The UK is home to many – countless, really – delightful places to have a drink. From London’s glorious roster of pubs and Manchester’s world-leading bars to the women shaking up Britain’s craft beer scene, whatever your tipple, you’ll find it in Britain.
British drinkeries nearly always feature in rankings of the planet’s best bars (five featured in 50 Best’s latest list), but recently a UK bar went a step further. A website called Top 500 Bars has listed – the clue is in the name – the world’s top 500 places to drink in 2025, and a British establishment was top of the list.
Top 500 Bars apparently reached its conclusion by aggregating data from over 2,000 different sources on the internet, in more than 20 languages. The site says it made the most of ‘the wisdom of crowds’, combining expert opinions with reviews on social media and search engines.
Top of the pile was Panda & Sons in Edinburgh. The bar, which was founded in 2013 by award-winning bartender Iain McPherson, is ‘hidden’ in a Prohibition-style speakeasy on Queen Street. It’s known for its innovation, distilling alcohol on-site and creating a range of cocktails that you’ll genuinely find nowhere else.
Sure, P&S may have topped a ranking that was compiled through cold, hard numbers, but it’s a worthy winner. Any readers who’s familiar with bar and cocktail awards will no doubt already know the place’s prestige: earlier this year Panda & Sons was awarded ‘best cocktail menu’ at the 2025 Spirited Awards and it was the only non-London British bar in 50 Best’s latest global ranking.
Top 500 Bars describes Panda & Sons as ‘intimate and cosy’ with a menu that offers ‘exciting drinks using the latest techniques’. The place is also apparently ‘all about friendly Scottish service’.
The best bars in the UK
Here are the other British bars that featured in Top 500 Bars’ top 50.
- Panda & Sons (1, Edinburgh)
- Tayēr + Elementary (7, London)
- Connaught Bar (12, London)
- Scarfes (21, London)
- Satan’s Whiskers (22, London)
- Lyaness (40, London)
- Spy Bar (48, London)
You can find out more about the Top 500 Bars ranking on Time Out here.
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