Martinis in America
2. Esquire The Best Bars in America
3. Wildsam The 50 Most Essential Bars in America

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

1. The 50 #68 · North America's 50 Best Bars
2. Spirited Awards 2026 · Top 10 Nominee · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar

A flaming red domed oven anchors the warehouse-sized dining room, which also has a copper bar, tulip pendant lights, and booths that seem to float slightly above the floor. This is a buzzy Italian restaurant in the Arts District where the crowd's energy and the kitchen's output seem to feed each other. The blistered pizzas and rich pastas are the reason the room is always full, and desserts from the pastry side hold their own.

1. Difford's Guide 4.5 stars · Difford's Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Time Out #37 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America
2. Spirited Awards 2025 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best U.S. Bar Team – U.S. West
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West

1. Food & Wine The 10 Top Bars in the US

Evan Funke's eponymous Italian restaurant occupies a three-story art deco building in Beverly Hills, where a glassed-in room lets you watch pasta being made by hand before it reaches your table. Red leather booths, stone tables, and tall ceilings set a tone that takes itself seriously without taking the fun out of dinner. The menu moves through handmade pasta and wood-fired dishes, the kind of Italian cooking where focaccia alone gets its own moment.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Los Angeles Times #19 · The 101 best restaurants in Los Angeles
3. Time Out #21 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Punch Real Charmer Daiquiri · Our Favorite Cocktails
2. Spirited Awards 2025 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West
3. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best U.S. Bar Team – U.S. West

1. The Pinnacle Guide 2 Pins
2. James Beard Awards 2025 · Nominee · Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program
3. James Beard Awards 2024 · Nominee · Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. Esquire Martini · The Best Martinis in America
3. Esquire Musso + Frank Martini · The Best Martinis in America

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America
2. Difford's Guide 3.5 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America
2. Esquire LDV Gibson · The Best Martinis in America
3. Eater The Best Beverly Hills Restaurants

1. Esquire Okra Martini · The Best Martinis in America

1. Esquire House Pickle-Brine Martini · The Best Martinis in America

1. Esquire House Pickle-Brine Martini · The Best Martinis in America

A French-Japanese bistro in an Arts District warehouse, where the croque-madame arrives on house-made shokupan with ham katsu standing in for the ham. The team behind sake-focused Japanese spots has gone full Paris here, or almost full Paris, because the ponzu jelly scattered over the burrata keeps reminding you exactly where you are. Come for an aperitif and stay until the kitchen stops feeding you.

1. Punch Best New Bartenders · Kevin Nguyen
2. The New York Times 2024 · The Restaurant List
3. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants

A Michelin-starred bistro in the Arts District where the steak au poivre and golden frites hold their ground alongside some genuinely inventive plating. The kitchen leans French but isn't reverent about it, which is part of the appeal. The Provence Martini made Esquire's list of the finest in the country, so the bar pulls its weight too. It fills up fast and the open kitchen keeps the room loud and kinetic.

1. Esquire Provence Martini · The Best Martinis in America
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Time Out #18 · The 40 best restaurants in Los Angeles you need to try right now

1. Esquire Saltie Martini · The Best Martinis in America

1. Wildsam The 50 Most Essential Bars in America

1. Esquire The Martini You Drink Before You Fly · The Best Martinis in America

A tiki bar so small it was once a violin-repair shop, which tells you everything about the square footage and nothing about the ambition. Three generations of the same family have been pouring Mai Tais under the thatched canopy on Sunset since the sixties, and they do not serve beer or wine, so don't ask. Modern tiki bars tend to look like this place photoshopped. The original is still doing it straight.

1. Difford's Guide 4.5 stars · Difford's Guide
2. Huckberry The 50 Best Dive Bars in America

1. Esquire Dahlia Martini · The Best Martinis in America

1. Esquire Tequila Martini · The Best Martinis in America
2. Eater The Best Beverly Hills Restaurants

A former church in Downtown LA, now a contemporary restaurant with an open ceiling that lets the room breathe and the people-watching practically do itself. The crowd comes for small plates and cocktails at the two circular bars or settles into the sofa-stuffed lounge like they own the place. The menu roams globally, though the kitchen keeps one foot planted in the familiar. Loud, beautiful, and a little theatrical.

