The best bars in Ubud, Bali: a folklore cocktail bar, a cave beneath the Campuhan bridge, barrel-aged drinks over the Ayung, and a 1930s speakeasy in the rice fields.
Table of contents
Editor's note
This guide is published by Revasi, a reservation platform that powers booking for Night Rooster, one of the bars on this list. To keep the recommendations honest, bars are included only if they would belong here whether or not they use Revasi. The rest are recommended purely on their merits.
Ubud is not a nightlife town, and nobody who lives here would pretend otherwise. What it has instead is a small number of genuinely serious bars, most of them run by people who could work anywhere and chose the jungle.
The drinking here follows the food. The same instincts that made Ubud a fine dining destination — short supply chains, foraged and fermented ingredients, a refusal to import what grows down the road — have produced a cocktail scene with an unusually strong sense of place. You will not find much in the way of clubs. You will find bars where the drink in front of you could not have been made anywhere else.
Key Takeaways
- Ubud is a serious cocktail town rather than a nightlife town — a handful of destination bars, most run by their owners, and no clubs of any scale.
- The drinks follow the food: house fermentation, foraged botanicals, rice-wine distilling and in-house vermouth give the scene an unusually strong sense of place.
- Night Rooster is the standout — folklore-driven cocktails, a kitchen worth a full dinner, and the only bar here you can book directly through Revasi with instant confirmation.
- Plan around sunset and an early close: most bars run from afternoon to between 11pm and midnight, so start at six, not ten.
- Book ahead for weekends, groups of four or more, and the small speakeasies — Kawi has just fifteen seats.
This guide covers the bars worth planning an evening around, what each one is for, and how to book them.
Table of Contents
- How We Chose These Bars
- Why Ubud Drinks Better Than You Expect
- What to Expect: Timing, Booking, and Getting Home
- The Bars Worth Knowing
- Choosing by Occasion
- How to Book Bars in Ubud
- Practical Information
- Frequently Asked Questions
- Related Reading
How We Chose These Bars
Plenty of best-bars-in-Ubud lists exist online, and most are assembled from press releases by someone who passed through once. This one is not. Revasi works with Ubud's hospitality teams every day, and the bars below are the ones we actually send people to.
A bar earns its place on the drinks in 2026, not on reputation — Ubud loses good rooms to staff turnover, and we have left off places that no longer hold the standard. One of them, Night Rooster, books through Revasi; it is here on merit, and we say so in the editor's note above. The rest are recommended purely on theirs.
Why Ubud Drinks Better Than You Expect
Three things explain it.
The ingredients were already here. Ubud's kitchens spent a decade building relationships with growers, foragers and fermenters. The bars inherited that. Wild botanicals, seasonal fruit, house-made vermouth and bitters, rice wine distilled on site — the supply chain that makes the food distinctive makes the drinks distinctive too.
The talent followed the restaurants. Bartenders who wanted to work at a high level with local produce came to Ubud because that was where the produce was being taken seriously. Several of the bars on this list are run by their owners rather than a group, which shows in the menus.
Small bars, long evenings. Nobody in Ubud is running a two-thousand-capacity beach club. These are fifteen to sixty-seat bars where the bartender can talk you through a drink. That changes what is possible behind the bar, and it changes what an evening feels like.
The trade-off is that Ubud closes early by Bali standards. Plan accordingly.
What to Expect: Timing, Booking, and Getting Home
Ubud is an early town. Most bars here run from the afternoon to somewhere between 11:00 PM and midnight. If you want a 2:00 AM night, you are in the wrong part of Bali. Start at six, not at ten.
Sunset is the peak. Anything with a view fills between 5:00 and 7:00 PM. The jungle and river bars in particular are worth arriving early for, while there is still light on the ravine.
Book for weekends and for groups. Midweek, most of these bars will find space for two. Friday and Saturday are a different matter, and the smaller speakeasies fill first because there are simply not many seats.
Dress is smart casual. Neat and considered. Nobody will turn you away in sandals, but these are not beach bars.
Sort your ride home first. Ubud's roads are dark, narrow and busy with scooters. Grab and Gojek both work, though coverage thins late at night in the outer areas like Sayan and Kedewatan. If you are drinking at a resort bar outside the centre, ask them to arrange a car before you order the last round.
