By far one of the most interesting cocktail bars in San Francisco, the Interval is part museum, part cafe, part (best part!) cocktail bar. The menu is extensive, but thoughtful and unique. While you’re picking up, wave hello to prototypes of the 10,000 Year Clock and the floor-to-ceiling library that houses thousands of books.

A true, 87-year-old North Beach classic, where the neighborhood gathers over Fernet and whiskey cocktails. The fading neon sign will guide you inside, where each table has an actual, flickering candle on it. Settle in at the long bar for a beer and a shot or drink a very good old fashioned.

With a prime location on Columbus in North Beach, Red Window and its Spanish-inspired menu of cocktails can bring a little Iberian sunshine to even the foggiest of San Francisco days. There’s a tapas menu to pair with drinks like the Oops I Dropped the Coconut, an almost tropical cocktail served in an actual coconut. Also of note: the entire menu is low-ABV featuring cocktails built on aperitifs like vermouth and sherry instead of stronger spirits. 

China Live, the massive multi-level dining emporium, does have good drinks hidden away in an upstairs room. Cold Drinks is the cocktail bar on the second floor, and it’s a secluded lair, gilded in black and gold. The cocktails rely on whiskey, including an old-fashioned washed in duck fat, and plenty of pebbled ice, young coconut, and fresh pineapple.

Macondray transformed a standard bar into a space washed with green paint, studded with warm metal, and filled with plants. Owners Aaron Paul and Jake Roberts are local industry pros who happen to have grown up in Maine, so in addition to spicy margaritas and other colorful drinks, there’s a serious lobster roll on the menu.

Pac Heights got lucky when a team of industry pros opened this cozy neighborhood bar in 2017. It’s named after the little nooks and crannies in an Irish pub.

House of Shields is a cocktail institution, more than a hundred years old, dating back to 1908. It’s lined with wood panels and brass hardware, including the original floors, chandeliers, and many other details. The cocktails are classic, the bartenders have worked there for years, and it’s a trip back to another era of San Francisco.

Head to this second bar from the Pacific Cocktail Haven team for a globe-trotting menu filled with intriguing ingredients like date molasses and ube-coconut cream. Inspired by street markets from around the world, at this dark cocktail den include a “Boracay old fashioned” with gin, vermouth, coconut water, calamansi, and makrut bitters, and “save me a piece of that corn!” with tequila, falernum, averna, atola de elote, and horchata.

This Outer Richmond Mexican restaurant is an institution for two reasons: the best tequila selection in San Francisco and pitchers of Tommy’s margaritas. Still, as long as you’re ordering, get an enchilada and taco combination plate. You’ll need it if the margaritas do their job properly.

Smuggler’s is a tiki bar that looks like the belly of a pirate ship, narrow but three stories tall, so drinkers can climb up into ropes hung with nautical gear, or descend down to a second bar filled with barrels. And it’s a rum authority, pouring hundreds of varieties, with a thick cocktail list. The indoor experience has been closed for months, but Smuggler’s has finally cracked open the door for takeout and delivery, serving zombies and painkillers to go, along with crushed ice by the bag and ceramic mugs. 

This laidback tavern on Divisadero usually pours pretty gin and bourbon drinks in that sunny terrarium of a front patio. There’s now a long parklet out front, too, and, as always, a food menu with everything from snacks like duck fat fries to full meals like a double cheeseburger on a sesame seeded brioche bun.

Blackbird is the neighborhood watering hole of Duboce Triangle, serving strong cocktails and craft beer. Happy hour from 5-8 p.m. means $10 select cocktails and wine but any time you swing through you’ll find a respectable list of drink options.

ABV owners Ryan Fitzgerald, Todd Smith, and Erik Reichborn-Kjennerd, are all longtime veterans of the San Francisco bar scene, so it only makes sense that the cocktails at their Mission bar are some of the best in the city. The menu is divided by spirit, a move that makes so much sense it’s a wonder more bars haven’t adopted it. You can’t go wrong with the Whiskey in Church and “the burger.”

This bar from the team behind Range — former bar manager Jeff Lyon and owner-chef Phil West — has a subtle railway theme and cocktails that feature seasonal ingredients and hand-cut and hand-crushed ice. The cocktails are all affordable, and don’t miss the beer, shot, and bite of homemade jerky.

Cocktails and food are equally matched at this creative Lazy Bear spinoff. Bar manager and partner Nicolas Torres is behind the creative list, which incorporates a variety of non-traditional cocktail ingredients like the Fungus Among Us, made with truffle vodka, candy cap mushroom, oxidized wines, lemon, and pet-nat.

A trio of friends opened this modern cocktail bar, which defies American expectations for what an Irish bar should look and taste like. Drinkers can sample the collection of Irish whiskey and gin, get a smooth pint of draft Guinness, and chase it all down with fish and chips. Bonus: it’s home to one of the coolest back patios in the Mission, with graffiti-covered walls encasing a rowdy space with tables, heaters, and (oftentimes) live music.

What do you get when you combine the skills of a handful of cocktail industry veterans with a familiar Mission space and a bevy of fried mortadella sandwiches? Buddy, the neighborhood bar powered by Alvaro Rojas (Elda), Nicolas Torres (True Laurel), Nora Furst (Uma Casa), and Claire Sprouse (Hunky Dory in Brooklyn). Step into the buttoned-up space for expertly-crafted cocktails, well above-average bar food, and a flood of natural wine.

At the top of Mission bordering on Bernal, the Royal Cuckoo has a devoted fan following, and a certain dark and mysterious bohemian charm. A self-described organ lounge, it has church pews for seats and an actual organ, and often hosts small live jazz groups. The bar pours a stiff Manhattan and keeps prices reasonable. Head all the way to the back to snag a coveted seat on the cozy patio.

A cocktail pro and a surfer teamed up to open White Cap, which is succeeding in warming up the Outer Sunset, a neighborhood in need of more watering holes. Filled with driftwood and a fireplace, drinkers can get cozy with a strong drink after a beach walk.