No bar has done more to convert the world to agave than Coa, and none outside Mexico is more decorated. On a sloping lane in Central, Hong Kong, a forty-seat room named after the machete-like tool used to harvest agave has become the most influential drinks venue in Asia, the first bar ever to top Asia's 50 Best Bars three years in a row. It is the work of Jay Khan, a self-taught Hong Kong bartender whose obsession with mezcal turned into a global argument that these spirits belong at the very top table. Coa is our highest-ranked mezcal destination outside Mexico, and the clearest proof that great agave drinking has gone worldwide.
The name is a small statement of intent. A coa, pronounced co-ah, is the semicircular blade a jimador uses to strip an agave's leaves and cut its heart at harvest. Khan carried a real one back from Oaxaca and mounted it in the wall. Everything about the room points back to the plant and the people who grow it.
The place
Coa sits at Shop A, on the lower ground floor of Wah Shin House, at 6 to 10 Shin Hing Street in Central. It is a cosy, intimate 40-seater with reclaimed industrial touches, wood, brick and concrete, dimly lit by candles, with hand-drawn murals on the walls, including one of Mayahuel, the Aztec goddess of agave. The World's 50 Best says the setting transports guests to the streets of Oaxaca, and that is the intention. It has earned what the same guide calls a loyal following and serpentine queues around the block, because Coa does not take reservations. It is walk-in only; you sign up in person at the bar to join a virtual queue, and the wait is part of the ritual. It generally opens in the evening from Tuesday to Sunday and closes on Mondays, running later on Fridays and Saturdays.
Jay Khan, the agave activist
Coa is inseparable from its founder. Jay Khan was born and raised in Hong Kong, of Pakistani heritage, the eldest of five, brought up by his mother and grandmother. He is entirely self-taught, having started behind a Hong Kong karaoke bar in the mid-2000s and learned the craft from cocktail books. A stint in Melbourne, a return home, and a place on the opening team of Lily & Bloom, one of the city's first craft cocktail bars, followed. It was there that he first tasted mezcal, and the encounter changed his career.
He describes that first taste in almost evangelical terms: it was mind-blowing, he told the World's 50 Best, with so much complexity, savoury, earthy and a tiny bit sweet all at the same time. What drew him to the artisanal producers was that their only focus was simply making a beautiful spirit, and that for mezcal it is all about culture and tradition. He made his first research trip to Mexico in the mid-2010s, spending weeks studying production, and has returned roughly every year since. After brand and management roles gave him the time to plan, he opened Coa in 2017. His own summary of the acclaim that followed is worth remembering: what looks like overnight success, he has said, was fifteen years in the making.
Khan is often called an agave activist, and the label fits. Beyond the bar he co-founded Mezcal Mission, a charity workshop series aimed at agave education. His guiding idea at Coa is that the bar should educate and explain, but that it has to be fun at the same time. That balance, seriousness worn lightly, is the whole personality of the place.
The list and the drinks
Coa runs a 41-page menu organised by agave species, holding more than two hundred bottles, widely reported as the largest such collection in Hong Kong. Beyond tequila and mezcal it stretches into the rarer corners of the family, raicilla, bacanora, sotol and charanda. Rather than the ubiquitous flight menus you find elsewhere, Coa deliberately does something different: it pours smaller measures of each spirit so guests can explore by themselves, or embark with a bartender as a guide on a journey through Mexican flavours. It is, in other words, a build-your-own tasting rather than a fixed set, which suits a collection this deep.
The cocktails rotate, with a new one built around seasonal ingredients most weeks, so any given drink may not be there when you visit. A few are worth knowing. The Paloma de Oaxaca, made with tequila blanco, mezcal joven, lime, grapefruit soda and worm salt, is the signature, and the only cocktail that has been on the list since the bar opened. The Ancho Highball pairs tequila blanco with salted plum, ancho chile and guava soda. Others, like a Bloody Beef Maria built on beef stock, come and go. Coa is a place to drink agave neat and to drink it mixed, and to let the bartenders show you how far the category reaches.
The awards
Coa's record is extraordinary, and worth stating precisely. On Asia's 50 Best Bars it became the first bar ever to take the number one position three years running, in 2021, 2022 and 2023. On the World's 50 Best Bars it debuted at number 49 in 2019, leapt to number 8 in 2020, and peaked at number 7 in 2021, the year it was also named the best bar in Asia on the global list. It has remained a fixture since, placing 38th on the most recent 2025 ranking. The World's 50 Best described it in 2023 as the most awarded venue in the history of the list and the most influential drinks venue in Asia of recent times, one that in less than six years turned largely misunderstood spirits such as tequila and mezcal into must-haves for discerning drinkers across the whole continent. Accepting that third consecutive Asian number one, Khan told the room that if you have a dream, you should go for it, because dreams do come true.
A short course in agave spirits
Because Coa pours across the whole family, it is the perfect place to learn the distinctions. Agave spirits are distilled from the cooked hearts of the agave. Tequila uses a single species, blue Weber agave, is generally oven or steam cooked rather than pit-roasted, and tends to be clean rather than smoky. Mezcal is the umbrella category made from many agave species and traditionally roasted in earthen pits, which is where its signature smoke comes from. Then come the cousins: sotol, made from a desert plant that is not technically an agave at all; bacanora, a mezcal-style spirit from Sonora made from Agave angustifolia; and raicilla, from Jalisco and Nayarit, which has its own Denomination of Origin and is legally not mezcal despite loose everyday use of the word.
