The best burgers in Los Angeles

This bistro burger/Big Mac hybrid arrives a picture of decadence so large and enticing you don’t even know where to begin. (We recommend starting with a fork and knife; it’s that or like 40 napkins.) This is the high-low of gourmet burgers: Soaking in a rich bordelaise, this thin-pattied beauty features bougie ingredients while also sporting perfect, pedestrian American cheese. Factor in those caramelized onions and garlic aioli and you have one of the city’s absolute finest—and messiest—burgers, bar none, and it's available at both the Hollywood and the Sherman Oaks locations.

This West L.A. institution has somehow managed to escape time. Burger patties sizzle on the griddle that’s been around for decades (since 1947, to be exact) and get served by friendly waiters that seem to have been around for just as long. Everything's aces, but we're partial to the smoky Hickory Burger, which comes slathered in secret house sauce (think: sugary, smoky tomato). Pair with an order of crispy fries served in a paper cone, and save room for a slice of house-made apple pie (á la mode, all the way).

Pie ’n Burger knows that when you’ve got a good thing going, sometimes it’s best not to mess with it. This classic L.A. burger spot’s been serving up that good thing since ’63, offering griddled burgers using the same methods and sourcing—when possible—for more than 50 years. Careful when you lift these stacked burgers to your lips; they practically ooze that house-made thousand island, and the lettuce, tomato and onion are so packed in that they practically spring out. If you're really hungry, opt for the Big Ben: a double patty that's stacked extra high. It’s probably best to grab some extra napkins before digging in. (We’re just lookin’ out.)

Our ideal smashburger comes from this tiny bistro-turned-gourmet-burger-joint in Hollywood and Downtown's Grand Central Market (plus other outposts in Glendale and Whittier). Whether you’re ordering a single, double or a triple, you’ll tear into flattened, perfectly crispy patties of grass-fed beef, plenty of griddled onions and a Thousand Island-esque sauce sandwiched between two halves of a Martin’s potato roll. Pair your burger with the delectable fries if you have room in your budget—For the Win's higher-quality take on a typical fast food meal comes with markedly premium prices.

This is a burger purist’s platonic ideal. Unassuming but beloved by all, E.R.B.’s Single Burger is proof that less is more. Nearly impossible to savor slowly, this burger disappears in seconds, probably due to that perfect balance of salty, juicy medium-rare beef to squishy bun to dairy. No visit to this Arts District bar is complete without ordering at least one for the table, but good luck leaving without ordering another. E.R.B.’s single is simplicity at its finest: a solitary gound-chuck patty made from prime beef that gets covered in stringy, melty Tillamook cheddar. That’s it. That’s the whole shebang. Well, we guess there’s also the dill pickle, a special sauce and an eggy brioche bun, but OK, now that’s it. It’s the simple things in life.

Often imitated but never duplicated, backyard pop-up gone permanent restaurant Burgers Never Say Die can largely be credited with sparking L.A.’s smashburger frenzy. These stacks caused so much commotion that they’ve wrapped three-hour lines around the block and even caused a fan to hire someone to wait in line for them. That success probably has something to do with founder Shawn Nee’s quest for perfection, and it’s paid off. Now, fans line up at this walk-up Silver Lake brick-and-mortar for buttery, paper-thin patties pressed so hard, the crisp edges almost resemble lace. Topped with pickles, raw white onions and a drizzle of ketchup and mustard, the Regular (a double patty) is like the best fast-food burger you’ve ever tried. Supplement with some CVT soft serve and a styrofoam cup brimming with beef-tallow fries and you've got one of the best, most nostalgic meals in L.A.

Inspired by the Big Mec, the off-menu burger at this Michelin-starred Arts District bistro mixes dry-aged beef and duck meat for a juicy, luxurious patty that plays well against sweet caramelized onions, beef tallow remoulade and a duck fat brioche bun. Though pricey, the burger's overall decadence makes for the city's most memorable new handheld dining experiences. The almost over-the-top addition of duck to both patty and bun imparts a slightly gamey flavor to the burger, and each order comes with a pile of fries and a trio of housemade dipping sauces—details that make a $30 for plate of burger and fries feel well worth it.

This buzzy Santa Monica burger dates back to an early pandemic pop-up, when owners Max Miller and Danny Gordon first began selling short rib smashburgers in the driveway of the latter's Mar Vista home. Now, Heavy Handed's smashburgers draw lines of hungry folks most days of the week. Made of high-quality, marbled beef, the Double's lacy-edged crispy patties pair beautifully with the restaurant's signature sauce and a blanket of gooey American cheese. Housemade potato rolls and deep, rich caramelized onions add up to a satisfying gourmet fast food burger, especially with a side of beef tallow fries (no breaks for vegetarians here).

