Vancouver’s JW Marriott balloon floor with dance music and the buzz of conversation 2025 50 Best Bars in North America. The lining of the edges of the room is sponsored by the boss of the event – Cointreau, Perrier, Rémy Martin and others. The members of the Rayo bar team from Mexico City make Spritzes and Negronis, while they bathe in the bright pink light of the Campari stand, ignoring that Rayo will have become one of the most prominent victims of the night, disappearing completely from the list, despite the fifth classification of last year – the only Mexican bar to be removed this time.
But there were few other wild surprises for anyone who has paid attention to the Mexican bar scene in recent years, because a total of 18 bars have made the top 100.
The longtime LimantourBaltra and Hanky Panky all maintained positions on the list, with Baltra and Hanky Panky moving and Limming holding stable in # 9. Other past winners – Aruba Day Drink in Tijuana, Nadie Café in Mexico and Selva in Oaxaca also continued their sequence as members of the winning club.
There are a handful of beginners from Mexico this year, but none of the additions will shock cocktail aficionados in the capital. Bar Mauro in Roma Norte has been hailed since its opening a few months ago and rightly deserved a place in 14th place. Jewel, a speakeasy hidden at the top of the Escuela de Gastronomia in Condesa entered the list at No. 34.
“I think that 50 best was incredible for the Mexico bars scene, but I also think that the bars that opened the scene forward, they were really the biggest change,” said Erik Van Beek, co -owner of the Mexico handshake, who after two years in the first place in the list again took the first point cut.
“When I arrived in 2019, there were fifty mils, Limming, Hanky Panky and Baltra, that was all. And now people really push their cocktail program, their service and their standards. Of course, 50 best have helped this a lot because people receive recognition, but at the end of the day, it’s bars. ”
“There is a good network of bartenders who send people to different bars through the city,” explains Claudia Cabrera, co -owner and director of the bar in Kaito del Valle de Mexico, another list of the list in the 40th row this year. “Even my friends who are not really in cocktails will suddenly tell me about a new fashionable cocktail bar in which they have gone and ask me if I know.”
“We have seen a big change,” says Cabrera. “We are in a family district and suddenly, when the list is out, people started to come (del Valle).” Kaito del Valle has been working for the past eight years and a half years in Colonia del Valle, a district just south of Condesa and slightly off the tourist path in Mexico City. “There is nothing else around us, so we know that it has to do with that. Our atmosphere is a bit of Divey, more like a place in the neighborhood, but we have seen now that people were looking for us specifically and we did not have that before. ”
“I think that the list reflects the plurality of the scene,” explains Eli Martínez, owner of Tlecān, who won place n ° 3 this year after entering # 10 in 2024. “It is pleasant to see bars inside hotels that have infinite resources at their goal and on the same lists of lists that have made a formidable to increase their own money.
Martínez won the bartender prize for this year. The price is voted by the other barmans on the list of the best 50 and recognizes someone who has had a significant impact on the bartender profession and his peers in the industry and is one of the most prestigious prices awarded at night.
Cocktail bars and mixology in Mexico have been increasing for longer than the last three years on the list of best bars in North America, but there is no doubt among the participants that the list has encouraged the professionalization and expansion of industry.
“The level of mixology has clearly improved,” explains Martínez, “and it is now common to find a menu of drinks with a real story to tell.”
“You see gourmet restaurants with a good drinking program and hotels and chefs and other people pay attention,” says Cabrera. “I think that in the past six or seven years, we have all become really proud of our products. We use more agave, more local products, more local brands, and there are more collaborations between everyone. Drinks go minimalist, which you would never have seen in Mexico before.
Martinez agrees. “I think the trend is more and more in the sense of showing all the culinary and cultural richness of Mexico,” she finished.
The entire winners:
- Speakeasy of the handshake (Mexico)
3. Tlecān (Mexico)
8. The high rooster (Guadalajara)
9. Limantour alcohol shop (Mexico)
14. MAURO bar (Mexico)
20. Baltra (Mexico)
22. Drink Aruba Day (Tijuana)
27. Statue (tulum)
29. Selva (Oaxaca)
34. Drinkery room (Mexico) jewelry
35. Hanky Panky (Mexico)
40. Kaito del Valle (Mexico)
47. Coffee person (Mexico)
49. Bekeb (San Miguel de Allende)
Long list
54. Sabina Know (Oaxaca)
65. Bruges (Mexico)
82. Ticuchi (Mexico)
94. Casa Plus (Mexico)
Lydia Carey is an independent writer and a translator based in Mexico City. It has been widely published online and on paper, writing on Mexico for more than a decade. She lives a double life as a local tourist guide and is the author of Mexico Streets: Roma. Follow his urban adventures on Instagram and see more of his work to www.mexicocitystreets.com.
