dublin pubs: the best bars in dublin
Welcome to the Drink in the Sights Guide to the best pubs in Dublin.
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When it comes to cities with famous and glorious pubs Dublin stands head and shoulders above the rest. According to Google there's 751 pubs in Dublin and I hope one day to see them all, but for now I'm somewhere around the 100 mark across several visits. You'll find every type of bar your heart could desire in Dublin, and nearly all of them have their own claim to fame. One thing I'm going to try to avoid is talking about how great the hospitality is in these pubs. Because it's Dublin, everyone is friendly, everyone is approachable, and all the staff are great, so there's not much point repeating it for every bar. When I started writing this piece it was going to be the 10 best pubs in Dublin, but I couldn't bring myself to leave out so many great ones so it quickly became the top 20 and then finally we come to this, the Drink in the Sights Guide to the 30 best bars in Dublin.
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The Best Pubs in Dublin
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Temple Bar
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I know a lot of people refuse to talk about The Temple Bar when they do a best pubs in Dublin guide, they think it's a tourist trap, that it's too commercial, that it's overpriced, and so on. To those people I say get over it. The truth is that The Temple Bar is mega famous for a reason, and that reason is that it's spectacular. Honestly how many bars can you walk into on a Monday afternoon and struggle to find a seat? And honestly what's the chances that everyone there is wrong? So yea I make no excuses for starting this guide to the best bars in Dublin with the most obvious one, as frankly anything else would just be snobbery.
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The Temple Bar has been at the centre of the Dublin beer and whisky scene since 1840, and while this website is really about travel and beer I do have to point out that The Temple Bar has the biggest Whisky collection in Ireland, and I imagine there's some pretty big collections here. Among its other claims to fame is that the longest guitar performance ever was here. It went on for 114 hours 6 minutes and 30 seconds. That's nearly 5 solid days. This probably explains why you'll find live music in Temple Bar pretty much from the minute it opens to the minute it pours its last pint of Guinness.
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As for the pub itself, well it's pretty huge, and pretty wondrous. You'll find a large outdoor area featuring masks of the river gods, there's also wonderfully tiled floors, bare brick walls, wooden bars, enough staff to cater for the thirsty hordes, and even statues of Irish greats like James Joyce. Sure if you want a nice quiet room to sit in and contemplate your existence The Temple Bar may not be the place for you, but if you just want to have a damn good time, with great music, I don't think there's many better places than this. In fact the only place I can honestly think of with a comparable atmosphere is Szimpla Kert in Budapest, but even that's relatively quiet compared to this during the day. Despite what the spoil sports may tell you The Temple Bar is one of the best bars in Dublin.
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The Brazen Head
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The Brazen Head really is a staple of every best pubs in Dublin guide partly because it's probably the oldest pub in Dublin, and partly because it genuinely is one of the best bars in Dublin. Lets deal with the age first. This pub was in founded 1198, so it's way over 800 years old, and it's looking pretty good for it's age. I think I've only been to two older pubs Ye Olde Trip To Jerusalem in Nottingham and the Bingley Arms in Leeds which is believed to be the oldest in the world having had its 1000th birthday a few years ago. Anyway leaving history to one side The Brazen Head would be a truly magnificent pub even if it was only built yesterday. The history is just a nice bonus.
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The bars interior is that of a truly classic Irish pub. There's the wooden floorboards, the open fire, and the red leather sofas that just make the bar area feel like a really nice living room. The walls are covered in pub and beer memorabilia, it's just a great place to relax, but I prefer the outside. For a start the walls look like they belong on a castle, not a pub, and the suit of armour that greets you only adds to the affect. The little alcoves you can sit in are wonderful, and there's something about a signpost pointing the way to cities like Belfast, Stockholm and Moscow that I appreciate. I guess it's the traveller in me. Truly this is one of the great Dublin pubs.
