Forget South Beach—Sweet Liberty is known as one of the best bars in Miami. Period. This flashy cocktail bar whips up amazing cocktails alongside a menu of fresh seafood and delicious bar food. Happy hour (95-cent East Coast oysters, $5 beers, $7 wines and $9 sangria and select cocktails) is every day from 4 to 8pm.
We’re not knocking the bachelor parties and girls’-night-out groups from Wisconsin that tend to crowd into overpriced SoBe bars with the single goal of guzzling aquarium-sized cocktails after a day of roasting on Miami’s famous beaches. People flock to South Beach, Miami’s most touristic ‘hood, often for this very reason. We’re just not going to suggest that you repeat their mistakes.
Look, we fancy a frozen daiquiri churned from a washing machine vat behind the bar as much as the next person. But we’re here to assure you that South Beach has legendary dive bars, excellent cocktail dens and plenty of unexpected hidden gems, too. No guide to Miami Beach would be complete without a survey of the area’s most worthy watering holes. So without further delay, here are our top picks for the best bars in South Beach.
RECOMMENDED: Full guide to South Beach, Miami