Best Speakeasies in NYC
10 real NYC speakeasies for 2026, checked door by door, from PDT's phone booth to a hidden Brooklyn tunnel bar.
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The list
- 1East Village · $$$ · 1 Av (L) · 113 St Marks Pl
Also No. 8 on Best Cocktail Bars in Manhattan →
The bar that restarted NYC's speakeasy revival in 2007, hidden behind a real, working hot dog shop.
Because you still have to walk into Crif Dogs, step into the vintage phone booth, and pick up the receiver before anyone lets you through.
Order The Benton's Old Fashioned, made with bacon-fat-washed bourbon, is the drink most associated with this bar.
Book exactly 7 days ahead on Resy for a table of up to 4; without that, show up as a walk-in party of 4 or fewer and wait near the hot dog counter.
From @pdtnyc on Instagram, shown through Instagram's own embed player.
- 2Lower East Side · $$$ · Grand St (B D) · 134 Eldridge St
Also No. 3 on Best Cocktail Bars in Manhattan →
A no-menu, no-sign cocktail room on Eldridge Street, built in the space that once held Milk & Honey.
Because there's still no printed menu; you describe a spirit and a mood to the bartender and they build the drink around it.
Order Skip trying to order by name and just describe what you usually like, since that improvisation is the whole point of Attaboy.
Look for a blank steel door marked only with a small 'AB', not a storefront, and arrive right at the 5pm opening if you want to skip a line.
From @attaboy134 on Instagram, shown through Instagram's own embed player.
- 3West Village · $$$ · Christopher St-Stonewall (1) · 510 Hudson St
Also No. 3 on Best Late-Night Eats in NYC → · No. 6 on Best Cocktail Bars in Manhattan →
A West Village cocktail bar and late-night kitchen that's run behind a fortune teller's storefront since 2004.
Because the front room is staged as a palm reader's parlor, and a real tarot reader still works that space most nights before you reach the bar.
Order Ask for the Ginger Smash, a ginger-and-rye drink that's been on the menu since the bar opened.
Call the reservation line directly rather than a booking app, and remember the kitchen runs late, making this a solid choice after midnight.
From @employeesonlyny on Instagram, shown through Instagram's own embed player.
- 4Lower East Side · $$ · Delancey St-Essex St (F J M Z) · 102 Norfolk St
One of only two NYC bars still pouring drinks in the same room they occupied during actual Prohibition.
Because cocktails still arrive in teacups and beer still comes wrapped in a paper bag, the same disguises used here to dodge Prohibition-era police raids.
Order Order anything served in the teacup, since that presentation is the whole reason people come here.
Find the unmarked 'Lower East Side Toy Company' sign on Norfolk Street, walk down the alley beside it, and take the hidden stairwell door.
- 5West Village · $$$ · Christopher St-Stonewall (1) · 45 Grove St
Also No. 9 on Best Cocktail Bars in Manhattan →
A Japanese-style cocktail den relaunched by the founder's daughter after a nearly 30-year East Village run ended in a 2022 eviction.
Because this bar genuinely operates in the West Village now, reopened by Erina Yoshida in 2023, not at the old East Village address still printed on older lists.
Order The Whiskey Smash, one of the bar's original signature builds, is a dependable order no matter who's behind the bar.
Look specifically for 45 Grove Street; the entrance is unmarked and there's nothing left to find at the former St. Marks location.
From @angelssharenyc on Instagram, shown through Instagram's own embed player.
- 6Chelsea · $$ · 132 Ninth Ave
A 1920s-styled Chelsea speakeasy built around a real freestanding clawfoot bathtub as its centerpiece.
Because you still order at the counter of Stone Street Coffee Company first, and the bar sits only through a door at the back of that same shop.
Order Ask about a punch served from the bathtub prop when it's running; otherwise the house Bathtub Gin Fizz sets the tone.
Walk up to the coffee counter, not a hidden street door, and let staff know you're there for the bar once you're inside.
- 7Lower East Side · $$ · Delancey St-Essex St (F J M Z) · 146 Essex St
Tao Group's flagship Lower East Side restaurant-lounge, entered through a walk-through pawn shop since 2010.
Because you still walk through a stocked, working pawn shop storefront before a door opens into the actual restaurant and lounge.
Order Ask for one of the current seasonal cocktails tied to their Restaurant Week menu, since the list changes with the promotion.
This one runs bigger and glossier than a true hidden den, so it's the better pick here for a full dinner or a larger group, not just a quiet drink.
- 8Theater District · $$ · 50 St (1) · 210 West 50th St
A neon-lit cocktail bar built inside the downtown 1 train's 50th Street subway entrance, opened New Year's Eve 2022.
Because the entrance really is down the subway stairs at 50th Street, past a stretch of blacked-out windows most riders walk right by.
Order Order off whatever's currently on the rotating neon cocktail menu, since the list changes often enough that there's no single fixed classic yet.
Head down the stairs for the downtown 1 train at 50th Street and look for the blacked-out windows past the turnstiles, easy to mistake for a closed storefront.
- 9Downtown Brooklyn · $$ · Jay St-MetroTech (A C F R) · 372 Fulton St, 2nd Floor, Brooklyn, NY 11201
A nautical, tiki-leaning cocktail bar built to feel like a sinking ship, one flight above the landmark 1892 chophouse Gage & Tollner.
Because it's still walk-in only, no reservations, up a staircase from the working dining room of Gage & Tollner below.
Order Order one of the rum-forward tiki builds, the lane this bar's whole menu is built around.
There's no way to book ahead, so arrive right at the 5pm opening on a weeknight if you want a table without a wait.
- 10Brooklyn Heights · $$ · Borough Hall (2 3 4 5 R) · 135 Atlantic Ave, Brooklyn, NY 11201
A Marie Antoinette-themed underground cocktail lounge with nightly burlesque, built into a leftover segment of the old Atlantic Avenue subway tunnel.
Because the way in is still through Chez Moi, where a bookshelf on the left wall swings open as a hidden door, not through any marked entrance on Atlantic Avenue.
Order Ask for one of the champagne-forward cocktails, in keeping with the room's Marie Antoinette-era styling.
Walk into Chez Moi first and look for the bookshelf on the left wall; there's no separate street-level entrance to search for.