Best-of list · City Guides
The 11 best bars in Istanbul across every category: rooftop cocktail dens, Kadıköy live music, Bosphorus views, and the city's best hidden gems.
Istanbul has never been a simple city for drinking. The Ottoman empire imposed prohibition for centuries; the secular republic that followed produced a culture where alcohol and religious observation coexisted in a permanent, uneasy negotiation. That friction produced something unusual: a bar scene that knows exactly what it is and refuses to apologize for it.
The city's 15 million people drink across a geography that spans two continents, three coastlines, and at least eight distinct neighbourhoods worth your attention. The European side runs from grand hotel bars in Beyoglu to hole-in-the-wall meyhanes in Karakoy, with rooftop cocktail bars in Cihangir offering views that feel almost cinematically contrived. The Asian side, anchored by Kadikoy, operates at a different register entirely: younger, louder, cheaper, and in several cases more interesting.
Istanbul's bar scene matured quickly in the 2010s. A generation of Turkish bartenders returned from London, New York, and Tokyo with serious training and serious intentions. They arrived to find a pantry that no other city in the world possessed: Anatolian herbs, mastic resin from Chios, dried figs and pomegranate from the southeast, cold-pressed rose and lemon oils from the Aegean coast. The drinks that followed are genuinely unlike cocktails made anywhere else. Our 11 picks span every category and every budget.
5.Kat has run above Cihangir since the 1990s, a bohemian rooftop and restaurant with red velvet, drag nights and a Bosphorus view that costs nothing extra. It is camp and proud of it. The cocktails are simple and the meze is better than it needs to be. Order a rakı or a gin drink, take a terrace table at sunset, and stay for the crowd.
Full listing & hours →Arpa is a cramped Cihangir corner bar that the neighbourhood's musicians and writers treat as a second living room. Cheap beer, loud talk, vinyl on the deck. Nothing about it is styled, which is the point. Order a draught Efes or a rakı, squeeze in after 10pm when it gets going, and expect to make friends you did not plan on.
Full listing & hours →Karga has anchored Kadıköy's drinking scene since the 1990s, a dark multi-floor townhouse hung with art and full of students and old regulars. No sign, no fuss. Order a cheap beer or a rakı, climb to an upper floor for a quieter seat, and treat it as the start of a long Kadıköy night rather than a single stop.
Full listing & hours →The Anemon Galata's rooftop bar trades almost entirely on its view, a terrace level with the Galata Tower and a sweep over the Golden Horn. The drinks are hotel-priced and unremarkable, so come for the panorama, not the cocktail list. Order a beer or a glass of wine, arrive an hour before sunset for a rail seat, and move on after.
Full listing & hours →Babylon is Istanbul's best-known live music room, now in Bomonti after years in Asmalımescit, programming jazz, world and electronic acts to a serious crowd. The bar is a venue bar, so judge it on the bill, not the pour. Order a beer, check the listings before you commit to a ticket, and treat the music as the reason you came.
Full listing & hours →Bant Mag runs out of an independent magazine's hangout, a scruffy creative café-bar that hosts gigs, screenings and a young arts crowd. It is cheap, friendly and entirely off the tourist map. Order a beer or a filter coffee depending on the hour, come for a listed event, and check the schedule, since the hours follow the programme.
Full listing & hours →Unter sits on a Karaköy backstreet, a concrete-and-glass restaurant and bar that draws a design crowd and runs late at weekends with DJs. The food is good, the cocktails are competent, and the room knows it is handsome. Order a cocktail or a glass of natural wine, come for a late dinner that drifts into drinks, and book ahead on a Saturday.
Full listing & hours →11 Kadıköy works the Caferağa side of Moda with a modern room, a long cocktail list and a kitchen running burgers, steaks and pizza. Happy hour fills weekday afternoons and the bar runs to 2am. Best for a relaxed cocktail on the Asian side.
Full listing & hours →Allen Kitchen and Cocktail sits in a garden off Bağdat Street in Suadiye, a restaurant and bar with around forty signature drinks and refined plates under bioclimatic pergolas. The room leans chic and unhurried. Best for a garden cocktail and dinner on the Asian side.
Full listing & hours →Frankie sits on the eighth floor of the Sofa Hotel in Nisantasi, a Sinatra-themed rooftop bar with Turkish-Mediterranean plates and live music on midweek nights.
Full listing & hours →Beyond the 10
Lelabbo Moda works a vintage-pharmacy fit-out on Moda Caddesi in Kadikoy, where the bartenders build ingredient-driven drinks and talk guests through every one.
Moretenders' Cocktail Crib pairs a low-lit room in Asmalimescit with a sushi menu and ranks among the most awarded cocktail addresses in Istanbul.
Neolokal holds a Michelin star inside the SALT Galata building in Karakoy, where chef Maksut Askar reworks Anatolian recipes and the bar pours only Turkish wine over Golden Horn views.
Zuma Istanbul runs an izakaya kitchen in Ortakoy with an upstairs sake and cocktail bar, a Bosphorus terrace and resident DJs at the weekend.
Sunset Grill and Bar has held its hilltop spot in Ulus Park since 1994, a fine-dining room with Bosphorus views and one of the deepest wine cellars in Turkey.
Arkaoda has shaped Kadıköy since 1999, a café by day and an underground music bar by night, with velvet armchairs, dim light and DJs pulled from Istanbul and abroad. The upper floor runs live shows. It is the room that made Kadife Sokak. Order a beer or a cocktail, go on a club night for the bill, and expect it to fill fast.
Moda Sahnesi is a Kadıköy stage as much as a bar, a performing-arts house where the foyer bar fills before and after shows with a theatre-going crowd. Treat it as a drink wrapped around a performance rather than a night out on its own. Order a beer or a glass of wine, book the show first, and arrive early for a seat at the bar.
Çukur Meyhane is the kind of Beyoğlu backstreet meyhane Istanbul does best, a tight room of rakı, meze and live fasıl on the right night. It is loud, warm and built for a long table. Order rakı with cold meze and grilled fish, come with a group after 9pm, and let the evening run for hours. Book on a weekend.
Mikla sits on top of the Marmara Pera, the rooftop bar attached to one of Istanbul's most respected restaurants, with a 360-degree view over both continents. It is expensive and knows it, so come for the panorama and one well-made drink. Order a signature cocktail, arrive for sunset and the call to prayer across the city, and dress the part.