Any night · 3 stops · all walkable
Roma Norte, award row
Three bars that have all placed on the World's 50 Best in the last two years, none of them more than a seven-minute walk apart.
If you only have one night
Top picks
Speakeasy$$$$
Handshake SpeakeasyRanked No. 1 on the World's 50 Best Bars in two of the last three years, and still the hardest reservation in the country.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
Licorería LimantourThe bar that put modern Mexican cocktail culture on the map in 2011, and it's still turning out inventive, ingredient-driven drinks.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
Bar MauroItalian aperitivo filtered through a Mexican lens, and the buzziest bar in Latin America right now.Walk-ins only
Cocktail bar$$$
TlecānA standing-room shrine to agave spirits beyond mezcal, pouring bacanora and raicilla you won't find poured by the glass anywhere else nearby.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
Baltra BarA Darwin-themed room the size of a living room, and proof Condesa doesn't need a hidden door to be worth the trip.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$$
TicuchiChef Enrique Olvera's sculptural stone mezcal bar, built around corn and agave rather than classic cocktails.Book ahead
Bars in an order that works
Ready-made nights
Any night · 3 stops · book the first stop ahead
Juárez after dark
The two speakeasies that put this neighbourhood on the map, then a Sonoran cantina nightcap with a pool table.
- Handshake Speakeasy Juárez
The World's 50 Best No. 1. Reserve weeks out if you can.
About 5 minutes on foot.
Any night · 3 stops
Condesa and Hipódromo, slow and low
A Darwin-themed living room, a jazz lounge, and a listening bar built for a slow night, all within Condesa's quieter half.
Thursday to Saturday works best · 3 stops
Roma Norte, after hours
A sculptural stone bar, a Wes Anderson-styled speakeasy with live music, and a dive-leaning cocktail bar for last call.
By neighbourhood
Every bar
Roma Norte
The city's cocktail engine room, from the bar that started the modern movement to a run of mezcal dens and listening bars within a few blocks of each other.
13
Craft cocktails$$$
Licorería LimantourA pioneering cocktail den in the heart of Roma Norte since 2011, with a livelier bar scene downstairs and a calmer lounge upstairs. The bar's own site says it welcomes both adventurous and classic tastes, and the menu rotates seasonally around Mexican culture, art and street flavors.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
Bar MauroA 1970s-Milan-styled aperitivo den built as a tribute to the owners' grandfather, Don Mauro — black-and-white Italian prints on the walls, shelves lined with hard-to-find amari and vermouths, and a bio that reads simply 'Aperitivos día y noche.' It runs walk-ins only, no reservations.Walk-ins only
Craft cocktails$$$
BrujasAn all-female-led cocktail bar set inside the Casa de las Brujas, a building said to have once housed a healer, with a dim, witchy, wood-and-taxidermy interior built around Mexican herbalism. Drinks are mixed from botanicals prepared in the bar's own lab, and the current menu reimagines ten historical women through ten cocktails. It plays as theatrical and intimate rather than loud — more ritual than rager.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$$
TlecānA tiny, dimly lit bar built like a gallery tribute to pre-Hispanic Mexico, centered on a carved stone disc depicting Mictlantecuhtli. It's standing-room only with a handful of stools, so the room runs close and social rather than quiet.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
RayoSet on the upper floor of a Porfirian-era Roma Norte mansion behind an unmarked, easy-to-miss entrance, reached by a vintage elevator. The room is built around the Aztec legend of Mayahuel, the agave goddess, with a neon lightning-bolt (rayo) sign and a numbered cocktail menu where each drink carries its own cultural backstory.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