Each has its own protected region, tequila in Jalisco and a few neighbouring states, mezcal across a group of states led by Oaxaca, sotol in the northern deserts, bacanora in Sonora, raicilla in western Mexico. The common agave species run from espadín, the workhorse behind most mezcal, to wild tobalá and the slow-growing tepextate. And the coa itself, the bar's namesake, is the jimador's harvesting blade, the first tool in the long chain that ends in your glass. To sit at Coa and taste a tequila, a mezcal and a sotol side by side is to understand in one sitting what most drinkers never quite grasp: that this is a whole world, not a single spirit.
How to visit
A few practical notes. Coa does not take reservations, so plan to queue; sign up in person at the bar to join the virtual list and be prepared for a wait on busy nights, especially weekends. Go with an open mind rather than a fixed order, because the real value here is the guided exploration; tell a bartender what you like and let them pour you a progression across the collection. Expect signature cocktails around the mid-range for Hong Kong, with a service charge on top, and remember the cocktail list rotates, so chase the spirit rather than a specific drink. Above all, treat it as a tasting bar rather than a party bar; the collection rewards curiosity and conversation with the team.
Why Coa matters beyond Hong Kong
It is easy to read Coa's list of awards and miss the bigger point, which is what those awards represent. When Coa opened in 2017, tequila and mezcal were still widely treated across Asia as party spirits, the stuff of shots and slammers rather than serious sipping. In less than six years, as the World's 50 Best noted, Coa changed that perception across an entire continent, turning misunderstood spirits into must-haves for discerning drinkers. That is a rare thing for a single bar to accomplish. It did not just climb a ranking; it shifted a culture, and it did so from Hong Kong rather than from Mexico or the traditional Western cocktail capitals.
The influence has spread through the people Coa has trained and inspired as much as through the accolades. Bars across Asia now carry deeper agave lists and take mezcal seriously in a way that simply was not the case a decade ago, and Coa is a large part of the reason. Jay Khan's parallel projects, including the Mezcal Mission education workshops and a second Coa in Shanghai, have extended that reach further. When we call Coa the most influential drinks venue in Asia, we are borrowing the World's 50 Best's own phrase, and it is not hyperbole.
How Coa compares to the Mexican temples
It is worth being clear about what Coa is and is not, especially alongside the Oaxaca and Mexico City bars at the top of our ranking. The mezcalerias of Oaxaca are rooted in place; they pour spirits made a short drive away, often by people the owners know personally, and their authority comes from proximity to the source. Coa's authority is different. It comes from the breadth of its collection, the rigour of Khan's sourcing trips, and the skill with which the bar translates a distant tradition for a global audience. It is the finest ambassador agave has outside its homeland, rather than a piece of that homeland itself.
That distinction is exactly why Coa sits at number five, the highest non-Mexican bar on our list but still below the Mexican temples. No bar outside Mexico can offer the direct, rooted connection to producers and villages that Bósforo or In Situ do. But no bar in Mexico has done more to carry mezcal to the wider world than Coa has. Both things are true, and together they explain the placement.
Frequently asked questions
Where is Coa? At Shop A, on the lower ground floor of Wah Shin House, 6 to 10 Shin Hing Street, in Central, Hong Kong. The street sits on the Central and Sheung Wan border, but Coa and the 50 Best both place it in Central.
Can I book a table? No. Coa is walk-in only and does not take reservations; you sign up in person at the bar to join a virtual queue. Expect a wait on busy nights, particularly at weekends, and treat the queue as part of the experience.
What makes Coa special? It holds one of the largest agave collections in Asia, more than two hundred bottles across tequila, mezcal, raicilla, bacanora and sotol, and it is the most awarded venue in the history of the World's 50 Best Bars, having topped Asia's 50 Best three years running.
What should I order? Rather than a fixed flight, ask a bartender to guide you across the collection by the glass, tasting agave spirits side by side. If you want a cocktail, the Paloma de Oaxaca is the signature and has been on the menu since day one.
Is Coa only for experts? Not at all. The whole philosophy is to educate while keeping it fun, so beginners are welcome and the staff are practised at pitching the experience to your level.
Is there more than one Coa? Yes. Jay Khan opened a second Coa in Shanghai in 2022, extending the concept beyond Hong Kong, though the original Central bar remains the flagship and the more decorated of the two.
When is it open? Generally evenings from Tuesday to Sunday, closed Mondays, with later hours on Friday and Saturday. Confirm current times before visiting.
The verdict
Coa is the bar that made the rest of the world take agave as seriously as Mexico always has. It has the awards, the collection and the missionary zeal, but what makes it special is that it wears all of that lightly, turning a deep education into a genuinely fun night out. No bar outside Mexico has done more for mezcal, and few anywhere match the combination of depth and warmth on offer here. It is the definitive agave destination beyond the heartland, and a worthy number five on our list of the best mezcal bars in the world.