Everyone has an opinion on the best pub in Dublin, and everyone is a little bit right. A good Dublin pub isn’t about the fanciest fit-out or the biggest beer list — it’s the pour, the welcome, the hum of a room that knows how to hold a conversation.
We’ve left out the Temple Bar tourist traps and the places trading purely on a famous name. What’s left is ten pubs where the pint is right, the atmosphere is real, and you’d happily lose an afternoon.
Ranked for the whole experience — the Guinness, the crowd, the craic — not just the beard-stroking beer selection.
The Bridewell
The complete Dublin pub: a properly poured pint of stout, snugs worn smooth by a century of elbows, and a trad session most nights that locals actually turn up for.
No screens, no gimmicks, just the best version of the real thing.
28 Queen Street, D07 · Standout the near-perfect pint of Guinness
Nolan’s
The kind of pub where the barman starts your pint when you walk in. Nolan’s is unhurried, unbothered and exactly what you want on a wet Tuesday — a fire, a paper, a slow pint.
Stoneybatter has trendier options; this is the one the locals keep for themselves.
17 Prussia Street, D07 · Standout the fire and the peace and quiet
Molloy’s
If you want music, come here. Molloy’s runs the best informal trad sessions on the southside — no cover, no set list, just fiddles appearing as the night goes on.
Get there before nine to get a seat within earshot.
66 Meath Street, D08 · Standout Thursday-night sessions
The Barley Mow
When the sun makes its rare appearance, all of Portobello spills onto the canal bank outside here. Inside it’s a proper old boozer; outside it’s the best pint-with-a-view in the city.
Grab a spot by the lock on a long evening and you won’t want to leave.
2 Lennox Street, D08 · Standout canal-side pints in summer
The Cobbler
The best beer list in the city centre without any of the smugness that usually comes with it. A dozen rotating taps heavy on Irish independents, and staff who’ll happily talk you through them.
For anyone bored of the same three lagers, this is the antidote.
40 Aungier Street, D02 · Standout the rotating Irish craft taps
The Sextant
On a Dublin match day, this Drumcondra institution on the walk to Croke Park is electric. The rest of the week it’s a warm, chatty local with a serious toasted-sandwich game.
Blue-and-navy heaven in September; a proper neighbourhood pub the rest of the year.
112 Drumcondra Road Lower, D09 · Standout the buzz before a Croker game
The Wren
A pub that happens to make excellent cocktails, rather than a cocktail bar pretending to be a pub. The result is the best of both — a proper pint if you want it, a faultless Martini if you don’t.
Camden Street’s most grown-up room without ever being stuffy.
31 Camden Street Lower, D02 · Standout the house Martini
The Wolfe Tone
Gloriously unreconstructed. Formica, a telly with the racing on, and a toasted special that has kept the northside going for decades. A pint here costs what a pint should.
The antidote to anywhere with an Edison bulb.
5 Wolfe Tone Street, D01 · Standout the cheese-and-onion toastie
Dockline
Come Friday at six, half the tech companies in the docklands empty out into here. It’s big, buzzy and better than it needs to be, with a decent yard for the summer.
Not the place for a quiet one — very much the place for a lively one.
4 Hanover Quay, D02 · Standout the Friday after-work buzz
The Hare’s Corner
The all-rounder every neighbourhood deserves: good pints, a proper fire, quiz on a Tuesday and enough room to always find a seat. Nothing about it is trying too hard, and that’s the charm.
The Rathmines local that does everything right.
190 Rathmines Road Lower, D06 · Standout Tuesday-night table quiz
Frequently asked questions
Where can I hear traditional Irish music in Dublin?
Molloy’s in the Liberties and The Bridewell in Smithfield both run genuine, locals-first trad sessions with no cover charge. Arrive early for a seat.
Which Dublin pub pours the best pint of Guinness?
It’s a religious argument, but The Bridewell and Nolan’s are our two picks for a textbook pour, poured with patience the way it should be.
Are these tourist pubs?
Deliberately not. We’ve steered around the Temple Bar circuit in favour of pubs where Dubliners actually drink — see also our things to do in Dublin guide for the daytime version of the city.