Newcastle can have some serious bragging rights over some of its rivals thanks to finishing second in new UY rankings
Newcastle’s Grey Street.(Image: Newcastle Chronicle)
We know that Newcastle is a place brimming with brilliant places to go for food and drink and now national experts have picked up on that too, as the city, championed by experts for offering a ‘world class experience’ is second, ahead of the likes of Manchester, Leeds and Edinburgh on a new list of the best places in the UK for food lovers. And only London beat it in the 2025 rankings.
You don’t need to tell us here at ChronicleLive that Tyneside is blessed with an abundance of fantastic food and drink spots, from Newcastle city centre, with its great mix of fantastic local businesses and in demand chain restaurants, to places just a few miles out of town, like Jesmond’s always buzzing Osborne Road and Heaton’s Chillingham Road, a location that has earned itself a reputation of being one of THE places to go for a quality bite to eat.
Well, Newcastle can now be feeling rather chuffed with itself as, just a week ahead of this year’s Christmas Market uniting an array of brilliant food vendors from all over the region, the city is sitting in second place in a list of UK’s Top 10 Cities For Food Lovers, second only to the capital. The rankings have been compiled by kitchen specialists Wrap Your Kitchen, who based their placings on on five key factors: restaurant density per 10,000 residents, number of award-winning restaurants (including Michelin-starred and Bib Gourmand establishments), average dining costs for two people, annual food festivals, and social media engagement measured through Instagram hashtags.
And, with a score of 39.4 Newcastle clin ched second, although some way behind London which finished well ahead of everyone else on 60. Newcastle scored particularly well when it comes to the number of restaurants in the area, with 55.98 per 10,000 people, with it also second to London on the number of food festivals. Championing Newcastle, Caitlin King, CEO of Wrap Your Kitchen commented: “Newcastle strikes the perfect balance. You get a vibrant food scene with plenty of variety and events, but at a price point that makes dining out regularly much more accessible. Cities like this prove you don’t need to be in the capital to enjoy world-class food experiences.”
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