{"id":16537,"date":"2026-04-23T16:04:07","date_gmt":"2026-04-23T16:04:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/16537\/"},"modified":"2026-04-23T16:04:07","modified_gmt":"2026-04-23T16:04:07","slug":"this-vancouver-institution-was-just-named-best-bar-in-canada","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/16537\/","title":{"rendered":"This Vancouver institution was just named Best Bar in Canada"},"content":{"rendered":"

Get the best of Vancouver in your inbox, every Tuesday and Thursday.\u00a0Sign up for our free newsletter<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Vancouver’s cocktail scene is having its moment\u2014and this time, the whole continent showed up to watch. The North America’s 50 Best Bars 2026 list<\/a> was revealed Wednesday night (April 22) at a live awards ceremony at the Vancouver Convention Centre.<\/p>\n

The biggest news: The Keefer Bar<\/a> took the #7 spot overall, earning the title of Best Bar in Canada 2026. Keefer has been a\u00a0Chinatown\u00a0institution for over a decade, built around a drinks programme inspired by old apothecaries. Beverage director Amber Bruce’s “prescriptions”,\u00a0AKA cocktails, have clearly been doing their job. The bar ranked #49 in 2024, climbed to #28 last year, and now sits comfortably in the top ten. If this trajectory keeps up, we’ll need a bigger medicine cabinet.<\/p>\n

Also returning to the list is Botanist Bar<\/a> at the Fairmont Pacific Rim, landing at #38. Known for its garden-to-glass cocktails that are as elegant as they are experimental, Botanist continues to prove that refined doesn’t have to mean boring.<\/p>\n

Two Vancouver bars are making their debut on the top 50 this year. June on Cambie<\/a> crashed the party at a very impressive #17, while Prophecy<\/a>\u2014which appeared on the 51\u2013100 extended list last year\u2014made a serious jump to #32. Both new entries signal that Vancouver’s bar scene isn’t just holding its own; it’s actively pushing forward.<\/p>\n

And the good news doesn’t stop at #50. The extended 51\u2013100 list features four more Vancouver spots: Bagheera<\/a> at #59, Meo<\/a> at #64, Laowai<\/a> at #72, and Mount Pleasant Vintage<\/a> at #91. Victoria also gets a nod with Humboldt Bar<\/a> at #53 and Citrus & Cane<\/a> at #87, a reminder that the cocktail talent in British Columbia runs deep.<\/p>\n

The top spot on the overall list went to New York City’s Sip & Guzzle, but with four bars in the top 50 and four more on the extended list, Vancouver made a strong case that the real party was here on the West Coast. Fitting, then, that 50 Best came back to the city to hand out the honours.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Get the best of Vancouver in your inbox, every Tuesday and Thursday.\u00a0Sign up for our free newsletter. Vancouver’s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":16538,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[415,17,412,413,418,407,414,420,416,423,226,389,419,422,421,417,95],"class_list":{"0":"post-16537","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-vancouver","8":"tag-arts","9":"tag-canada","10":"tag-city","11":"tag-culture","12":"tag-dining","13":"tag-entertainment","14":"tag-events","15":"tag-fashion","16":"tag-film","17":"tag-food","18":"tag-lifestyle","19":"tag-music","20":"tag-nightlife","21":"tag-restaurants","22":"tag-shopping","23":"tag-tv","24":"tag-vancouver"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16537","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16537"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16537\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/16538"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16537"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16537"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/canada\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16537"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}