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The Porterhouse Central and Temple Bar
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OK I know it's a cheat to do two pubs in one, but really you can't ask me to choose between the Porterhouse pubs they're both great, and so is the one in Covent Garden to be fair. But what makes the Porterhouse bars so good? I hear you ask. Well it's the beer. These guys really know how to brew. Honestly their Plain Porter is spectacular and if you somehow manage to get bored of that just move on to the Oyster Stout it's also a brilliant beer. In a city so dominated by Guinness and the occasional O'Hara's or Smithwick's it's great to be able to mix it up a bit while still drinking something brewed in the great city. Oh and if you get bored of the stuff on tap they have a small selection of around 200 bottles available for you to choose from.
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It's not just the beer that makes Porterhouse pubs some of the best in Dublin though, they really are the whole package. Both Dublin pubs are pretty big and absolutely beautiful. There's luscious wooden bars and floors, comfy sofas, huge burgers, and everything is beer themed. There's beer bottles everywhere, along with beer memorabilia, famous quotes about beer and so on. Honestly next time you're in Dublin, or London for that matter, make sure you get to at least one Porterhouse.
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Against The
Grain, Brew Dock, Beer Market, and The Black Sheep |
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OK if you didn't like me clustering both the Porterhouse bars together you really aren't going to like this, but it's the last time I'm going to do it I promise. I figure I can get away with it because they are all Galway Bay Brewery pubs, and they all follow basically the same guidelines. They all have about the best beer selections in Dublin with 20 beers on tap, mostly from the excellent Galway Bay Brewery, I recommend the Nitro Milk Stout. They also all have an array of cans and bottles, blue walls, wooden floorboards, cool posters, artwork and outside seating areas.
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None of this is a difficult formula to follow but all four Galway Bay bars in Dublin get it absolutely spot on partly because they seem to only hire staff who know their beer. I'm not going to pretend these are the most spectacular or ornate pubs in Dublin but for a pure beer drinking experience all of the Galway Bay Brewery bars deserve their place among any list of the best pubs in Dublin.
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The Hairy Lemon
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You really can't miss the bright yellow Hairy Lemon as you walk around Dublin. While the outside is certainly eye catching the interior is wonderfully quirky. There's an odd mixture of really nice memorabilia and downright tat covering every space on the walls, and in some cases the ceilings. You'll find bicycles, figurines, beer barrels and models of all shapes and sizes scattered all over the bar, and I really like it. There's something fun and playful about the Hairy Lemon which contrasts well with all the bars that take themselves really seriously in the Temple Bar area.
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It's also a huge bar with bare brick walls (I really love bare brick walls), leather seats, an impressive outdoor terrace and fun little bits of artwork dotted around everywhere. The bar is also famous for having some of the 1991 film 'The Commitments' filmed here so there's been some proper modern ish history made at the Hair Lemon. To be honest though that's a bit of a side show for me. What really matters is that this is a genuinely wonderful quirky bar with great staff and a decent selection of beer on tap. What more could you ask for?
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J W Sweetmans
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Everyone loves a proper brewpub right? Well you're going to love J W Sweetmans. Not only is this one of the most beautiful pubs you'll ever set foot in it also brews its own selection of 8 beers all of which are wonderful. Inevitably as a dark beer lover I'm going to recommend the stout and the porter but the wheat beer and the blonde are also excellent. These guys have been brewing here since the start of the 19th century and the almost completely wood and stained glass covered pub almost makes it feel like you're drinking in a church devoted to nothing more than the creation of great beers.
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The craftsmanship in this place really is spectacular which is why the first time I came to Dublin I pretty much instantly made J W Sweetmans my local. Well actually it was this and a great rock bar called Lannigans which is just across the river Liffey from here. Sadly while J W Sweetmans seems to have gone from strength to strength Lannigans is now a hollow shell of its former self and doesn't even make this list. Anyway the real point here is that if you want to have a great beer in a great building you really don't have to look much further than J W Sweetman's. Still one of the best bars in Dublin.
