Editorial
The best bars with outdoor seating are not the ones with the biggest terrace or the highest rooftop — they are the ones where the outdoor space was designed with the same care as the room inside. A corner of a Barcelona square at 7pm, a heated London courtyard on a cold October evening, a Miami rooftop where the cocktails are cold enough to justify the heat. We have sat in all of them. These are the outdoor spaces worth prioritising.
American cities that take outdoor drinking seriously tend to do it either at altitude or with serious design investment. New York's best outdoor bars are the ones that have solved the city's space problem creatively — rooftops, gardens carved out of impossible gaps, and terraces that feel private despite being twenty feet from the street.
European outdoor bar culture is built on the terrace — the pavement table, the canal-side chair, the square with aperitivo at 6pm and dinner at 9. Barcelona's Sant Antoni neighbourhood, Amsterdam's canal rings, and London's hidden pub gardens are three of the best expressions of this culture in the world.
Three cities with significantly different climates that have each developed outdoor bar culture suited to their conditions — Austin's year-round heat supports genuinely expansive outdoor spaces, Washington DC has invested in exceptional terrace gardens, and Edinburgh has produced outdoor bars that operate defiantly against a climate that does not encourage it.
The quality of an outdoor bar space comes down to three things: the quality of the drinks (which should not decline because you are outside), the design of the space (which should work harder than a few chairs on a pavement), and the attitude of the staff (who should treat the outdoor tables as equal to the indoor ones). Every bar on this list meets all three criteria.
Our practical note: the best outdoor spaces in every city fill quickly on good weather days. Go early, bring a jacket even in summer for the evening temperature drop, and always order from the bar rather than waiting for service — the tables closest to the bar will always get the best attention.
For a broader summer-specific guide — including seasonal terraces, pop-up outdoor spaces, and the best outdoor bars that only operate in warm months — our editors' roundup of the best bars for summer outdoor drinking covers the format across 11 cities in more depth.
Sofia has been reviewing outdoor bar spaces across Europe and the Americas for over a decade. She has a strong view on the minimum heater-to-seat ratio required for a November terrace to qualify as a genuine outdoor bar.