Editorial
The Six Nations is the best six weeks in rugby, and the best bars to watch it understand that. We're talking about venues where the atmosphere starts building before the warm-up, where the crowd knows the difference between a scrum and a lineout, and where the sound system gets turned up at the right moments. We've covered London, Edinburgh, Dublin, Cardiff, and the transatlantic outposts in New York where the Six Nations following is just as serious.
London has more Six Nations bars than anywhere outside the competing nations themselves. The challenge is finding ones where the crowd is genuinely invested rather than just present. These are the London pubs that earn their reputation every February and March.
The transatlantic rugby community is larger than most people expect. New York has a genuine club rugby scene and a significant Irish, English, Welsh, and Scottish expat population that treats Six Nations weekends as a semi-religious obligation. These are the American bars where the tournament is taken seriously.
If you're planning a Six Nations trip to one of the host cities, these are the bars that complement the stadium experience. Whether you're watching from the ground or following on screen, the atmosphere in Dublin and Edinburgh during home fixtures is worth planning a trip around.
The best Six Nations bars have one thing in common: they treat rugby with the same seriousness as their most committed regulars. That means proper early opening times, screens you can actually see from every seat, and a crowd that comes for the rugby rather than the social occasion. Book ahead for any England, Ireland, or France fixture — those are the ones that fill up first. Scotland and Wales matches are quieter to get into and often produce better atmospheres because the crowds that do show up are the genuinely committed ones.
Sofia grew up watching Six Nations matches in a south London pub with her Welsh father and has been tracking the best rugby bars across Europe ever since. She has opinions about the difference between a rugby pub and a pub that shows rugby, and she will share them unprompted.