1. James Beard Awards 2025 · Nominee · Outstanding Professional in Cocktail Service · Tobin Shea
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. Esquire The Best Bars in America

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Top 10 Nominee · U.S. Bartender of the Year · Linda Douglas
2. Spirited Awards 2025 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best U.S. Restaurant Bar – U.S. West
3. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West

1. Spirited Awards 2026 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West
2. Spirited Awards 2025 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West
3. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West

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

The Standing Room, a subterranean lounge tucked under the Arts District, is the reason to come to this Los Angeles outpost of the New York cocktail institution. Death & Co keeps its speakeasy bones, dark and deliberately moody, while the menu organizes its 25 cocktails by personality rather than spirit, which is either very LA or very useful depending on your mood. Californian wines and global beers round things out for anyone who finds the taxonomy exhausting.

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

1. Spirited Awards 2025 · Regional Top 10 Honoree · Best New U.S. Cocktail Bar – U.S. West

Inside the Hauser & Wirth arts complex in the Arts District, Manuela is a restaurant and bar where conceptual art hangs on the walls and the cooking tilts Southern with a serious commitment to local ingredients, some grown in their own garden. Cocktails use house-made bitters and tonics, and the food is the kind that makes a gallery crowd linger well past closing time.

1. Punch Archie · Our Favorite Cocktails
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The dining room at this West Hollywood EDITION hotel restaurant looks like a luxury spa that decided to feed people: white velvet booths, staff in beige, and enough greenery to require a groundskeeper. The menu leans vegetable-forward but keeps dry-aged lamb and steaks around for the unconvinced. Prices sit firmly in hotel territory, which the hotel guests seem not to notice.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Spirited Awards 2023 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Hotel Bar – U.S. West
3. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Hotel Bar – U.S. West

1. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Professional in Cocktail Service · Jason Lee

Tucked into Mandarin Plaza on Broadway, this contemporary Chinese American restaurant and bar is the project of a first-generation chef cooking his own story onto the plate. The cocktail program is serious enough to earn national bartender recognition, so start there before the food arrives. Dishes are built for sharing, the kitchen is open to the room, and the whole setup feels more like a dinner party than a transaction.

1. Esquire Bartender of the Year · Kenzo Han
2. Punch Best New Bartenders · Kenzo Han
3. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The smartest move Accomplice ever made was opening next to Taiwanese restaurant Little Fatty, so when the cocktails do their work, crab rangoon and shrimp chips are one door away. It's a moody cocktail bar in Mar Vista where the drinks lean into unexpected flavors, Japanese whiskey and oolong sharing space with goji berry and ginger. The 50 Discovery named it among their finds, which tracks.

1. Spirited Awards 2024 · Top 10 Nominee · Best U.S. Restaurant Bar
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery
3. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Bar Team – U.S. West

1. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Bar Team – U.S. West

1. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Hotel Bar – U.S. West

1. Spirited Awards 2024 · Regional Honoree · Best U.S. Hotel Bar – U.S. West

You reach Caña by walking through a parking garage in the base of a historic Petroleum Building until a podium appears, which is the kind entrance policy that filters out the uncommitted. Inside, a corridor lined with rum bottles leads to a wood-panelled room with leather banquettes and a ribbed concrete ceiling. It's a rum cocktail bar that takes the spirit seriously, and the dim lamplight makes everyone look like they have good taste.

1. Difford's Guide 4.5 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Wine Enthusiast Forward 50 Restaurants
2. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Bar
3. James Beard Awards 2023 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Bar

A French spirits lounge on Melrose where the cocktail menu is divided into categories named Parfum and Potion, which tells you immediately what kind of evening they have in mind. The team also runs La Descarga and Harvard & Stone, so the theatrics are deliberate. Low lighting, a Parisian lounge sensibility, and a crowd that dressed for it. The menu leans heavily on calvados, armagnac, and eau de vie, which is either your thing or a prompt to try something new.

1. Difford's Guide 4.5 stars · Difford's Guide

A New Orleans cocktail bar where the inside has been dressed up to look like an outdoor street scene, the way a film studio backlot would imagine the French Quarter. Barrel-aged cocktails are the house move, and the 1920s theme is committed enough that someone looked up the etymology of sassafras before naming the place. The crowd tends toward people who wanted something more atmospheric than a standard Hollywood dive.