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The Celt
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I don't think there's a more Irish pub anywhere in the world than The Celt. From the bright green exterior to the Ireland forever flag, and from the Jameson bottle candlestick holders to the Irish music playing in the background everything is just as Irish as it gets. I honestly think this is the only bar in Dublin that I heard Lord of the Dance. In all honesty my initial thought was that this was all just too stereotypically Irish to be anything other than a façade but after a few minutes listening to the accents in the pub it became clear that this excellent Dublin pub wasn't just for tourists.
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While I love that The Celt is so wonderfully Irish I also love the eclectic nature of the place. There's pictures, flags and posters on every wall, there's stuff hanging from the ceilings, and statues and plants dotted around everywhere. You'll also love the covered outdoor area, the wooden bar and floorboards, and the tankards hanging over the bar. This really is one of the best bars in Dublin. 'So dance now whoever you may be I am the lord of the dance said he, and I'll lead you all wherever you may be, I'll lead you all in the dance said he.'
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The Palace Bar
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I could easily describe a lot of bars in Dublin as palace like, but The Palace Bar really kicks it up to another level. This is one of the proper old Victorian Dublin pubs steeped in history and full of wonders for you to discover. In amongst the leather sofas, wooden panels and lovely bar area you'll find the kind of glorious artwork that wouldn't be out of place in one of the top galleries in Europe. All of this pales into insignificance though when you look up and see the incredible stained glass roof. I've been in Baroque churches that look less opulent than this. If you want to feel like you're having a drink somewhere truly opulent The Palace is one of the best pubs in Dublin.
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Toners
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If I was giving out awards for the best beer gardens in Dublin Toners would be right up there. Sure the inside is nice, in that it's like most Dublin bars, old, beautiful, historic and covered in wood, plus a scene from the cult film A Fist Full of Dynamite was filmed here, but really go outside. The beer garden looks for all the world like you're inside a wonderful Dublin pub, but you get to see the sun. There's Toners memorabilia everywhere, TV's showing sport, leather seats plus artwork, empty beer bottles and all the rest. If there's one thing I like more than been in a pub, it's been in a pub beer garden that looks exactly like a pubs interior on a sunny day. History, great pub trappings and magnificent outdoor space, how could Toners not been on a list of the best pubs in Dublin?
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Mary's Bar and
Hardware Store |
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As you may have gathered I love the proper traditional Dublin bars but I also like the ones that offer something just a little bit different, and Mary's certainly offers something different. I didn't enquire as to if it was actually possible to buy the hardware on show in this shop come bar, but I hope you can as I can see nothing better than a store where you can pick up a drill, some Dulux paint and a pint of the black stuff all in one place. B&Q really could learn something from Mary's. The place is just absolutely, eclectically and uniquely beautiful. It really is like walking in to an antique hardware store with a bar and a Wow Burger downstairs. For anyone who likes to have a bit of quirkiness with their pint look no further.
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Church Bar
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I always go to a few cathedrals and churches on my travels, not because I'm particularly religious but just because they are wonderful pieces of architecture, so imagine my delight when I found Church Bar. This is a stunning pub with a bar right in the centre, which is exactly where a good bar should be. You'll find all the usual Irish beers here but you get to sip them while looking around a spectacular old church. Most the old fittings are still there, including the organ and stained glass windows so it really does still feel like a church. I should add that the balcony level, the cellar level, and even the toilets are all absolutely immaculately done. It's like drinking in a bar, inside a palace inside a church. So if you fancy a bit of a change Church Bar may well be one of the best pubs in Dublin for you.
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Darkey Kelly's
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It's only on Drink in the Sights we'd move seamlessly from talking about a bar that used to be a church to a pub that used to be a brothel. That's right folks Darkey Kelly's is named after the brothel owner, alleged serial killer, alleged witch, and alleged ghost that still haunts the pub today. I was initially concerned that the pubs name was a little, how shall we put it, massively racist, however apparently Darkey Kelly's real name was Dorcas and she was white, so we're probably ok aren't we? I mean no-one wants to be called Dorcas do they?
