Edinburgh is one of the great drinking cities in the world.
That is not a casual claim. Panda and Sons on Queen Street is a cocktail bar hidden behind a barbershop facade and was ranked the second best bar in the UK by the Top 50 Cocktail Bars awards in 2025, and the 34th best bar in the world. The Devil’s Advocate, in a converted pump house below the Royal Mile, serves cocktails in a vaulted Victorian space that draws both locals and visitors for the specific combination of the drinks and the room.
Edinburgh Gin has a distillery bar where you can watch the three stills produce while you sip. And the Victoria Street area is Edinburgh’s most atmospheric drinking street, which partially inspired the Diagon Alley of Harry Potter. This street concentrates more good bars per hundred metres than almost anywhere in Scotland.
Edinburgh’s bar culture spans every register: medieval pub, Victorian whisky bar, world-ranked cocktail room, craft taproom, warm neighbourhood local. This guide covers the best of all of them.
Key Takeaways
- Panda and Sons on Queen Street is the most internationally decorated bar in Edinburgh – second in the UK in 2025 and 34th in the world by the Top 50 Cocktail Bars rankings.
- Edinburgh’s cocktail bar scene is concentrated in the New Town (Queen Street, George Street) and the Old Town (Cowgate, Victoria Street, Grassmarket), with strong neighbourhood bars across Leith, Bruntsfield, and Stockbridge.
- Whisky is the drink that defines Edinburgh – the Angel’s Share, the Scotch Malt Whisky Society, and several Old Town whisky bars provide world-class access to the full range of Scottish single malts.
- The Grassmarket and the Cowgate are the most concentrated evening drinking areas; George Street has the more stylish cocktail bars; Leith has the most local and independent character.
- Most of Edinburgh’s best bars do not require reservations; the more popular cocktail rooms benefit from arriving early in the evening or booking ahead at weekends.
World-Class Cocktail Bars
Panda and Sons
On Queen Street in the New Town, Panda and Sons is the most internationally acclaimed bar in Edinburgh. It’s a cocktail room hidden behind a false barbershop facade, its entrance through a vintage cabinet door that opens into a dimly lit space of serious cocktail craft.
The bar was named second best in the UK by the 2025 Top 50 Cocktail Bars awards and has been ranked among the top forty bars in the world. The cocktail programme uses experimental techniques including freeze-drying and cryo-concentration in drinks that are described by the judges as “first-class, refined and intelligent.”
The entrance ritual means pushing through the cabinet door into the bar. It retains its effect despite the bar’s fame, because the room itself is genuinely extraordinary and the drinks consistently justify the reputation.
Reservations are recommended on weekends.
Credit: DRAM Scotland
Devil’s Advocate
In a converted Victorian pump house below the Royal Mile, the Devil’s Advocate is one of Edinburgh’s most consistently cited bars for the combination of space and drinks.
The vaulted brick interior is dramatic, warm, entirely its own and provides the most atmospherically specific setting of any cocktail bar in Edinburgh. The drinks menu is wide and well-made; the whisky selection is strong; and the kitchen’s Scottish small plates make it one of the better options for an evening that combines drinks with food in a single room.
The location, in the lanes between the Royal Mile and the Canongate, makes it accessible from almost anywhere in the Old Town.
Credit: TopTipEDI
Lucky Liquor Co.
Also on Queen Street, a few doors from Panda and Sons, Lucky Liquor is a neighbourhood cocktail bar of a very different kind. It’s relaxed, with a pool table in the basement – the kind of place where locals come after work and stay for three drinks instead of one.
The house-made liqueurs, aperitifs, and amaros are the distinctive element: Lucky Liquor produces its own spirits, and the resulting cocktails such as the Penumbra with whisky, coffee liqueur, amaro, tonka liqueur, cinnamon, and cardamom, have the specific character of a bar that is making its own ingredients rather than assembling them from a standard back bar.
The vibe is deliberately unpretentious for a bar of this quality. It is one of Edinburgh’s finest locals’ cocktail bars.
Credit: 50Best Discovery
The Last Word Saloon
Near Broughton Street in the New Town, the Last Word Saloon is the cocktail bar most consistently recommended by Edinburgh locals as their personal favourite. It’s a relaxed, welcoming room whose cocktails consistently deliver on ambition.
The signature drink with pear and goat’s cheese influences, a combination that sounds improbable and tastes extraordinary, is the most-cited example of what the bar does differently. Even though the bar is not hidden or particularly obscure, it retains the feel of a discovery: the crowd is predominantly local, the atmosphere unhurried, and the quality consistently high.
Credit: Square Meal
Whisky
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society on Queen Street is the most specific whisky experience available in Edinburgh – a members’ bar that offers single cask bottlings sold exclusively to the Society’s members worldwide, available to non-members as guests.
The Society’s single cask bottlings are bottled at cask strength without colouring or chill filtration and are named with eccentric titles rather than distillery names. It’s a policy that emphasises flavour and personality over brand recognition. The Queen Street bar, in a beautifully preserved Georgian building, is one of the finest whisky environments in Scotland.
Non-members can visit as guests of a member or on specific guest days. This is worth checking the website before visiting.
Credit: Tripadvisor
Angel’s Share
On Hope Street near Princes Street, Angel’s Share is the bar most recommended for visitors new to Scotch whisky – a warm and accessible space with a vast selection organised by region and character, and staff who are genuinely passionate about helping guests navigate it without intimidation.
The name refers to the whisky that evaporates through the cask during maturation or “the angels’ share.” The bar’s atmosphere reflects that kind of generous, knowledgeable relationship with the spirit. The cocktail menu applies whisky to unexpected combinations with genuine skill.
Credit: Tripadvisor
Historic & Atmospheric Pubs
The Canny Man’s
In Morningside, which is Edinburgh’s most genteel residential neighbourhood, south of the city centre, lies The Canny Man’s. And that is the most distinctive pub in Edinburgh.
The interior is so laden with objects, photographs, paintings, instruments, and memorabilia that it is almost impossible to absorb on a first visit. The walls, the ceilings, the shelves, and the bar top are all occupied. The pub has been run by the same family since 1871 and has acquired its character over that period without any coordinated effort. It is simply the accumulation of a century and a half of a particular kind of collecting.
The Canny Man’s is a true Edinburgh institution, completely unlike anywhere else in the city, and entirely worth the fifteen-minute bus journey from the centre.
Credit: DRAM Scotland
The Bow Bar
On Victoria Street resides Edinburgh’s most atmospherically medieval shopping and drinking street called the Bow Bar. It’s the finest traditional Scottish pub in the city for real ale and a straight malt whisky.
No cocktails, no food, no music, no television. A back bar of extraordinary whisky selection. A rotating selection of Scottish and British real ales on handpull. The specific pleasure of a wooden booth and a glass of something excellent in a room that has been providing exactly this since the 1990s.
The Bow Bar is what a serious Edinburgh pub should be, and it is exactly that.
Credit: Tripadvisor
The Oxford Bar
On Young Street in the New Town, the Oxford Bar is a tiny, utterly unpretentious pub that most visitors walk past without noticing and that Ian Rankin made famous as the preferred drinking establishment of his fictional detective Inspector Rebus.
The bar has no kitchen, no decoration worth noting, and no particular claim to the visitor’s attention beyond the fact that it is an entirely genuine, entirely unreconstructed Edinburgh locals’ pub that happens to have an unusual literary association.
It is exactly as good as that description suggests. A pint here is one of Edinburgh’s more specific pleasures.
Credit: Tripadvisor
Neighbourhood & Leith Bars
Nauticus
In Leith, Nauticus is set in a former bank building and celebrates Scottish spirits including locally sourced whisky, gin, and beer, in a maritime-inspired interior that reflects the neighbourhood’s long connection to trade and the sea.
The drinks menu champions Scottish producers throughout; the environment is warm and characterful; and the combination of the Leith setting with a genuinely independent bar ethos makes Nauticus one of the finest examples of what Edinburgh’s bar culture looks like away from the tourist centre.
Winner at the Scottish Bar and Pub Awards – a recognition that reflects what regulars already knew.
Credit: DesignMyNight
Lochrin Bar
In Fountainbridge, Lochrin is a stylish rooftop bar with a heated outdoor terrace, views of the city, and a cocktail menu that includes the One O’Clock Gun Martini named after Edinburgh Castle’s daily cannon, which has fired at one o’clock since 1861.
Winner of Molinari Hotel Bar of the Year at the 2024 Scottish Bar and Pub Awards. The combination of the views, the cocktails, and the live music events that Lochrin hosts regularly makes it one of the most complete evening venues in Edinburgh outside the Old Town.
Credit: Lochrin Rooftop Bar
Black Ivy
Near the Water of Leith in the northside, Black Ivy is one of Edinburgh’s most warmly received neighbourhood cocktail bars. It’s a dog-friendly space with a thoughtful cocktail menu, a welcoming atmosphere, and the specific quality of a bar run by people who genuinely enjoy both making drinks and having customers.
Black Ivy is specifically recommended for visitors who want a cocktail bar that feels local rather than destination-focused. The drinks are consistently well-made, and the welcome is warm.
Credit: SquareMeal
For Beer
Hanging Bat
On Lothian Road, the Hanging Bat is Edinburgh’s most serious craft beer bar. It’s a large, industrial-aesthetic room with an extensive rotating selection of Scottish and international craft beers on tap and in bottle.
The range encompasses IPAs, sours, stouts, and lagers from the Scottish craft brewing scene alongside international highlights, and the staff are knowledgeable about what is on and what pairs well with the food menu of American-influenced pub dishes. The Hanging Bat is the right address for any visitor who wants to understand what Scottish craft beer looks like beyond the big names.
Credit: The Hanging Bat
BrewDog Edinburgh Lothian Road
BrewDog’s Edinburgh Capital bar on Lothian Road provides comprehensive access to Scotland’s most internationally distributed craft brewery alongside a guest tap selection and a kitchen producing food designed to pair with the beers.
For visitors who want craft beer in central Edinburgh without exploring further afield, the Lothian Road BrewDog is the most accessible and most consistently good option.
Credit: Tripadvisor
Edinburgh Gin Distillery Bar
In The Arches on East Market Street, Edinburgh Gin’s distillery bar allows visitors to watch the three copper stills produce gin while drinking cocktails and working through the distillery’s range.
The Seaside gin is one of the distillery’s most distinctive expressions, with coastal botanicals. It is the most-cited discovery for visitors unfamiliar with Edinburgh Gin’s range. The bespoke bottle experience, available for groups, makes it one of Edinburgh’s more unusual evenings.
Credit: The Backpacker
The Grassmarket
The Grassmarket on the historic square below Edinburgh Castle is not a single bar but Edinburgh’s most concentrated drinking area: a street of pubs, bars, and restaurants in one of the most visually dramatic settings in the city, with the castle visible on its rock above.
The Black Bull, the Beehive Inn, and Maggie Dickson’s are the most consistently recommended of the Grassmarket’s pubs for atmosphere and character. The whole square is liveliest in the evening, particularly in summer when outdoor seating fills the square.
Credit: Edinburgh Tourist
Conclusion
The bars in Edinburgh span a range that few cities of its size can match.
A world-ranked cocktail bar hidden behind a barbershop. A Victorian pump house below the Royal Mile. The finest traditional pub for real ale in Scotland. A Morningside institution so laden with objects it takes three visits to see everything. A Leith whisky bar in a former bank.
Edinburgh takes its drinking seriously, and the range of what that seriousness produces is one of the city’s most specific and most enjoyable offerings.
To experience Edinburgh’s extraordinary bars, food scene, and culture as part of a private curated visit, discover our private Edinburgh tours.
