The best dive bars in North Beach
The 8 best dive bars in North Beach, hand-picked from barfly.life's North Beach list. Cheap, dark, and gloriously unbothered. These are the SF rooms where the drinks are strong, the décor is an accident, and nobody's checking your shoes. Stiff pours over small talk.
8 spots in North Beach.
Bamboo Hut
Latehuge fruity tropical drinks, a tiki-meets-dive vibe
Maggie McGarry's
North Beach soccer pub (home of the SF Blues / Man City), Guinness and walls of screens
Specs' Twelve Adler Museum Cafe
walls covered in decades of oddities and memorabilia, down a tiny alley
The Saloon
oldest bar in SF (1861), nightly live blues
Gino & Carlo
opened 1942 — North Beach's old-Italian-guys bar par excellence, Beat-era regulars (Ferlinghetti, Saroyan) drank here when it was already old
Red Jack Saloon
large selection of flavored whiskeys, pinball machines and darts
La Rocca's Corner
open since 1922 — Joe DiMaggio's old haunt, frequented by local mobsters in the 40s–50s, $8 Irish Coffee that's a genuine steal
Sweetie's Art Bar
bar, pool hall, and rotating art gallery in one, free pool always
Can't pick from 8? That's what the lever is for.
Spin the slot machine →