A bucket list for bars is a different kind of list. It is not a ranking of the technically best bars in the world, though several of these qualify. It is a list of the 20 experiences that a serious drinker should have at least once to understand the full range of what bars can offer. Some of them are famous. Several are not.
We asked our editors across 12 countries to contribute one mandatory entry each. The instruction was the same for everyone: not your favourite bar, but the bar that every person who cares about this subject needs to visit. The results span basements in Tokyo, rooftops in Singapore, century-old pubs in Dublin, and purpose-built cocktail theatres in Chicago. What they share is an ability to show you something you cannot see anywhere else.
None of this requires you to spend a fortune, though some of these venues are expensive. What it requires is genuine curiosity and a willingness to let the bartender lead. Our weekly newsletter covers new additions to lists like this as they emerge worldwide.
The Americas
Death and Company
The bar that changed the American cocktail conversation from a basement on East 6th Street. Seasonal menus, extraordinary spirits depth, and service that makes you feel like the regulars arrived 20 years ago. If you only go to one cocktail bar in New York, this is the one. Then go to at least seven more. See our full guide to the best cocktail bars in New York for context on why this one still leads.
The Aviary
Grant Achatz's cocktail laboratory takes the theatrical excesses of molecular gastronomy and makes them serve genuine flavour. Custom glassware, preparations that happen at the table, a menu that reads like a science fiction story. It should not work. It does. Chicago's West Loop is worth a trip on its own; The Aviary is the reason to stay a second night. Explore more at Chicago's cocktail bar scene.
Cure
New Orleans invented the cocktail, and Cure is the bar that reclaimed that inheritance for the modern era. Set in a converted firehouse, the programme is Louisiana-centric: local spirits, seasonal produce, and a philosophy that connects drinks to place in a way that most bars talk about but few achieve. After your visit here, explore the New Orleans cocktail bar guide to understand the broader ecosystem this bar helped create.
Raised by Wolves
Hidden inside a department store in a city that the bar world routinely overlooks, Raised by Wolves is one of the most technically accomplished cocktail programmes in the US. The botanical spirits library is 600 bottles deep and the menu changes every few weeks. San Diego's bar scene sits in the shadow of LA and New York, which is exactly why the bartenders here are among the most motivated in the country.
"A great bar creates a world with rules you do not fully understand until you have been there three times. Then you realise you have been a regular since the first visit."
Europe
The Connaught Bar
Repeatedly named the world's best bar and still earning it. The martini trolley, the Edwardian room, the level of service: all of it operates at a standard that most bars globally cannot approach. You do not have to order a martini, but you should. The London cocktail scene is the most competitive in Europe; The Connaught remains its most reliable standard-bearer.
Multnomah Whiskey Library
Over 1,500 whiskey expressions available in a room that looks like the private library of someone who spent their fortune very wisely. Oregon's distillery scene has matured to the point where domestic bottles on this list stand against any Scotch or bourbon from anywhere in the world. This is the bar that converted our craft beer editor to whiskey on a Thursday night, and we have not let him forget it. Browse the Portland hidden gem bars for more off-radar venues.
Little Red Door
The most conceptually ambitious cocktail programme in Europe, rebuilt from scratch every year around a new sensory or philosophical theme. Recent menus have been built around memory, texture, and the science of perception. The room on Rue Charlot is intimate and unhurried. If you visit Paris and care about cocktails, this is mandatory. Paris's bar scene overall has transformed dramatically in the past decade; the Paris cocktail bar guide shows you how far it has come.
Prater Garten
Germany's oldest beer garden and one of the great democratic institutions in European drinking culture. On summer evenings, 600 people sit under chestnut trees in a venue that has operated continuously since 1837. No cocktail theatre, no curated playlist, no reservations required. Just biergarten tradition executed without modification or apology, which makes it as interesting to the serious bar enthusiast as any cocktail programme in the city.
Delirium Café
Over 3,000 beers available in a labyrinthine bar complex in the centre of Brussels. The Guinness World Record for largest beer selection is held here and updated whenever a new contender appears. Belgium makes the most sophisticated beer in the world, and this is where you go to understand the full scope of that. It is not a quiet evening; it is an education. See our Brussels craft beer guide for the wider picture.
The Long Hall
Built in 1881 and preserved almost perfectly since. The Victorian interior, the genuine pint of Guinness, and the absence of any irony whatsoever. Dublin has a talent for bars that perform no identity. They are simply themselves, and they have been for 140 years. Visit this before the cocktail bars of Temple Bar. It will recalibrate what you think a bar needs in order to be exceptional. The Dublin hidden gems guide lists 11 more venues in this tradition.
