The 56 Best Places to Eat in Nice

Bare tables and clean lines set the tone at this intimate fine dining room tucked into Nice's antiques quarter, where a Michelin-starred Italo-Argentine couple met at Mirazur and later opened their own place. The short tasting menus follow the season and the local catch closely, with the occasional unexpected pairing that makes you put your fork down for a second. The wine list is priced like they actually want you to order from it.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. 50 Top Italy #32 · The Best Italian Restaurants In The World

A Nice scorpionfish meeting a vadouvan-spiked broth is a fair summary of what the Tourteaux brothers do at this two-Michelin-starred creative restaurant: local ingredients from the market, spices from much further away, and enough confidence to make the collision feel inevitable rather than eccentric. The room is small and the cooking is precise, the kind of place where the menu reads like a dare that the kitchen quietly wins.

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

Sansho, Timut, black lime, green cardamom: the chef introduces each spice at the counter before it shows up in your plate, which is either charming or a spoiler, depending on your nature. This Michelin-starred modern dining room in Nice is small and warm-lit, with every seat angled toward the open kitchen. Local fish and vegetables carry the menu, seasoned with a precision that owes something to years under Marcel Ravin at Monaco's Blue Bay.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

Jan Hendrik van der Westhuizen cooked on private yachts in Monaco before opening this intimate, 20-seat fine dining room near the port in Nice. A single set menu channels South African flavors, playing sweet against sour, smoke against acid. When cheese arrives, you cross the street to a separate cheese bar stocked with around twenty varieties, preserves, and dried fruit. The detour alone earns its Michelin star.

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

A glazed kitchen window lets you watch the brigade work from your table, which sets the tone at this sleek modern restaurant a short walk from Place Masséna. The chef cooked at Plaza Athénée and Le Bristol before landing here, and the cooking shows it: Mediterranean ingredients, Nice and Ligurian coast produce, handled with the precision that résumé implies. It holds a Michelin star.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

Fine dining inside the Negresco, the grand old hotel that lords over the Promenade des Anglais. Virginie Basselot, a Meilleur Ouvrier de France, runs the kitchen and cooks modern French with a Mediterranean lean, sourcing tightly from local producers. The room is the kind of swanky that makes you sit up straight without being told. A Michelin star hangs over the whole project, and the service is polished enough to match it.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

A small, lively bistro on rue Bonaparte where the menu names alone are enough to make you curious, and the food backs up every bit of it. The chef, a Passage 53 alumnus, works entirely with local suppliers to produce creative, technically precise cooking that's more playful than precious. The room buzzes, the service is seamless, and the chef occasionally delivers dishes himself. It holds a Michelin star.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

A Michelin-starred vegetable restaurant in Nice where the menu is a single set of whatever the kitchen garden offered at its peak that day. Bruno Cirino and his team have built the whole thing around local organic produce, coaxing something quietly extraordinary from garlic, olive oil, artichokes, and basil. The room is small, the price is not what you'd expect for a star, and the wine list runs the same way.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

A short, market-driven menu in Nice's Musicians' Quarter, where the cooking changes with what looked good that morning. This is a neighborhood bistro with Australian roots and a Niçoise soul, earning a Michelin Bib Gourmand for hearty, unfussy plates served by the chef's partner, who runs the room with the ease of someone who genuinely likes being there. Natural wines, affordable lunches, and no dish on the menu that needs an explanation.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