Gin GinA plant-filled, well-lit gin sanctuary where bartenders work in button-down Oxford shirts against a pinstriped, British-kitsch backdrop. Time Out calls it more a 'pharmacy than a bar,' built entirely around juniper and gin-and-tonic riffs. The crowd mixes hipsters and yuppies who treat it as a pre-game stop as much as a destination.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$
Ladina BarA dive bar with its edges sanded down on the ground floor of Hostal 333 — dark, low-lit, and running on a nostalgic '90s rock soundtrack, with bartenders Michael Howes and Giovanni Bulnes pouring classic-leaning drinks with real respect for the base spirit.Book ahead
Lounge$$$
Salón RosettaA small cocktail lounge on the second floor above chef Elena Reygadas' flagship restaurant Rosetta, built as a quieter extension of the kitchen's own sensibility rather than a separate nightlife concept.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$
Café de NadieA music-first bar named for a historic Mexico City café that once served as headquarters for the Stridentist avant-garde movement, with walls lined in vinyl and a cocktail menu where several drinks nod directly to specific songs.Walk-ins only
Lounge$$$
Salón PalomillaA dark, mysterious second-floor lounge inside an old Roma casona, sharing its Yucatán 84 address with the taquería Páramo, with an open circular skylight that frames the night sky directly over the room.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$$
La Vista BarA sound-focused listening bar hidden from the street, with dim lighting, concrete surfaces, and a pair of wooden speakers handcrafted in Berlin anchoring a room built specifically around how the music sounds.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$$
Antesala BarA low-pressure date bar built around a sculptural stone bar and soft lighting, quiet enough for conversation and set up around one of the better sound systems in the city, with a grill upstairs sending down bar snacks.Book ahead
Speakeasy$$$$
Club El DesconocidoAn early-20th-century Roma mansion turned theatrical bar, with a red velvet staircase leading between a first-floor 'Sonido' salon of velour booths and purple carpet — one reviewer's shorthand was a Wes Anderson set — and a darker, esoteric library upstairs.Book ahead
Juárez
Hidden doors and quiet courtyards a few streets off Paseo de la Reforma, home to the hardest reservation in the country and the speakeasy that set the template for it.
5
Speakeasy$$$$
Handshake SpeakeasyA discreet door in Colonia Juárez marked only by the number 13, run by a team (Eric van Beek, Marquitos Di Battista, Joseph Kuri, Rodrigo Urraca) that has pushed this room to the very top of the global bar rankings. Inside it's low-lit, precise, and built entirely around the drinks rather than spectacle.Book ahead
Speakeasy$$$$
Hanky PankyEntered through what looks like an ordinary working taco stand, with a host who only leads you through once your reservation is confirmed. Walter Meyenberg started it as a private bar for his own friends before it slowly opened up, and that clubby, in-on-the-secret feeling has stuck.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$$$
Fifty MilsThe polished cocktail lounge of the Four Seasons Mexico City on Reforma, built for a dressed-up evening rather than a dive into a hidden door. The program leans into Mexican spirits and has run seasonal mixology-and-gastronomy collaborations like the hotel's Cubo series.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$$$
RuidoA design-forward room built around a vinyl listening station and, oddly, a giant robot sculpture, pulling in a fashion-aware, well-connected crowd. It's polished enough to work as a date spot but still reads as a hangout rather than a formal lounge.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$
CananeaA border-town-inspired cantina on a quiet Juárez street, built on the site of a former hotel restaurant, with dim red light, a pool table, and a jukebox you can feed your own song picks. It leans into Sonoran mining-town nostalgia rather than Mexico City cantina tradition.Walk-ins only
Condesa
Tree-lined streets around Parque México, best known here for a Darwin-themed bar that doesn't try too hard.
1Hipódromo
Condesa's quieter, curving half, where a jazz lounge and a listening bar sit two doors apart.