If you can get past Moo's nitpicky house rules (no saving seats while in line, and you can't eat pre-orders on-site), this Lincoln Heights barbecue joint serves one of the most unique, gut-busting burgers in the entire city. Served on a Martin's potato bun, the thick patty made of Moo's famous smoked brisket comes loaded with American cheese and signature aioli, plus dill pickles and razor-thin raw onions to cut through all the fat. The peppery, smoky quality of the meat infuses every bite—and is definitely delicious enough to sway diners away from the rest of the menu.

Come on, how could we not? The not-so-secret menu at In-N-Out is rife with burger combinations, and fans of the burger chain will defend to the death their own go-to order. Here is our call: the Double-Double (Animal Style, obviously), boasting two mustard-griddled all-beef patties with lettuce, tomato, cheese and an extra helping of In-N-Out’s blessed thousand island dressing, along with pickles and grilled onions. Argue with this classic, we dare you.

Pick a burger, any burger; at this old-time West Hollywood roadside stand with a second location along La Brea, every order comes with a side of L.A. history. Revived in 2022, the Route 66 icon’s no-frills burgers still deliver, especially with a side of fries and a spruced up dessert menu that includes milkshakes and birthday cookies. For a less complicated cheeseburger, opt for the Just For You, which comes simply dressed with pickles and housemade sauce on a sesame bun. S

To call this burger iconic almost feels like an understatement. Chef-owner Sang Yoon was one of the first to give L.A. burgers a gourmet spin, and he did it with a now-famous but still-polarizing rule: No substitutions. No matter how much you might love ketchup, just order this burger and do it his way—you’ll be glad you did once you sink your teeth into dry-aged beef topped with caramelized onions more akin to French onion soup than the simply sautéed variety. Of course there’s also arugula and blue cheese, and that garlic-butter-toasted bun. Wash it down with one of this gastropub’s 30-plus beers and call it a night, whether in Santa Monica or Culver City.

A shining, beefy example of L.A.’s smashburger trend, Love Hour slings crisp-edged, pressed-thin patties on potato buns with a handful of topping options “for a good time.” You can find these singles, doubles, triples or more—someone’s even done a 10-patty burger—in Koreatown's old Beer Belly space, which the team has turned into a natural wine and burger bar. Love Hour also offers a range of absolutely killer seasoned fries, tossed to order in flavors like BBQ, garlic-parmesan, and sour cream and onion, making for the ultimate burger-and-fries combo. Recently they've added a take-home kit, too, so you can always have Love Hour on hand for a good time.

This Brain Dead collab burger packs major heat and flavor between two halves of a soft sponge bun emblazoned with the Fairfax streetwear brand’s eye-catching logo. While Burgerlords has recently added meat to the menu again, you can still order the Brainburner completely plant-based with a "beefy" patty being made in-house with barley, shiitake and a couple dozen other ingredients you can both recognize and pronounce. Jalapeño potato chips add texture and a hint of spice, while chopped yellow chili peppers add even more kick to each bite. It’s a burger worth tearing up over—pain or joy, you decide.

With Impossible 2.0 patties and irresistible branding, this vegan chain has taken over L.A. with locations in Koreatown, Echo Park and Culver City, plus another shop out in Riverside. The Impossible patties here combine with Follow Your Heart cheese, housemade Thousand Island-style spread, lettuce, tomato, pickles and grilled onions for the most straightforward and delicious happens-to-be-vegan burger in the city—and we’d be remiss if we didn’t include it here alongside more traditional meat-based picks.

Alvin Cailan returned to Far East Plaza, but this time around, the chef’s Amboy restaurant isn’t serving Filipino food—it’s all about burgers. Reborn as Amboy Quality Meats & Delicious Burgers, Amboy now serves as a combination burger counter and butcher shop—and the shop now has a second Valley outpost within Westfield's Topanga Social. The made-to-order burgers are available in more straightforward varieties such as the classic double, with caramelized onions and American cheese, as well as the higher-end gourmet: If you’re looking for smashburger reprieve, try Amboy’s DH Burger, which stacks a 10-ounce dry-aged–beef patty with provolone, garlic-confit mayo, pickes, and caramelized onions. It’s massive, takes about 20 minutes and swings back toward hearty burger maximalism.

L.A.’s home to a lot of gastropubs, but a gastropub that nails a perfect burger? Now that’s more of a rarity. At neighborhood spot Electric Owl, the smashburger is king. The patty—made from wagyu and dry-aged beef—is a little heftier than the smooshed-thin kin you’ll find cropping up around town, but it’s got a perfect, even char, and comes draped in house-made American cheese. Top it all off with pickles, aioli and griddled shallots, then throw it onto a fluffy bun, and you’ve got yourself one of the city’s most underrated burgers, smashed patty or not. (Note: Electric Owl even offers a healthier variety, made with a blend of Impossible Foods’ “beef” and regular beef—for half the cholesterol.)