Asia and Middle East
Bar Benfiddich
Hiroyasu Kayama farms his own botanicals and creates spirits from scratch that exist nowhere else on earth. The bar seats 12. You watch the entire preparation in silence. It is the closest thing to a spiritual experience that a bar has produced in the modern era. Reserve two months ahead and treat the reservation like a flight ticket. The Tokyo cocktail bar scene is extraordinary; this is its pinnacle.
Manhattan at Regent Singapore
Asia's finest American whiskey collection, over 200 bottles deep, in a hotel bar that routinely outperforms standalone venues in global rankings. The cocktail programme channels pre-Prohibition classics with modern precision. Singapore's bar scene is now a serious international destination; Manhattan is why serious drinkers add the city to their itinerary first.
Bar High Five
Hidetsugu Ueno's bar on the fifth floor of a Ginza building operates on the principle that the best cocktail is the one the bartender determines you should have. You describe how you feel, what you have been doing, what time of year it is. He makes something that fits. There is no menu. You trust the process entirely. Few experiences in the bar world are more genuinely memorable.
Abstinence
Cape Town's finest cocktail bar occupies a Victorian townhouse in De Waterkant and has built the most interesting non-alcoholic programme in Africa alongside its full menu. South African spirits, local botanicals, and a wine list that reminds you that the Cape Winelands are 30 minutes away. The city is one of the most underrated bar destinations on earth; this is where to start your exploration.
The Rest of the World
Frank's Café and Campari Bar
A rooftop Campari bar on top of a multi-storey car park in Peckham that operates only in summer. At sunset, with the City of London visible across 8 miles of rooftops, a Negroni here becomes one of the finest drinking experiences available in Europe. It is the bar that best demonstrates that the room is not the building; it is the combination of the moment, the company, and the view.
Florería Atlántico
Enter through a flower shop, descend a staircase, and arrive in a bar where the entire cocktail programme is a meditation on Argentine immigration history. Each drink references a different wave of arrivals to the country. The food matches. The atmosphere is unlike anything in the Northern Hemisphere. Buenos Aires is significantly underrated on the global bar circuit; this is the reason it should not be.
Proof and Company, Atlas Bar
The Atlas lobby bar in London gets more press, but its Singapore counterpart at Parkview Square has the better room: a soaring Art Deco interior that seats 200 and feels like a private audience hall. The gin collection is the largest in Asia. Arriving before 7pm and watching the room fill is one of the great bar experiences available in Southeast Asia.
Maybe Sammy
Two-time winner of Asia's best bar and a venue that demolished the assumption that Australia's bar scene was 10 years behind Europe. The Rat Pack-themed room, the technically precise cocktail programme, and the neighbourhood's proximity to Sydney Harbour make this a bar that would rank anywhere in the world. The Sydney cocktail bar scene has overtaken Melbourne to become the more interesting destination.
Swig Bangkok
Bangkok's bar scene is one of the most undervalued in Asia for travellers who look past the Khao San Road tourist strip. Swig operates a rotating menu built around Thai ingredients that most bartenders outside the country have never worked with. Makrut lime, butterfly pea flower, galangal, tamarind: each used in ways that create drinks with no equivalent anywhere else in the world. A visit here followed by street food at midnight is one of our editors' most recommended evenings anywhere in Asia.
Schumann's American Bar
Charles Schumann opened this bar in 1982 and it has operated to the same standard ever since. The drinks are classical, the room is beautiful, and the overall experience proves that a great bar does not require novelty or reinvention. It requires intention, maintained for 40 years. One of the most important bar visits in Europe for understanding that the best drinks programmes are philosophies, not menus. For more bars where the physical space itself is central to the experience, our guide to the best bar interiors in the world catalogues the rooms worth travelling for.
Twenty bars is not enough. Every editor on our team could add five more without hesitation. But this list is a starting point: a framework for understanding the full range of what the bar world has produced. Once you have visited these, you will have strong opinions about what should replace them. That is exactly the point. If views from great heights are a priority, our editors have also compiled the definitive guide to bars with the best views in the world — 12 venues ranked specifically for the quality of their panoramas, from Dubai rooftops to Cape Town cliff edges. Submit your own recommendations through the Submit a Bar page and help us build the next iteration.