4
Speakeasy$$$
Bijou Drinkery RoomA genuinely hidden bar reached through a secret entrance inside a culinary school, Bijou builds its stained-glass, Piet Mondrian-inspired room around the three 'jewels' of the 1880s Bijou cocktail: gin, vermouth, and chartreuse.Book ahead
Lounge$$
Felina BarFelina feels less like a bar than a friend's well-furnished apartment: low lighting, vintage armchairs and couches, art-deco-leaning wallpaper, and a soundtrack built on soul, boogaloo and jazz rather than club music.Book ahead
Cocktail bar$$$
ShhhShhh sits above the 99 Records vinyl shop as a dedicated listening room: a high-end hi-fi rig, nightly curated album sets played start to finish, and a house rule to keep your voice down so the music stays the point.Book ahead
Speakeasy$$$
OloloSet upstairs from the pre-Hispanic-leaning restaurant NIICH, Ololo (Mayan for 'gathering') plays Prohibition-era mystery against a single-tone orange, mid-century-modern room designed by Llave Maestra, with guest DJs spinning disco, funk and electronic sets late into the night.Book ahead
Polanco
Galleries and boutiques around Parque Lincoln, with a stone-walled mezcal bar from one of the country's best-known chefs and a room hidden under a glass roof.
2
Cocktail bar$$$
TicuchiA dark, cave-like room built around an open street-side kitchen centered on a clay comal, this is chef Enrique Olvera's agave-and-mixology offshoot of Pujol. Stone surfaces and low light give the room a ceremonial, almost subterranean feel suited to slow sipping of rare mezcal.Book ahead
Craft cocktails$$$
Franz 145An intimate, hard-to-get-into Polanco cocktail den built around a large tree that grows up through the bar's glass roof, with a big terrazzo bar anchoring the room. It leans classic and polished rather than experimental, better suited to a couple than a crowd.Book ahead
Centro Histórico
Colonial-era blocks around the Zócalo, where a single unmarked mezcal bar on Luis Moya keeps locals coming back after the tour groups leave.
1Paseo de la Reforma
The city's grand boulevard, best known here for a hotel terrace looking down at the Diana fountain.
1Coyoacán
Cobblestone streets south of the centre, in Frida Kahlo's old neighbourhood, with a cantina that has a famous co-owner.
1Good to know
Questions
What is the best cocktail bar in Mexico City?
Handshake Speakeasy in Juárez has ranked No. 1 on the World's 50 Best Bars list twice in the last three years. For something that started the whole movement, Licorería Limantour in Roma Norte has been on that same list every year since 2013. Bar Mauro, also in Roma Norte, is the newest to break into the world's top 10 and is arguably the hardest table in the city to walk into without a wait.
Where are the speakeasies in Mexico City?
Handshake Speakeasy and Hanky Panky, both in Juárez, are the two that started the city's hidden-door scene. Club El Desconocido and Ololo keep it going in Roma Norte and Hipódromo, and Bijou Drinkery Room hides inside a larger restaurant in Hipódromo. None of them have a sign out front, so look for the door that looks like it shouldn't be one.
Do I need reservations for Mexico City cocktail bars?
Handshake Speakeasy, Licorería Limantour and Fifty Mils book up, so reserve ahead online. Bar Mauro and Tlecān are walk-in only and don't take phone or app reservations at all, so go right at opening or expect a line by 9pm. Most of Roma Norte's smaller bars fall somewhere in between: walk-ins welcome, but a wait is normal on weekends.
What's the best mezcal bar in Mexico City?
Tlecān in Roma Norte goes beyond mezcal into bacanora, pox, raicilla and sotol from small producers. Ticuchi in Polanco, from chef Enrique Olvera, builds its menu around corn and agave in a sculptural stone room. El Bósforo in the Centro Histórico is the old guard: a dim, unmarked room with more than fifty small-batch Oaxacan mezcals and none of the polish of the newer bars.
What neighbourhood should I base myself in for the best bars?
Roma Norte has the single highest concentration: Limantour, Bar Mauro, Tlecān, Rayo and half a dozen more are all within a 10-minute walk of each other. Juárez, just east along Paseo de la Reforma, is the second cluster and has the city's two best-known speakeasies. Condesa and Hipódromo are quieter and a short cab from both.
Every bar here was checked against its own site or listing in November 2026. Bars change hours and menus often, so check before a big night.