You cannot eat the Whipper Burger at Hawkins House of Burgers without a fork and knife. It’s just not possible. And while some behemoth burgers aim more for quantity than quality, the Whipper manages to encompass both. Two well-seasoned, tender patties are topped with a pile of expertly fried pastrami, along with sausage links that delightfully snap when you bite into them. It’s a mess. It’s kind of ridiculous. But it’s worth the half-hour wait and the curious looks that go along with ordering it—and the additional curious looks from fellow diners when it lands on your table.

The burgers at HiHo aren’t groundbreaking in flavor, but they’re practically groundbreaking when it comes to sourcing: The meat is entirely wagyu, grass-fed, non-GMO and non-antibiotic, and the beef comes from cows raised by the certified-humane collective First Light Farms. The result? Tender, perfectly seared beef that almost melts on the tongue and is easy on the conscience, too. You can go either double or triple (sorry, no singles here), and either classic (cheese and ketchup only), or as the mustard-grilled HiHo standard (onion jam, cheese, house-made pickles, ketchup and lettuce). Either way, it goes best with a side of those hand-cut, twice-fried fries.

The lobster rolls rightfully get all the shine here, but don’t overlook the seafood shack’s turf when you’re stopping by for some surf. Rich and deep in flavor thanks to shio kombu—along with that American cheese and caramelized onion—Broad Street Oyster Co.’s beach burger is hearty and worth an order, especially considering the quality of the meat. Niman Ranch provides high-end beef for these patties, which sear on the flat top to a perfect crust before getting sandwiched by brioche buns and all its dressings. Want to spruce it up? You can even add Nueske’s bacon, a fried egg and avocado—or all three, if you really want to go big.

While the full steakhouse in Venice offers farmers-market sides and dimly-lit vibes, American Beauty’s casual walk-up windows next door, along the boardwalk and near Silver Lake's Sunset Triangle offer a sunny—and affordable—taste of the restaurant. It also happens to serve one of the best smashburgers in town, especially for the price: For only $3.95 you can snag a straightforward, wholly satisfying single patty with American cheese, house sauce and grilled onions on a potato bun just a few blocks from Venice Beach. Really hungry? The double will only set you back $6.25.

The Oinkster is chef Andre Guerrero’s playground, and it’s on the Royale where he really lets loose. (But perhaps not as loose as our belts need to be by the time we’re done eating it.) The Oinkster patriarch starts with a 1/3-pound Angus patty and doesn’t stop until it’s stacked with pastrami, bacon, house-made chili, thousand island dressing, lettuce, tomato, onions and pickles. It's a classic L.A. burger, in more ways than one: It nails the simple throwback fast-food ingredients, then adds pastrami, another civic staple. Whew. No napping under the tables, please.

Tommy's has earned cult status in L.A. thanks in part to its famed double chili cheeseburger. Two well-seasoned beef patties, cheese, pickles, a glop of hearty chili and a thick slice of tomato have kept this chain going since its first store opened on Beverly in 1946, and still draw crowds at more than 25 locations in California. Not into chili? They're open early for breakfast burritos and hash browns as well.

Goldburger’s Allen Yelent gives fans the best of both worlds: a still-juicy center but ample crust on the patties, which are always stacked double; the meat is more pressed around the edges than some of the city’s other smashburgers, providing plenty of texture in every bite. The namesake Goldburger comes standard with American cheese, a garlic-mustard aioli, pickles and perfectly charred grilled onions, but everything here is worth a try—especially the L.A. special, which comes topped with pastrami (always add chilies to this one). Yelent’s Highland Park and Los Feliz locations offer some sweets, too: Look out for slices of pie in flavors like chocolate chess and cranberry apple custard.

A Bill’s burger is a thing of beauty, and what's more, it's a time machine. Take a bite and get transported to the mid-’60s, when this classic L.A. burger shack first fired up the flat top. The bacon cheeseburger is exactly that: griddled burger, American cheese, crispy bacon. There’s lettuce and tomato, and you can (and probably should) add grilled onion, but don’t get too crazy; the idea here is simplicity—because by God, Bill makes one hell of a burger. Just remember to bring some bills—Bill’s spot is cash-only.

Alhambra’s metal-themed, meat-slinging burger shop doesn’t serve a single patty that’s not obscenely dressed, and the Napalm Death tops them all. A medium-rare, half-pound patty gets drenched in gooey pepperjack, pickled jalapeños and cream cheese, then it's all topped off with fried jalapeño poppers and habanero aioli. It’s what we’ll dine on when the valkyries carry us over the rainbow bridge to Valhalla (which may be because it kills us as we’re eating it).