Barcelona’s Paradiso Tops The 50 Best Bars In The World List — See All The Winners

Sure, when you travel internationally, you can always ask a hotel concierge or a cab driver for suggestions about the best local bars to visit. Frankly, however, those suggestions rely on personal opinion so they can be hit or miss.

There is, however, a better approach to finding the best bars to visit while you travel internationally — or when you visit New York, Miami, or Chicago for that matter. That’s because rather than relying on hearsay, you can instead lean on the expertise of bartenders, drinks writers, and cocktail specialists from around the world.

Indeed, that knowledge is used by William Reed — the group behind The World’s 50 Best Restaurants — to create the 2022 edition of The World’s 50 Best Bars. The list is compiled by tabulating votes from The World’s 50 Best Bars Academy, made up of more than 650 drink experts with 50/50 gender parity, including bartenders, consultants, drink writers, and cocktail specialists from 28 geographic regions around the world.

So, let’s jump right to it. Here are The World’s 50 Best Bars:

1. Paradiso

Barcelona

Paradiso, which was also named The Best Bar in Europe 2022, is located behind an antique refrigerator in the back of a pastrami shop in Barcelona’s trendy El Born district.

“Paradiso offers a truly masterful take on the speakeasy, combining technique, precision, and creativity with an unwavering sense of fun,” The World’s 50 Best Bars explains. “In stark contrast to the understated exterior, the majestic front bar welcomes guests into a strikingly playful space, complete with dramatic glass light fittings and Gaudi-inspired, curved-wood ceiling.”

What To Drink

If you plan to visit Paradiso, be sure to try the Supercool Martini, which uses a “supercooled” gin mix “to build an iceberg in the glass.” There are also 15 new cocktails inspired by the Evolution of Humankind, such as the Fleming, which is inspired by Alexander Fleming’s discovery of penicillin.

2. Tayēr + Elementary

London

When Tayēr + Elementary was opened in 2019 by Monica Berg and Alex Kratena, “it felt like a glimpse into the future,” The World’s 50 Best Bars explains. “Every element of the cocktail bar had been reimagined, from the design to the approach to service and drinks making. It’s a venue of two distinct parts.”

On the one hand, Elementary, with its industrial style, “is the everyday bar you pop into for a quick drink, with a long communal table and seasonal cocktails served from taps,” The World’s 50 Best Bars continues. Meanwhile, Tayēr has “more of a forensic, culinary approach, with lesser-known ingredients wrought by high-tech equipment to deliver new flavor experiences.”

What To Drink

If you’ll be visiting Tayēr, be sure to try its self-labeled wine and beer, as well as the signature One Sip Martini.

3. Sips

Barcelona

“With an island bar center stage, Sips is every bit the modern bar concept — here the bartenders and their creations are the show,” according to The World’s 50 Best Bars. “And with two of the most box-office drinksmiths in the cocktail world holding court, Simone Caporale and Marc Alvarez, it’s quite the spectacle.”

What To Drink

Be sure to try the Daiquri Heliodora. Grapefruit shaved ice produced by a vintage Mexican hand-turned machine forms the drink’s base before sherry, rum, and lime are added.

4. Licorería Limantour

Mexico City

Licorería Limantour, which has been listed in The World’s 50 Best Bars every year since 2014, was also named the 2022 Best Bar in North America for the second year in a row.

“Licorería Limantour is an institution. It’s the type of bar that gets everything right: Packed every day of the week, with efficient service, on-point drinks, and an intoxicating atmosphere,” The World’s 50 Best Bars notes. “Under the stewardship of Benjamin Padrón and creative maverick José Luis Leon, Limantour and the team have put out a host of crazy menus over the years, with many drinks standing the test of time.”

What To Drink

Be sure to try the Margarita al Pastor when you visit Licorería Limantour.

5. Little Red Door

Paris

“This cozy and cosmopolitan nightspot, entered through a red door in the pleasant Paris district of Marais, has been an almost constant feature of The World’s 50 Best Bars for a decade,” according to The World’s 50 Best Bars. “That longevity isn’t down to classicism, but reinvention. Little Red Door has never stopped probing the conventions around cocktails and the way they are communicated to guests. Its current drinksmiths, Alex Francis and Barney O’Kane, continue to shine the creative torch: their latest menu, Flourish, builds on the bar’s new direction.”