1. Difford's Guide 4.5 stars · Difford's Guide

An unmarked door at the back of Cole's opens into a dimly lit cocktail bar where jazz plays low and Victorian oil lamps glow against wood-panelled walls. The late Sasha Petraske was a part owner, and the room feels exactly like something he'd have built: serious about its classic cocktails, quiet enough to hear the ice hit the glass, and a little too good at making you lose track of the hour.

1. Difford's Guide 4.5 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

Every bottle behind the bar at Las Perlas comes from south of the border, which means no vodka, no whiskey, and no gin to tempt you off the path. It's a cantina-style mezcal and tequila bar on Sixth Street, candlelit and maximalist, with Del Maguey mezcals and rare 100% agave pours listed by region and paired for the curious. The kind of place that makes an argument without ever saying a word.

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

The chandeliers alone explain why every studio executive who ever needed to feel important has passed through here. Library Bar sits inside the Hollywood Roosevelt, a hotel so soaked in old Hollywood mythology it practically seeps into the drinks. It's a cocktail bar where the Spanish Colonial bones do most of the heavy lifting, and the clientele tends to dress accordingly. Order something classic and let the room do the rest.

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

Four oversized bronze chairs whose frames spell out an "R" set the tone before you've ordered a thing. This is the bar side of a sleek Latin-themed restaurant, where the drinks program leans into tequila and mezcal with the same design seriousness the room applies to everything else. It's a long way from neon cantina signage, both in looks and in the glass.

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

Three antique pool tables on tartan carpet greet you at the top of the stairs, which sets the tone for this whiskey bar doing a convincing impression of a Scottish gentleman's club in downtown L.A. The black walnut bar runs nearly the full length of the room, with shelves so tall the bartenders use a rolling ladder to reach the rarer Scotch, Japanese, Irish, and bourbon bottles, several hundred in all, including single-cask and collectible pours.

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

The name is literal: a neighborhood cocktail bar tucked into a quiet stretch of Washington Boulevard in Culver City, the part of LA better known for art galleries than drinking. Inside, it's casual and intimate, the kind of room that fills up with locals and after-work regulars who seem to have quietly agreed not to tell anyone else about it. The bartenders lean toward inventive riffs on classics.

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

A cocktail bar tucked behind a psychic shop on La Cienega, marked by a red neon hand in the window and, somewhat defeating the mystique, valet attendants and a sign on the pavement. Inside, it's all dark wood paneling, picture frames, antique stained glass, and a vintage mirror above the bar that promises "the best of everything and nothing but the best." Booths line one wall, low tables fill the back, and the lighting is dim enough to feel like a secret even when it isn't.

1. Difford's Guide 4 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide 3 stars · Difford's Guide

The California poppy, "copa de oro" in Spanish, cup of gold, lends its name to this Santa Monica cocktail bar a couple of blocks from the beach. Terracotta tile, dark wood, and a resident artist's work on the walls give it a warm Hispanic character that tips, even on a Wednesday, toward a genuine party. The kind of place that starts feeling festive before you've finished your first drink.

1. Difford's Guide 3 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide 3.5 stars · Difford's Guide

A wall lined with metal cafeteria trays and merit badges sets the tone at this sprawling Los Feliz bar, where the summer camp theme is played completely straight. The cocktail menu splits neatly into Citrus/Refreshing and Aromatic/Boozy, which is honestly a more useful taxonomy than most bars manage. The glassed-in fire pits on the patio do a convincing impression of a campfire, without the s'mores obligation.

1. Difford's Guide 3.5 stars · Difford's Guide

The entry corridor sets the tone: a wall-sized photo of the old Famous Department Store, vintage neighborhood shots lining the walls, and classic films rolling on the screens inside this cocktail lounge tucked into Glendale's historic Huntley-Evans building. Live bands and DJs take over on weekends. Most of the crowd is passing through before or after the Americana at Brand across the street, which makes the retro-local atmosphere feel like a quiet act of mild resistance.

1. Difford's Guide 3 stars · Difford's Guide

A long marble bar anchors this windowless cocktail bar on La Brea, where the Art Deco bones and Venetian chandeliers give the room the air of a Middle Eastern hotel lobby, in a good way. Gold leather tub chairs and plush booths line the perimeter, which draws a crowd that came dressed for it. The cocktail list keeps things short, leaning on classics and originals, which suits a room this serious about atmosphere.

1. Difford's Guide 3 stars · Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide Difford's Guide

1. Difford's Guide Difford's Guide