The Best New Cocktail Bars in New Orleans

This is a guide to the hottest spots for cocktails a la minute, places that are creating buzz and shaking up the scene in a new way. This line up also includes restaurants with especially strong bar programs and welcoming spaces for cocktail sipping.

Local cocktail enthusiasts have something new to toast this year — for the first time in 24 years, non-industry guests are invited to Tales of the Cocktail, the world’s premier cocktail festival, from July 22-25. Check the Tales passport for access to this international event.

Explore Eater’s guide to New Orleans’s essential bars for more suggestions on the city’s best watering holes, and to sample a New Orleans-born classic, here’s where to find the most iconic New Orleans cocktails. Welcome to the cocktail heatmap, a running guide to the freshest destinations for classic cocktails, frozen drinks, and rare spirits in New Orleans.

This is a guide to the hottest spots for cocktails a la minute, places that are creating buzz and shaking up the scene in a new way. This line up also includes restaurants with especially strong bar programs and welcoming spaces for cocktail sipping.

Local cocktail enthusiasts have something new to toast this year — for the first time in 24 years, non-industry guests are invited to Tales of the Cocktail, the world’s premier cocktail festival, from July 22-25. Check the Tales passport for access to this international event.

Explore Eater’s guide to New Orleans’s essential bars for more suggestions on the city’s best watering holes, and to sample a New Orleans-born classic, here’s where to find the most iconic New Orleans cocktails.

Nightbloom

Nightbloom is a chill late-night cocktail bar on St.

Claude Avenue, across the way from Galaxie Tacos. Moody with flickering candlelight and sparely adorned with calming colors, Nightbloom is pretty, a classy little romantic haven in the Bywater. In addition to classics like a daiquiri, Negroni, and Old Fashioned, there are specialty drinks like the Miss V, which combines mezcal, tequila, cilantro, mint, jalapeño, pineapple, lime, and a dash of salt; and the flavorful bright green Pedro Navaja, a potent and drinkable tiki meets key-lime pie experience.

Nightbloom is open nightly — and playing good tunes — from 5 p.m. to 1 a.m. weekdays, until 2 on the weekends.

Fives

This French-style cocktail bar in the heart of the Quarter is an oasis of elegant, old-school action on the edge of Jackson Square. Fives specializes in oysters and other small plates like beef tartare and tuna crudo, excellent drinking food, but cocktails steal the show.

A beautiful bar puts out classics, New Orleans cocktails, and specialty drinks including the Kingston Lights, a spicy shake of pisco, pineapple, ginger, and a hint of habanero. There’s a Columns Martini made with vodka, gin, dry vermouth, brine, and pickled vegetables, or try a flight of three bar faves.

Observatory Eleven Bar

It’s not exactly a rooftop bar, but the floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the river sure feel on top of the world, with one of the very best views in town. Observatory 11 at the Westin is more than a convention hotel bar, thanks to the swank setting and the live music that gives it a true New Orleans sense of place.

Jolie

Jolie, formerly a World of Beer tavern, has been transformed into a warm, inviting lounge with an old-world European vibe, thanks to the careful work of local tastemakers Kiah Darion (Bar Marilou) and Will Lester (Longway Tavern).

Chefs Indigo “Soul” Martin and Adrian Martinez offer a menu of shareable plates with French influences (think foie gras toast, tempura frog legs, beef carpaccio), and the cocktails lean into juicy notes of passionfruit, lemon, and even honeycrisp apple, adding flair with intricate tools like atomizers, eye droppers, and blow torches. Keep an eye on Jolie’s calendar for live music, DJs, and a monthly “Cirque de Jolie” lineup of performers.

Dew Drop Inn

The Dew Drop Inn is back in a big way after Curtis Doucette Jr. revived the legendary Central City hotel, music venue, and nightclub in 2024.

The pool, live music stage, and bar are welcoming havens of good vibes, a truly joyful atmosphere in which to sip drinks and enjoy life. Specials abound during happy hour and throughout the week, with DJ nights, pool parties, jazz brunch, and more to round out the offerings.

Brass bands are a specialty.

Maze

Maze is New Orleans’s newest spot for nightlife, a sultry Mid-City cocktail lounge complete with VIP tables, bottle service, DJs, and neon wall signs with sayings like “She’s a Maze with no escape.” It had its grand opening in mid-January in the former home of craft cocktail bar Cask, serving extravagant cocktails like an espresso martini with coffee-infused whipped cream, the smoke bubble-topped Ultraviolet, and a Tequila Bloom spritzed with sparkles.

Maze is open Sunday through Thursday from 4 p.m. to 11 p.m. and Friday and Saturday from 5 p.m. until 1 a.m.

Junebug

Junebug is the latest from the Virginia-based Neighborhood Restaurant Group, which closed its first two local ventures, Brewery Saint X and Devil Moon Barbecue, in January.

Junebug is a stunning music-themed restaurant and bar with a lushly landscaped back patio. Its theme is homage to Jazz City Studio, where icons Cosimo Matassa, Allen Toussaint, and the Meters helped shape the sound of 1970s funk.

There are turn tables for spinning 500 curated vinyl albums and a stellar bar program from manager Sophie Burton, whose menu offers drinks two ways, full-strength and lower ABV, with a focus on eau de vie and fruit brandies mixed into cocktails or served on the rocks. There are also a dozen beers on draft, and not just the usual options by the bottle.

All together it makes for an excellent date night spot.

The Crustacean Club

Love an oyster meets cocktail bar? Welcome to the Crustacean Club, where married chef partners Brenna Sanders and Evan Ingram curate the seafood tasting menu in the swank rear dining room, while up front, there is an oval white marble bar with fresh seafood displayed like precious jewels.

The cocktail list is designed to pair with local Gulf seafood and caviar — think martinis, champagne, and regional twists on the classics. Don’t miss all of the fish-inspired design details, a thoroughly charming thematic touch.

Aguasanta

Chef Luis Nava is the force behind Aguasanta, which means holy water, a modern Mexican restaurant with French and Asian influences at 8312 Oak Street. The art-filled bright space includes a long bar, behind which bartenders mix balanced and unique cocktails, from herb infused gin in the citrus forward Herbal Elixir to the Aguasanta, a holy blend of moonshine, maraschino liquor, and tortilla salt.

Tragos Amargos

The latest speakeasy from Veho Hospitality is a listening bar hidden behind a jukebox door in the back of Taquerias Carnalito, the company’s CDMX-style taco joint in the CBD. Go down the rabbit hole to discover curated drinks from beverage manager Evan Smits and small plates from chef Christian Moreno, radiating with the room’s ruby-hued sex appeal and immersive theme.

Think crystal chandeliers, DJs, turntables, and slow roasted short rib tacos and oxtail mole negro. The cocktails are complex and layered — try Summer in the City, made with house-brewed pineapple tepache and mole liqueur — and vinyl rules the DJ booth at the bar.

All together it makes for so much sassy fun.