Portland drinking starts with Hey Love, Best U.S. Hotel Bar at the Tales of the Cocktail Spirited Awards 2023, and the bench behind it runs deep: we list 19 active bars across the city. The 12 below are our pick of them. 2 of them hold verified international recognition, from the 50 Best lists to the Spirited Awards. Every listing below is verified by BarMagazine, with addresses, opening hours and the signature drinks worth ordering.
Hey Love is the lobby bar of the Jupiter NEXT hotel on East Burnside in Portland, Oregon, and describes itself as a top-notch cocktail lounge, a community meeting hall, a hidden garden and a house party all wrapped into one. The room is lush with plants and hung with local art, and the music is rich and soulful and usually at least a few decades old. The cocktails are vibrant, a little bit sexy and always fun, and the kitchen is run by Machetes, a Mexico City street food concept. Hey Love calls itself both a love letter to Portland and a portal to somewhere else entirely.
A below-ground whisky and cocktail bar in Portland, open nightly from Wednesday to Sunday. Its back bar is built around Scotch, and reservations are taken through Resy. It sits at No. 63 on North America's 50 Best Bars 2026.
Angel Face is a small room on Northeast 28th Avenue that makes classic cocktails from scratch, with a food menu and a wine list running alongside the spirits. The bar is run by Fara Fortier and the kitchen by James Melendez. Seating is first come, first served, with no reservations taken, and there is space both indoors and out. The room opens at 4:30pm every day, closing at 11pm from Sunday through Thursday and at midnight on Friday and Saturday. It is the kind of bar where guests describe what they like and let the bartender build from there, which keeps the list fluid through the seasons.
The Driftwood Room is a 1950s era lounge off the lobby of Hotel deLuxe, and it has been mixing drinks on the same spot since 1954. The room is compact and curved, all banquettes and low light, and the program covers classic cocktails as carefully as its own inventions, including flights built around the Manhattan for guests who want to taste variations side by side. Food is served alongside. Doors open at 4pm every day, closing at 11pm from Monday through Saturday and at 10pm on Sunday, with happy hour from 4pm to 6pm Sunday through Thursday. Reservations are handled through the hotel.
Hale Pele is a tiki bar on Northeast Broadway, built out with the full vocabulary of the form and a bar team that leans on high end rums, house syrups, and fresh juice rather than shortcuts. The menu carries the essentials done straight, including a Mai Tai described as the original, made with a blend of rums, curacao, and orgeat, and a Navy Grog of aged rums, fresh squeezed lime, grapefruit, and a rich blend of allspice and honey. Garnishes arrive lit more often than not. Doors open every night at 4pm and run to midnight, with last call at 11:30pm and reservations taken through Tock.
Multnomah Whisk{e}y Library sits above Southwest Alder Street and describes itself as dedicated to the art of spirits, cocktails, and service. Bottles climb the walls of the main room, and the house keeps separate menus for cocktails and for the long list of whiskies behind them. The adjoining Green Room works as the easier, more casual counterpart, with its own menu and a later last call. The Library runs Tuesday through Sunday and the Green Room Tuesday through Saturday, with Sunday service at the Library added from Labor Day weekend onward. Reservations are handled through the bar, and a sister account covers the Green Room.
Pacific Standard is the ground floor bar at the KEX hotel on Northeast Martin Luther King Junior Boulevard, described by the house as a modern West Coast drinking and dining hall by Jeffrey Morgenthaler and Benjamin Amberg. The stated ambition is to celebrate the hotel bar by acting as a living room for the city, a destination for travelers and a haunt for regulars alike. Guests are invited to take a menu, find a seat, and let the bar keep the rounds coming. Doors open daily at 3pm and close at midnight, with dinner until 10pm and happy hour at both ends of the evening. The Sunset Room sits alongside.
Palomar is a Cuban bar and kitchen on Northwest 23rd Avenue, run by Ricky Gomez. The list leans on Havana classics and the frozen and blended end of the rum canon, with spiked aguas frescas and an espresso martini alongside the daiquiris and highballs. Food is served from the kitchen through the evening. The room offers indoor dining with reservations available through Resy and plenty of space kept back for walk in guests, and online ordering and delivery are also available. Happy hour runs every day from 4pm to 6pm, and the bar opens daily at 4pm and closes at 10pm.
Panther Club opened on Southeast 6th Avenue with a line it still uses for itself: a good bar for bad people. The room pairs a cocktail list with pool tables, disco balls, and a kitchen sending out steaks and burgers, and the house invites guests to treat the space, the booze, and the music as their clubhouse. Records and guest selectors run through the week, and the room regularly hosts release parties and DJ nights rather than karaoke. Doors open at 5pm seven days a week and stay open late. Bookings for parties are taken through the bar directly.
Rum Club introduces itself as a craft cocktail bar with a rum problem, and it has been serving craft cocktails, food, and fun from Southeast Sandy Boulevard since 2011. The room sits on a busy inner eastside corner and keeps a short, focused list that leans on rum without being limited to it, with a kitchen running alongside the bar. Reservations are taken through the bar, and there is a shop for those who want to take something home. Doors open daily at 4pm and close at 1am, with happy hour every Sunday through Thursday from 4pm to 7pm. A newsletter carries menu changes and one off events.
Teardrop Cocktail Lounge has poured in the heart of Portland's Pearl District since 2007, and calls its work a perpetual quest for the new frontier of the cocktail. The approach runs from a deep respect for the classic to the adventure of unusual flavor combinations, and the menus are split into a standing cocktail list, a seasonal list, a nonalcoholic list, and food. Doors open at 4pm every night and stay open until close, with walk-ins encouraged at the main bar. Friday and Saturday reservations for parties of up to eight are seated in Crybaby, the room adjacent to the main bar. The license does not permit minors.
Too Soon sits on Northeast 28th Avenue and runs a tight, mostly spirit forward list with drinks named to match the room's sense of humor, among them Right Now built on tequila, Direct Deposit blending bourbon and scotch, and the House Special on gin. Ice is cut by hand and the bar works with a patio alongside the indoor seats. The kitchen sends out bar food through the night, and cookies arrive near last call. Doors open at 5pm Monday through Saturday and close at 1am, with no reservations taken at any point, so seats go to whoever arrives.
These 12 are the starting point. The full BarMagazine directory covers every listed bar in Portland, with a map, filters by bar type, and new openings as we verify them.
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