Near you
The best dive bars near you sit in our city guides for 25 metros, from New York, Chicago and New Orleans to London, Tokyo and Berlin. Each city below names its top dive with a link to the full guide. Our editors rank on cheap cold pours, an unpolished room with character, and a crowd of regulars over tourists.
Last reviewed June 25, 2026 · How we pick bars
Our number one dive on earth. Sunny's runs on folk nights, cheap beer, and a Red Hook crowd that never needed it to change. A cold one and a shot is the whole order.
Chicago's finest dive sits across from Second City, walls hung with local oil paintings and prices stuck a decade back. Order a beer and stay a while.
Specs is a North Beach institution buried in maritime junk and gloriously unbothered by tourists. The house pour and a long story is the move.
Tom Bergin's is an old Irish house with shamrocks on the ceiling and regulars who earned their spot. No reinvention, just a stiff drink and dim light.
A French Quarter survivor with dollar bills on every surface and two centuries of stories. Cheap, loud, and honest. Order whatever is cold.
Soho's most stubborn bar: no phones, no pints, just half measures and a literary crowd that has held the line for decades. A glass of wine and a corner is enough.
The oldest bar in the Raval still pours absinthe by the bottle under peeling paint and chandeliers held together by habit. Order the absinthe, slowly.
A Golden Gai box three storeys tall and barely wide enough for a stool, lit like a film set. Pay the seat charge and squeeze in. That is the order.
A Guadalupe Street mainstay that has put cheap beer and live music in the same room since the seventies. Order a longneck and find the back stage.
Reputed to be Nashville's oldest bar, cash only, beer cheap, and the carpet a crime scene in the best way. Come for the band you have never heard of.
Open since 1929, open all night, and proud of every scuff. Cheap, surly, and exactly what a dive should be. Order a beer and eggs at 3am.
The Sandy Hut has been Portland's favourite no-frills bar for generations, red lights and strong pours included. A cheap cocktail and a booth is the order.
Downtown Boston's last great cheap bar, no pretense and no patience for it either. A cold draft and the game on is the whole point.
Mount Pleasant's oldest bar, cash only, drinks cheap, and the jukebox better than yours. Order a rail and settle in.
An East Colfax classic where the owner hands roses to the women and shots to the regulars. Cheap, warm, and entirely itself. Take the free shot.
South Street's gleeful mess: bumper cars, graffiti walls, cheap pitchers, and zero interest in growing up. Order a pitcher and a basket of fries.
A Corktown rock and roll dive with cheap beer and a stage that has launched more bands than most labels. Order a can and stay for the set.
Phoenix's oldest tiki dive, kitsch piled to the ceiling and drinks priced for the neighbourhood. Order a cheap mai tai and lean into it.
The oldest freestanding bar in Vegas, where the Rat Pack drank and the roof once hosted bomb-test viewings. Off-Strip, cheap, and real. Order a beer.
South Beach's oldest bar, neon and vinyl and a pool table, open until 5am while the clubs pose. Order a cheap drink and watch the city walk in.
A literary Dublin institution where the pint is well kept, the toastie is famous, and the art on the walls is for sale. Order a Guinness and a cheese toastie.
A Latin Quarter cellar with a vintage jukebox and a sangria pitcher that has fuelled student nights for fifty years. Order the sangria and head downstairs.
Nina Hagen's old haunt, now a riot of kitsch and cheap drinks in Friedrichshain. Loud, queer, and proudly tacky. Order whatever the bartender is pushing.
One of the last wooden houses in the city, a sailors' bar since the 1500s where rent was once paid in monkeys. Order a jenever and mind your head.
A speakeasy-era bar in Principe Real, all dark wood, pinball, and decades of regulars. Cheaper than it looks. Order a beer and find the back room.
Our full global ranking of the fifty greatest dives on earth.
Serious cocktail rooms, ranked by what they pour.
Taprooms with real rotation and a clean pour.
The twenty-five bars above are our top-ranked dive in each city, pulled from our global ranking of the fifty best dive bars on earth. They are the anchor picks: the one honest address to hand a friend who wants a cheap drink and no scene tonight. For the rest of each city, follow the link inside each card.
A dive earns its place on price, regulars, age, atmosphere, and a complete lack of self-awareness. The bars here pass all five. We do not count a new bar dressed up to look old.
If a bar here has closed or cleaned up past recognition, tell us. We keep the page honest by correcting it, not by inventing a replacement.
Good questions