Speak

speakeasy Speak Low remains the room that taught the rest of China what a serious cocktail programme could look like, and the three-floor structure — bar shop on the ground floor, the main bar above, a hidden upstairs room beyond that — is now the most-imitated speakeasy template in Asia.

Shingo Gokan's Tokyo-trained discipline is visible everywhere from the ice work to the dilution-tested stirring counts to the obsessive citrus-yield management, but what has kept Speak Low at the top is the team's continuing willingness to integrate baijiu, Chinese herbs and seasonal Shanghai ingredients into the menu rather than coasting on the classics it could safely default to. The technical floor across all three rooms is the city's reference, and the upstairs hidden bar in particular delivers a tasting-paced experience that no other Shanghai room can currently match.

For the full ranking, see our editorial round-up of the 10 best cocktail bars in Shanghai, the broader Shanghai cocktail bars guide, and our category index of cocktail bars worldwide.