Best-of list · Sports Guide
The best bars to watch the Champions League in London and Barcelona. Our editors cover the venues where the atmosphere matches the football — from.
The short answer
8 ranked rooms follow. How we picked is at the end of this guide.
Watching the Champions League in a bar in London or Barcelona is a fundamentally different experience from watching it anywhere else. Both cities have clubs in the competition, a population that cares about the result, and pubs and bars that have been doing this for long enough to know what game night looks like. We've been to enough Champions League nights across both cities to separate the venues worth going to from the ones that happen to have the game on.
London has four clubs that reach European competition regularly, which means the pub culture around the Champions League is properly developed. These bars open early enough for Tuesday and Wednesday 8pm kick-offs, have the audio managed for the match rather than the DJ, and draw crowds who know the squads on both sides.
How we picked
The Champions League's Tuesday and Wednesday evening schedule gives it a different rhythm from weekend football — these are midweek nights, which means the best venues are the ones that make the commitment feel worth it. In London, the neighbourhood pubs with history tend to outperform the managed event venues; in Barcelona, the Barça nights at local bars are genuinely one of the city's better experiences. Book in advance for knockout rounds. For group stage matches, you can usually walk in. If you need help identifying which bars in your city carry the right channel for Champions League — or for any international competition — our guide to international sports on US TV in bars covers which streaming services carry which competitions and which bar types reliably show them.
Sofia covers European bar scenes with a particular focus on how cities watch football. She has been to Champions League knockout nights in London, Barcelona, Amsterdam, and Munich — and has a clear ranking of which city does it best that she will share with enough provocation.
Last reviewed 2026-03-23 · The editors recheck hours and closures against current local coverage.