12 sports bars, ranked and reviewed by our editors. Champions League, Swiss Super League, and international rugby across Niederdorf, Langstrasse, and the city centre.
Zurich is not primarily a sports bar city, and it does not pretend to be. The drinking culture here skews toward the refined: wine bars, cocktail bars, and the long Swiss tradition of sitting with a single beer for two hours while watching the world from a terrace. But the sports bar scene exists, is better than the city's reputation suggests, and rewards the visitor who knows where to look.
The expat banking community has created reliable demand for Premier League and Champions League coverage, which means the city-centre bars like The James Joyce run consistently strong football schedules. The Swiss football following is more genuine than casual visitors might expect: FC Zurich and Grasshopper Club are institutions, the local derbies matter to real people, and the Helvetia Sports Lounge on a Swiss Super League evening gives access to that world in a way that no tourist route provides.
American sports are well catered for at Old Crow on Langstrasse. NFL Sundays from September through February draw a committed crowd from the US expat community, and the bar runs a ticket system for the most popular games. Expect to pay CHF 7 to CHF 14 for a draught beer in a Zurich sports bar, which is expensive by most standards but in line with the city's general cost of living. After the game, continue your Zurich evening at the best cocktail bars in Zurich, settle into one of the after-work bars for something more relaxed, or take the evening upward to one of Zurich's rooftop bars for a post-match drink with the Alps in the background.
Compare Zurich's sports bar offering with the exceptional atmosphere at Brussels sports bars, where the Belgian football culture runs considerably deeper.
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