What To Drink

Little Red Door’s farm-to-glass business model stresses the importance of produce, so be sure to try the Carrot. It may have a simple name but it’s made with “flavor wizardry.”

6. Double Chicken Please

New York City

“True to name, at Double Chicken Please, co-founders GN Chan and Faye Chen offer dual concepts in one swanky, archetypal New York City location sporting exposed brick, filaments, and immaculately styled fixtures and fittings,” The World’s 50 Best Bars explains.

What To Drink

In the front room, decorated in a tribute to the Lower East Side neighborhood’s soda shops of the past, be sure to try the #1 made with tequila, white cranberry, lavender, cacao, and amaro.

In the back room, where liquid drinks represent solid foods, be sure to try the Mango Sticky Rice, made with mango rum, sticky rice pu’erh tea wakame, and cold brew coconut.

7. Two Schmucks

Barcelona

“The five-star dive bar that is Two Schmucks lives up to its moniker and more. In Barcelona’s historic El Raval, all scruffy and characterful, the bar fits right in, with punk vibes and irreverent charm seeping out of every pore,” The World’s 50 Best Bars explains. “The deliberate disorder stops short of the hospitality, which finds a fine balance between relaxed and attentive service, while the drinks elevate the experience with an ingredient-led cocktail menu.”

What To Drink

Although the bar is known for numerous new cocktails that take a culinary approach, old crowd-pleasers such as the Clean Cut Mojito are still popular.

8. Connaught Bar

London

“Elegance in bar form, Connaught Bar is now in its 15th year and has set the standard for London hotel bars. It’s the marriage between classicism and modernity, traditionalism, and invention, pulled off with such poise by Agostino Perrone, Giorgio Bargiani, Maura Milia, and their team,” The World’s 50 Best Bars notes. “The current menu, Impressions, explores the encounters that shape experience, and like the bar itself, it knows exactly when to look to the future and when to draw on history.”

What To Drink

If you plan to visit Connaught Bar, be sure to try the Cloud Nine, made with bourbon, orange vermouth, pistachio, raspberry, and foaming bitters. Look down into the cocktail and you’ll see it resembles swirling clouds.

9. Katana Kitten

New York City

“Katana Kitten’s ‘director of deliciousness’ Masahiro Urushido is an icon,” The World’s 50 Best Bars explains. “Guests are greeted warmly as they descend from the New York City streets into his underground, Japanese dive bar. Inside, guests are instantly immersed in an authentically-’80s party.”

What To Drink

Be sure to try highballs such as the Slowpitch Paloma (made with tequila), the Pocari Sweat, Thai chili, and lime zest. Be sure to also try the signature Hinoki Martini, made with vodka, gin, fino sherry, junmai daiginjo, and hinoki tree essence.

If you’d like a bite to eat, don’t miss out on the Fujimi Crispy Chicken Sando, made with soy-garlic and sake marinade, scallions, sour cucumber, spicy mayo, and milk bread.

10. Alquímico

Cartagena, Columbia

Alquímico, which was also named The Best Bar in South America 2022, is not just a bar.

“Alquímico is located in a stunning, once decrepit mansion building,” The World’s 50 Best Bars explains. “The ground floor is the heart of the operation, a high-energy spot with loud music, mucho dancing, and a great, progressive cocktail list showcasing the country’s biological diversity and flavor potential. One floor above, international classics are given a Colombian twist. And if fresh air is what you need, there’s a great rooftop bar too, with yet another unique drinks list.”

Interestingly, Alquímico is also a farm about 550 miles south in Colombia’s coffee region. The farm, which co-owner Jean Trinh purchased in 2019, provides Trinh and the team with most of the produce used “to make the idiosyncratic house ingredients that go into the cocktails.”

40 More Of The Best Bars In The World

Here are the remaining bars that make up the 2022 edition of The World’s 50 Best Bars:

Now that you’re thinking about interesting and unique places to enjoy a drink, be sure to also read:

• 8 Incredible Rooftop Bars To Experience Around The World
• The World’s 9 Best Champagne Bars To Enjoy A Sip
• 10 Paris Rooftop Bars And Restaurants With Fantastic Views