The Best Bars in Klong Toei Khwaeng & Khlong Toei Nuae

The menu at this cocktail bar is organized like a tasting dinner, moving through starters, mains, and afters, with combinations like beef and onion or almond and ylang-ylang landing in your glass instead of on a plate. Seating is arranged so guests face each other across a lit surface, giving the room the feel of an omakase counter or possibly a very stylish interrogation. Ranked in the World's 50 Best Bars, it helped push Bangkok's bar scene toward the savory and strange.

1. The 50 #15 · The World's 50 Best Bars
2. The 50 #4 · Asia’s 50 Best Bars
3. The Infatuation The 20 Best Bars In Bangkok

The name comes from the physics of waves, sound and ocean both, which tells you something about how seriously this cocktail bar takes its own ideas. The bartender behind it ran both Vesper and Backstage before opening here on Thong Lo's second floor, and the drinks carry that pedigree, landing on Asia's 50 Best Bars at number five. Playful without being gimmicky, and worth lingering over.

1. The 50 #88 · The World's 50 Best Bars
2. The 50 #5 · Asia’s 50 Best Bars
3. The Infatuation The 20 Best Bars In Bangkok

A cocktail bar on the 11th floor of the akyra Thonglor, where old typewriters and printing curios share space with a glassy, capsule-lit back bar and views of Bangkok glittering below. The mix of nostalgia and neon shouldn't work, but somehow the room holds it together. The drinks list pulls from Prohibition-era spirits, handled by a bartender who came up through Vesper, one of the city's more serious cocktail rooms.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

A featureless door on Sukhumvit 31, a curtain to pull back, and suddenly you're in a candlelit two-storey shophouse cocktail bar named after a Chet Baker track, which tells you most of what you need to know. From the team behind Bangkok speakeasies Ku Bar and Sugar Ray, the room is retro-cosy and unhurried, built for long rounds and live jazz rather than anything louder. The 50 Best Discoveries list gave it a nod.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Ten seats, all at the bar, and the cocktail list changes every week, so regulars treat each visit like a puzzle. This small Bangkok cocktail bar from the team behind Sugar Ray keeps things unhurried and a little nerdy, with chess boards, vinyl shelves, and a turntable doing most of the decorating. The drinks riff on classics without being smug about it, and the bar snacks are taken more seriously than they need to be. Book ahead.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

A cocktail bar with a name this unhinged earns some goodwill before anyone orders a drink. Tucked inside the Octo Seafood Bar complex on Sukhumvit Soi 24, Sugar Ray went minimalist in its new digs but kept the looseness intact. Sit at the counter if you can; the bartenders reward the audience. Asian-inflected signatures lean on ginseng, pandan, and tea-infused gin. A 50 Best Discovery pick.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

The durian colada is either the bravest cocktail in Bangkok or a personal challenge, depending on your feelings about salty durian foam. This cocktail bar on Sukhumvit 37 runs on disco-funk and an unapologetic willingness to put curry powder in a drink. A khao soi cocktail, bar snacks that include chicken wings stuffed with fermented pork sausage, and a disco ball overhead make for a room where nobody is standing still.

1. The Infatuation The 20 Best Bars In Bangkok
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery