Edinburgh, for
still serving late
34 open rooms tagged for it
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Panda & Sons
Destination · Bar · New Town · $$
booking essential
The current menu, Transcend, is sixteen drinks built over five years of freezer work, and its first chapter freezes the water out of a spirit and swaps the ice for another flavor.
ArdfernBib
Solid · Restaurant · Leith · $$
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Roberta Hall-McCarron's second Leith room cooks fourteen hours a day, seven days a week, which almost nothing at Bib Gourmand level does.
SkuaBib!
Solid · Restaurant · Edinburgh · $$
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The only dessert is three pounds, in a room holding a Michelin Bib Gourmand.
Dreadnought Leith
Solid · Cask ale and cider pub · Leith · $
walk-in
Four cask lines, and the branch that surveyed the bar in February 2026 found no regular beer on any of them.
Hey Palu
Solid · Bar · Tollcross · $$
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Alex and Rachel Palumbo opened this Bread Street room in 2019 around amaro and aperitivo, and two of the city's best-known bartenders now send people here when the Old Town gets too loud.
MontroseMichelin
Solid · Restaurant · Abbeyhill · $$$
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Wine by the glass here comes out of a bag-in-box, and the staff decant it into its own small carafe at the table, so a six-pound pour arrives with the ritual normally kept for a bottle.
Jolly Judge
Solid · Pub · Old Town · $
walk-in
CAMRA's Edinburgh branch has voted this its Cider Pub of the Year three years running, in a city that argues about cask.
The Mother Superiorjust added
Solid · Whisky bar · Leith · $$
walk-in
In 2025 this bar was one of four shortlisted for Scotland's Whisky Bar of the Year, and it lost to a pub that has been open since 1897.
Bramble Bar & Lounge
Solid · Bar · Edinburgh · $$
walk-in
Named for Dick Bradsell's cocktail, this basement under a Queen Street dry cleaner was the only Scottish bar on the World's 50 Best Bars list in 2013, at number 32.
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society!
Solid · Whisky bar · New Town · $$$
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Every bottle the Society sells hides its distillery behind a number, a rule set in 1983 when consultant Russell Sharp told founder Pip Hills the distillery names were trademarked and could never go on a label.
The Black Grape
Solid · Small plates · Old Town · $$$
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Three weeks before the doors opened, on a street that sells shortbread by the ton, Gaby Soutar reported the promise: "there will be no haggis bon-bons."
Smith & Gertrude Stockbridge
Solid · Wine bar · Stockbridge · $$
walk-in
The couple who own this bar also own the bakery whose bread comes out on the cheese board.
Nauticus
Solid · Bar · Leith · $$
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Kyle and Iain built the drinks list around Scottish producers and then arranged it by what Leith actually shipped, so tea and spice, gin, sherry and whisky each get a chapter of the menu.
The Abbey
Solid · Pub · Newington · $$
walk-in
The back bar keeps its own single-cask bottlings alongside the standard range, which means there are drams in this Newington pub you cannot pour anywhere else in the world.
Salt Horse Beer Shop & Bar?
Solid · Craft beer · Old Town · $$
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The burger mince is one rare native breed, dry-aged whole for six weeks before anyone butchers it.
Black Ivy?
Listed · Bar · Marchmont · $$$
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The Scottish Bar & Pub Awards named the heated, awning-covered terrace over Bruntsfield Links the best outdoor area in Scotland in 2023, then again in 2024.
Old Pal Bar and Kitchen!
Listed · Cocktail bar · West End · $$
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Named for a cocktail, and it has taken the city's Best Restaurant Bar title in both years it has been open.
The Royal Dick Pubjust added?
Listed · Pub · Southside · $$
walk-in
The gin is piped in from the distillery across the courtyard, and the brewery is directly behind the bar.
The Devil's Advocate!
Listed · Bar · Old Town · $$
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The head of bars at Gleneagles picks this Old Town close for its drinks list, and the kitchen at the same address holds a failing hygiene rating.
The Keller
Listed · Pub · Edinburgh · $$
walk-in
A whole separate menu here runs on smoke, from the vodka to the beer to the martini.
Nightcap!
Listed · Cocktail bar · New Town · $$
walk-in
The door goes members-only at midnight and the room runs on to three.
Guildford Arms!
Listed · Pub · New Town · $$
walk-in
The Stewart family has run this bar since it opened in 1896, and they still put on two ten-day beer festivals a year plus fifteen smaller ones, each pouring four beers from a single brewery at one price.
The Burrowjust added?
Listed · Bar · Edinburgh · $$
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A basement room under a pizza restaurant that holds twenty-five, with a wine list naming the producer, the region and the vintage on every line.
Lost in Leith
Listed · Craft beer bar and barrel-ageing room · Leith · $$
walk-in
Three ten-hectolitre oak foeders stand at the back of the archway, bought new from a cooperage near Cognac because the second-hand ones were the wrong size and came with a waiting list.
Kebab Mahal!
Listed · Kebabs · Southside · $
walk-in
The tandoor on Nicolson Square has been turning out halal Punjabi food since 1979, from a room that sits beside the Central Mosque and about two minutes' walk from Bristo Square.
The Scotch Malt Whisky Society, The Vaults
Listed · Members whisky bar · Leith · $$$
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The Society's founding syndicate paid GBP 50,000 for this old J&G Thomson bonded wine warehouse in 1983, and the door has taken members and their guests ever since.
The Black Cat?
Listed · Whisky and folk-session pub · New Town · $
walk-in
A special bottling of heavily peated Croftengea marked the bar's thirteenth anniversary, and the emptied Pedro Ximenez wood behind it went on to age the owner's own apple spirit.
Mara?
Listed · Wine bar and small plates · Leith · $$
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The crew behind a nearby sports bar wrote this room a wine list that runs to orange and natural.
The Last Word Saloon
Listed · Bar · Edinburgh · $$
walk-in
The whisky list runs past a hundred bottles and the flights are built to order, which is what this room has that its owners' better-known bar does not.
Brass Monkey Leith
Listed · Pub · Leith · $$
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A pint of Cross Borders Heavy off the regular pump, and the bar runs to one in the morning.
Lucky Liquor Co!
Listed · Bar · New Town · $$
walk-in
Thirteen bottles of spirits, thirteen cocktails, and the whole thing torn up and rebuilt every thirteen weeks, in a Queen Street basement with records on and a pool table downstairs.
Pickles
Listed · Bar · New Town · $
walk-in
The basement everyone remembers was 56a Broughton Street, under L'Escargot Bleu; the bar has grown into larger rooms at street level at number 60, and the boards of cured meat, cheese and house pickles made the move with it.
Royal Mile Tavern
Listed · Pub · Old Town · $$
walk-in
Musicians play here every night from 10 until 1, and the pub charges nothing at the door.
Montpeliers!
Listed · Bar · Bruntsfield · $$
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Jules Clark of Montpeliers won the Unsung Hero Award at the 2024 Scottish Bar and Pub Awards, which is an award for a person and not for this room.
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