SF's dives are living history, a cash-only North Beach museum-bar, a red-lantern Chinatown cave with a secret mai tai, and grumpy beer temples with no-photos rules. Dim, stiff, and stuck in time in the best way.
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A cash-only North Beach institution since 1968, crammed with maritime bric-a-brac and Beat-era memorabilia. Dim, unpretentious, and fiercely beloved for cheap, stiff drinks with zero attitude.
Pip’s Tip Cash only, closed Sundays, opens 5pm. North Beach since 1968, crammed with maritime junk.
A 1941 Persian-themed hideaway with a curved bar and red-glowing Arabian mural, once ruled by an owner who decided who got a martini. Cash-friendly, dim, and gloriously stuck in time.
Pip’s Tip Closed Mondays, from 4pm. A 1941 Persian-themed hideaway with a curved bar in the Haight.
A gritty biker-and-bike-messenger beer garden with a huge back patio, 40-plus taps, tallboys, and a famous Bloody Mary. Loud, unpretentious, and endlessly beloved for its picnic-table sprawl.
Pip’s Tip Opens 9am daily. Huge back patio, biker and bike-messenger crowd, forty-plus taps.
A cavernous, red-lantern Chinatown cave open since 1937, famous for its potent secret-recipe Chinese Mai Tai and giant golden Buddha. Cash-only, dim, and a favorite of Anthony Bourdain.
A famously grumpy, graffiti-scrawled beer temple since 1987 with a rotating list of rare drafts and no-nonsense bartenders. Cash-only, loud, and dive-grimy, grab a sausage from next door.
Opened in 1893, one of SF's oldest bars: a cozy, dim Irish nook by Golden Gate Park with a clock stopped by the 1906 quake, tattered couches, and a backgammon-and-dominoes crowd.
Marked by a giant neon martini sign, this Mission corner dive pours cheap, strong drinks in a dim, red-lit room with a pool table and pinball. Unpretentious and beloved for its stiff pours.
A tiny, cash-only wedge of a bar on the Chinatown/North Beach border, dark as a cave with a horseshoe bar and cheap stiff pours. A grungy, no-frills locals' hideout for decades.
An 1893-era Mission corner saloon with a pressed-tin ceiling, antique back bar, free peanuts (shells on the floor), and a jukebox. Dim, warm, and a longtime neighborhood favorite.
A cash-only North Beach institution since 1968, crammed with maritime bric-a-brac and Beat-era memorabilia. Dim, unpretentious, and fiercely beloved for cheap, stiff drinks with zero attitude.
Dive bars are one chapter of Pip's Lifestyle, find the whiskey bars, lounges, steakhouses and the Domino Club below.
