An impressive California-centric wine list and a friendly welcome ensure this rather small wine bar punches well above its weight. The combination wine store and wine bar has been a Marina fixture since 1974, where handmade redwood shelves display wine bottles from floor to ceiling. They’re pouring in elegant Reidel glassware seven nights a week until late.

Like bees to nectar, wine geeks seek out this establishment for its international 800-bottle wine list. If you’re less than an oenophile, why not try a flight? The kitchen produces savory snacks, sweets and a mix-and-match cheese and salumi selection. Just off Chestnut Street, the Marina’s first-ever wine bar uses muted movies as moving wall art and candle light to set the atmosphere.

From the team behind The Barrel Room (both in SF and Oakland), this Marina wine bar and restaurant has flipped the script on wine tasting. Dishes here were developed to pair with two different wines, each one chosen to contrast or complement. The pairings are recommended, but it’s also a great place to stop by for a glass at the bar, or in the pleasant, firepit-studded garden patio.

A magnet for visitors and local wine lovers alike, a superior selection and unbeatable people-watching makes this a destination wine bar. With neighbors like Cowgirl Creamery and Hog Island Oyster Co., there’s always something worthwhile to eat when settling in to explore one of the Bay Area’s biggest and best inventories of boutique producers. Talk to the staff to tap into a wealth of knowledge.    

Carefully curated, regionally rotating, small production. Singled out for a 2016 award of excellence from Wine Spectator, only the best wines even make it to the cellar here, no less to your glass. The restaurant menu is paired with regional wines to focus on a different corner of the world each quarter. A speakeasy space is tucked away downstairs.

This friendly, grown up lounge in Lower Pac Heights provides a welcome neighborhood addition. Half-price Tuesdays pertain to single glasses and curated bottle selections from the “library wall.” Highlights include: Italian dishes from the kitchen, weeknight happy hours with dollar oysters, and Sunday night live jazz.

Gracing Geary in the TenderNob since 2015, Resolute is a handsome space with large picture windows and long wraparound banquettes. Go with white, sparkling, or a rosé flight, or pair a properly aged domestic red with pizza, a panini, or cheese and charcuterie. A three-hour-long happy hour (!) every day lasts until 7 p.m.   

Located in a sleek underground space, the Press Club is sophisticated enough for a “going out” outfit, but casual enough for post-work drinks, too. An early adopter of the Coravin system, which pours wine from the bottle without removing the cork to ensure freshness, The Press Club sports a five-page list of wines by the glass. There’s also a short food menu, and on happy hour, half-price on wine bottles $70 and more. On weekend nights, a DJ picks up the pace until midnight.

Tucked between the Clement Street lineup of pan-Asian eateries and old-time Irish pubs, veteran sommeliers Michael Ireland (The French Laundry, Quince) and John Vuong (Ame, Gary Danko) delivered just what the Inner Richmond needed upon their 2016 arrival. Customers are offered a taste before selecting from a well-curated selection of wines by the glass. The list rotates while they spin the vinyl, and occasionally, High Treason hosts live DJs.

It’s easy to appreciate the great bones in this big, open space that houses a Laurel Heights retail wine shop and bar. More than 800 wines impart a sense of France, Italy, Spain, Austria and America, with over 900 bottles for purchase, and 30 available by the glass. There’s a small food menu and a happy hour, too.

More proof positive that Hayes Valley is the place for cozy wine bars. This one, with 16 seats, has a slightly pastoral vibe with its interiors of plain white and wood. The kitchen produces appealing snacks, lunch, and dinner to accompany primarily European wines. The owner is always on hand to pour tastes, make recommendations, or offer a bite. In Italian, Birba means "little troublemaker,” but at this namesake spot, the only trouble is making sure you’ll get in. And at long last, they’ve just opened their charming back patio.

When it opened a decade ago, Terroir pioneered the organic wine frontier, pouring European wines free of pesticides, herbicides, or sulfur. A recent Friday night featured dollar oysters to pair with a flight of Catalonian wine grown on limestone. A large vinyl collection provides the soundtrack, and occasionally, bluegrass or jazz bands will play. $10 carafes are a draw during Wednesday happy hours.

Combining Champagne and caviar with a popcorn machine? Brilliant. The interior décor at the Riddler décor strikes gold — on the ceiling, gleaming brass trim, marble table tops, greenery, poster art — but the French bistro chairs and stools can only accommodate 40, so you might have to squeeze or wait your turn. Non-vintage sparkling starts at $12 and vintage Champagne starts at $22 a glass.

This heartfelt, personal wine bar on Divisadero from owner and certified sommelier Kavitha Raghavan seeks to unravel the supposed paradox of pairing wine with Indian food. Whether it’s difficult or not, Raghavan makes it look easy, matching unique bubbles, whites, and reds to Indian small plates, or chaats, like behl puri, a perfect light snack of crispy puffed rice, chutneys, potatoes, and mangoes.

Fog be damned, drinkers at this Inner Sunset bar will find an unpretentious approach to small-production California wines on a robust glass list. It’s only a short walk from Golden Gate Park, so loyal Sunset residents mix with park-goers from other ‘hoods. On weekdays from 4 p.m. to 6 p.m., happy hour is a draw, with $6 glasses of wine and comfy sofas that stimulate ease of conversation for small groups.

Because the sidewalk frontage looks like a spirits retailer, it sometimes throws people off — the tiny wine bar’s in the back. At the end of 2016, the longtime owners passed on their keys to Swirl’s wine and spirits buyer, winemaker Casey Bowers. The nightly lineup features family-owned, sustainable wines from California, Spain, Argentina, France and Italy.

Happily, 10 years after this wine bar opened in a test ground Dogpatch microhood, skeptics of sustainable, organic and biodynamic wines have disappeared. Indeed, the trend supports a sister wine bar location, Pause in Hayes Valley. Pair eco-friendly wines with vegetarian-friendly small bites, like vegan flatbread and a super artichoke dip.  

The Bayview’s legit garage winery Gratta Wines, a project of the passionate winemaker Barbara Gratta, pours delectable blends at a tasting room in the back of the Butchertown Gourmet Marketplace. Enjoy a glass with small plates and treats from its neighbors like Fox and Lion Bread Company, and bring home a bottle of what you like.

A roomy wine bar, restaurant, and retail shop from a married couple of veteran sommeliers, Rebecca Fineman and Chris Gaither, Ungrafted is a wine drinke’rs paradise in Dogpatch. Lots of champagne, half bottles, and wines by the glass make up the very serious wine list — which, stored in classic middle school binders, doesn’t take itself way too seriously. A full kitchen is turning out snacks and larger plates, including a must-order za’atar pull apart bread with labne. Want to learn something? Take a class with Fineman, Gaither, or others on their all-sommelier staff. They’re some of the smartest around.