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Anyway Darkey Kelly's is another one of those proper old Dublin pubs, and this ones owned by Rye Brewing Company so you'll be able to tuck in to one of their excellent pints while you're here. I know I bang on a lot about wooden bars, leather sofas and so on, and this has them all as well as the perfect central bar area, but I think we can all agree all of these things make for a seriously good looking pub. I really enjoy visiting Darkey Kelly's and now that I think we've established the name isn't racist we can treat it as one of the best pubs in Dublin.
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Doheny and Nesbitt's
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Hey guess what. It's another glorious old wood covered bar in Dublin!! And it's huge. Honestly from the outside Doherty and Nesbitt looks like a relatively small pub but it actually has seven impressive bar areas inside all of which are breathtakingly gorgeous. And I know I said at the start I wouldn't comment on the hospitality in Dublin bars because it's great everywhere but I felt this place really took it up a notch, which is probably why the pub is so popular with both locals and tourists. Really you just have to look at the pictures I've helpfully added to get a feel for the place, it's just great and because it has seven separate bar areas it still feels snug and homely despite its size.
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Best Bars in Dublin
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Sinnotts
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If I was going to pick a Dublin bar to watch some football in it'd probably be Sinnotts. It's just one large room with a beautiful wooden bar in the middle, a wood beam ceiling and wonderfully tiled floors. At the far end there's a big screen for the sports fans and I can assure you you'll never find a more beautiful place to watch a game. Well maybe Goodison Park but I'm a bit biased about that. Honestly though Sinnott's is one of the best bars in Dublin.
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The Long Hall
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Remember when I said there's quite a few bars in Dublin that look like they could be palaces? Well this is exactly what I mean. There's a long wooden bar between the red ceiling covered in chandeliers and the comfy carpeted floor which only adds to the palace living room feel. The Long Hall backs onto Dublin Castle and really it wouldn't be an unfitting room in there.
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The Norseman
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You can't miss this bright turquoise bar as you wonder through the old streets of Dublin. Fortunately it's not just eye catching from the outside, this 17th century pub is up there with the Hairy Lemon and second only to The Temple Bar when it comes to a great lively atmosphere in a proper old setting. You'll love the artwork on the walls, the stunning stained glass windows and all the usual gorgeous wooden features. This really stands out as one of the best pubs in Dublin.
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The Old Storehouse
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The Old Storehouse is another quint essentially Irish Victorian pub featuring wood beam ceilings and wooden floorboards with bare brick walls and the usual array of Guinness related merchandise. What I really like about this one though is that A it really used to be a storehouse so the name works and B there's quite a lot of random barrels, bottles and general fun stuff around that just makes it stand out a little bit. Like with a lot of the best pubs in Dublin don't be fooled by the relatively small exterior this is a pretty big place that's well worth visiting.
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Bruxelles
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Bruxelles is an outstandingly beautiful old Dublin bar with a bit of an international rock theme without the heavy rock music. The main bar area is covered in flags from around the globe which as a traveller I love, but I actually prefer the bar in the basement, it's just got a bit more of a classic rock pub feel to it. The whole place is lively and covered in music posters through the ages, so any music lover is going to want to spend some time in Bruxelles.
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The Stags Head
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Apparently the Stags Head won Traditional Irish Pub of the year 2019 so you don't need me to tell you how traditional it is. What I would say is that it's exceptionally good looking, and exceptionally woody. I'd also say if you get creeped out by mounted stags heads this place may not be for you. For me though it's one of the best pubs in Dublin. It's historic, it's covered in mirrors, stained glass and whatever isn't made of glass is made of wood. I also like that it keeps to the stags head theme rather than just having the name, even if I do feel a little sorry for the stags, but maybe they died of natural causes.