The open flame does most of the talking here, with a parrilla grill and plancha turning out Colombian-Italian fusion in a narrow, terracotta-warm room near the port. The terrace spills onto the street in orange seating, and the kitchen stays visible throughout. Chimichurri shows up alongside braised veal, ceviche alongside sardines. It's a casual, warm restaurant where two culinary traditions share a table without much fuss about it.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A former burger joint on a backstreet near the port, now a bright Mediterranean restaurant run by a southern Italian chef and a Lombard sommelier who named it by combining their surnames. The kitchen pulls from the Saleya Market daily, so the menu shifts with whatever looked good that morning, leaning on citrus and spice. The wine list roams all over Europe and moves around as much as the food does.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The name is a nod to Japan's izakayas, and the vibe follows: a casual Japanese spot tucked into a cul-de-sac off rue de la Liberté, where salmon seared with yuzu-miso and prawn socca tacos sit on the same menu without anyone apologizing for it. Maki, sushi, and vegetable tempura fill out the middle ground, and there's a cocktail bar and a serious sake list. Upstairs, a twelve-seat counter runs a tasting menu for when the mood is more committed.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The room was a grocery shop in a former life, and the intimate scale stuck. This bistro on rue Bonaparte runs a short, seasonal menu where most plates are built for two to share, the music skews trendy, and the wine list leans into orange with something like conviction. The team behind Les Agitateurs in Nice does the cooking, which swings easily between classic French and something more restless. A Michelin Selected restaurant.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Near the port, this cozy Italian trattoria leans into traditional Roman cooking, the kind where house-made pasta and spicy tomato sauce do all the talking. The bohemian decor and jazz in the background give it a lived-in warmth that makes lingering easy. The team keeps things cordial without being fussy, and the desserts are lighter than you'd expect.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Emerald walls, crystal chandeliers, and exposed stone pillars set the mood at this glamorous little bistro tucked next to its Michelin-starred sibling JAN. The menu runs classic French, sole meunière and tarte Tatin, but chef Jan Hendrik, who grew up in South Africa, quietly folds in lentil bobotie and malva pudding alongside vanilla ice cream, which gives the whole thing a cosmopolitan undercurrent that the room, for all its Niçois polish, wears surprisingly lightly.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A chalkboard menu across from the Docks de la Riviera covered market sets the tone: this is a neighborhood gourmet bistro that the tourist trail has yet to find, which suits the regulars just fine. The kitchen runs on seasonal Mediterranean produce, and the short menu changes with what's good rather than what's safe. Service is warm and personal in the way only a small operation can pull off.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The baba ganoush here has a smokiness that makes you wonder if other versions were ever trying. This is a Lebanese restaurant tucked near the Palais des Expositions, the kind of place that rewards coming in a group so the table fills with mezze and the sharing menu makes sense. The tabbouleh is bright and herb-heavy, the pistachio and almond pastries arrive with mint tea, and the whole thing moves at a civilized pace.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A small bistro just off Place Garibaldi, run by two people who clearly did their homework before opening it. The chef came up through serious kitchens, and the short menu leans on whatever fresh ingredients made the trip to market that day. The wine list covers every French region without making a fuss about it. Lunch is the move, when a set menu keeps things tidy and the room feels most like itself.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The room is all dark stone tones and brooding shadows, which makes the food's bright, citrusy energy feel like a deliberate provocation. This small fusion restaurant from the team behind Les Agitateurs sends Mediterranean produce through an Asian lens, think pho-scented broths, grilled duck with spring onion jus, and Thai salads that actually wake you up. The wine list leans organic, with a soft spot for volcanic terroirs and a smart sake selection alongside.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Blue and white tiles line a small bistro steps from the opera house, where fish and seafood arrive as tapas-style plates, the menu mixing Mediterranean and South American ideas: ceviche, tataki, cod fritters. The name means "fish" in Portuguese, which settles the question of what you're getting. No reservations, service runs noon to midnight, and the terrace fills fast enough to suggest you shouldn't arrive expecting a leisurely hunt for a table.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The sixth floor gives you Nice from both sides, city behind you and sea ahead, which is a view that makes it hard to focus on the menu. This hotel restaurant in Maison Albar - Le Victoria leans into Southern French cooking, with local produce and confident, deeply reduced sauces. The team presents dishes tableside, so there's a gentle theatre to the whole thing that stops just short of fussy.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A Neapolitan-style pizza spot near the Nice waterfront, where a local artist's work lines the walls and the indoor room pulls well ahead of the sidewalk tables. The dough is light and easy, the toppings chosen with actual conviction, and the appetizers hold their own before the main event. Named among 50 Top Pizza Europe's Excellent Pizzerias, it draws a neighborhood crowd that knows not to skip dessert.

1. 50 Top Pizza 50 Top Pizza Europe Excellent Pizzerias