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Badbobs
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I'd describe Badbobs as a little like a Hard Rock Cafe bar only not tacky and rubbish. It's actually really cool. There's a bit of rock vibe going on with all the instruments and skulls around the place, but it still maintains all the best aesthetics of a properly nice Irish pub. Badbobs is also another huge venue spanning 5 floors each with their own slightly different decor, and as you know I do like a pub you can exploring in.
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Bar Rua
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Do you think they called this place Bar Rua because if you say it fast enough it sounds like brewer? Just a thought. This is a Bru Brewery pub which gives you a good excuse to get off the Guinness band wagon and try something new, their Red Ale is pretty good to be fair. Bar Rua manages to maintain the proper Irish pub feel in a modern building, and with substantially more lighting than a lot of the pubs on this list. What's not to like? Is the obvious question. It's a bar that nods politely at the traditional Irish bars but does a little bit of its own thing and I like that. Bar Rua really is one of the best bars in Dublin.
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Bowes
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Bowes is very much this guide going back to what Dublin pubs do best, 19th century masterpieces covered in wood, mirrors and stained glass with comfy red sofas. It really is amazing that so many Dublin bars have the same basic ingredients but all manage to pull off something slightly different. Bowes is an excellent example of the old classic and proof that the old phrase still works... if it's not broke don't fix it.
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Brannigan's
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I love Brannigan's. It's got all the wonderful looks of a 19th century Irish pub plus a whole host of medieval looking weaponry, and lets be honest any pub, or any room for that matter can be upgraded with medieval weaponry. This really is another all Irish Dublin pub that stands out because of the medieval twist. I don't really know how the old currency stuck to the back of the bar fits in with anything else, but you know what it does. Beyond any doubt Brannigan's is one of the best bars in Dublin.
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Ha-Penny Bridge Inn
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Not too surprisingly the Ha-Penny Bridge Inn is at the end of Ha'Penny Bridge. It's another relatively small Dublin pub with exceptionally nice staff/owner, comfy sofas and loads of beer stickers and bank notes from around the world on the ceiling above the bar. This is actually the last pub I went to in Dublin for a quiet pint before having to jump on the plane back to England. To be honest I couldn't have picked a much better pub to end my most recent trip in. As with pretty much all of the best pubs in Dublin the Ha'Penny Bridge Inn does live music nights.
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Devitt's
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I know everyone thinks Temple Bar is the area to drink in around Dublin but a lot of the bars on this list are outside that small zone, and several including Devitt's are down Camden Street, which is very much the new Temple Bar area. It's just full of classic Victorian Irish bars but because a lot of tourists tend to stay in Temple Bar they feel a little more local. Devitt's is one of the best examples of traditional Irish pubs you'll find so you know what I'm going say but I'm going to say it anyway... There's good music, great staff, wooden bars, floors and ceiling, yea you know the drill by now. For me this is one of the best examples of the classic though, making it one of the best pubs in Dublin.
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The Auld Dubliner
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The Auld Dubliner in the centre of Temple Bar is a relatively small bar, but a great one. The bare brick walls were always going to win me over, as were the wood beam ceiling, and Jameson beer barrels with the pubs name on. More importantly though despite its size The Dubliner is one of the most lively places in Temple Bar when they have some live music on so make sure you check it out.
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Peadar Kearney's
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Last but by no means least in my list of the 30 best pubs in Dublin we have Peadar Kearney's. I don't think I could finish this guide with anything other than a typically Irish, properly old, wood covered bar with great staff. One thing that does really stand out here is the gorgeous domed light feature above the bar, just look at it, it's great. Peadar Kearney's certainly deserves its place on this and any list of the top pubs in Dublin.
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Right that really is it, all done, may the lord have mercy on your liver. I think the main take away from this guide should be that you can't go wrong in Dublin. Pretty much every pub you walk in will be gorgeous, the staff will be full of craic, and you'll have a great time. Thanks for reading my guide to the Best Bars in Dublin I hope you get chance to visit them all someday. Dance now wherever you may be...