The Bars Worth Knowing
There's no strict ranking here — just the bars worth knowing in Ubud. Where you can book online, there's a link; otherwise, call ahead or walk in — the small speakeasies fill fast. The $ to $$$$ price guide runs from a casual round to a luxury hotel bar.
| Bar | Style | Area | Price | Best for | Booking |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Night Rooster | Folklore cocktails | Jl. Goutama | $$$ | Ubud's best cocktail, explained | Revasi |
| Kawi Ubud | Intimate 15-seat bar | Kedewatan | $$$ | A quiet, serious drink | Direct |
| The Lair | Jungle cave bar | Campuhan | $$ | Atmosphere, a first date | Direct |
| Jati Bar | Open-air resort bar | Four Seasons, Sayan | $$$$ | Sunset, a slow afternoon | Direct |
| The Sayan House | Japanese-Latin terrace | Sayan | $$$ | Sundowners over the gorge | Direct |
| Ibu Susu | Cocktails & pan-Asian | Monkey Forest Rd | $$ | Cocktails with dinner | Online |
| Whisper Cove | Vintage speakeasy | Monkey Forest Rd | $$ | A quiet nightcap | |
| Copper Kitchen & Bar | Treetop rooftop bar | Jl. Bisma | $$$ | An easy after-dinner rooftop | Direct |
| Apéritif Bar at Viceroy Bali | Fine-dining cocktail bar | Viceroy Bali | $$$$ | A dressed-up drink, serious wine | Direct |
Night Rooster
Night Rooster is the most serious drink in Ubud, and the one a visiting bartender will ask you about.
It sits under the Locavore Group umbrella on Jl. Goutama, and it is run by Raka Ambarawan and Esy, whom the bar calls its alchemists rather than its bartenders. The room is a cosy, low-lit forty-seater with the feel of an old planter's club, which sets you up for drinks considerably more adventurous than the setting suggests.
The creative brief is Indonesian folklore. Every cocktail is tied to a myth, a folk tale or a supernatural story, which sounds like a gimmick until you drink one and realise the story is doing real work in explaining what is in the glass. Behind that, the team distils rice wine, ferments fruit, makes its own vermouth and bitters, and infuses spirits with local botanicals.
Order Ashes. It is the bar's most popular drink and the one people describe afterwards: vodka and whisky with blowtorched dehydrated fruit, house fortified wine and palm sugar syrup, finished with a cinnamon stick lit at the table so the smoke reaches you before the glass does. Theatrical, but the smoke is doing something to the drink rather than to the photograph.
Do not skip the food. The kitchen runs a selection the bar calls Eccentric Eats, and it is a serious menu rather than bar snacks to soak up the gin. The arancini are made with mushrooms grown at Locavore NXT and served with a kimchi emulsion, so the bar is eating from the same chamber that feeds the group's flagship restaurant. The beef heart pastrami sando is the other order, and it is the one that tells you what kind of kitchen this is. Plenty of people come for the food and stay for the drinks, which is not the usual order of things.
The recognition is worth listing. Night Rooster is on Asia's 50 Best Discovery, sits at number 472 on the Top 500 Bars list, and was named among the twenty best bars in Indonesia by Tatler Best in both 2025 and 2026, alongside a Taste Makers Award. Tatler Asia keeps its own profile of the bar. Those are Night Rooster's awards, and they are the publications serious cocktail travellers plan itineraries around.
Walk-ins are genuinely welcome, which is unusual at this level. Book if you are four or more, or if it is a weekend.
Hours: Every day, 5:00 PM until late.
Address: Jl. Goutama Sel. No.5, Ubud, Gianyar, Bali 80571.
Best for: The best cocktail in Ubud, a bartender who will explain it, and a genuinely good snack alongside.
Booking: Direct through Revasi, with real-time availability and instant confirmation.
Kawi Ubud
Kawi is where Ubud's own bartenders drink, including, often enough, the Locavore Group teams on a night off. That is the strongest recommendation a bar in this town can have.
It is small — fifteen seats — and deliberately hard to find, with a sign that barely reads from the street. Founded by three friends, Christian, Kong and Elaine, it came out of an interest in Balinese culinary tradition and a wish to build the bar they wanted to sit in themselves.
The menu avoids flash. Drinks are built on local elements and the memory of familiar things: the earthy comfort of teh botol, the cool slip of daluman. Behind the bar are jars of spirits infusing with local produce, a slow laboratory where flavours are left to happen at their own pace rather than forced. Nothing here is trying to win a competition.
It is a bar for conversation and for taking your time. Two people at the counter, not a group of eight.
Hours: Wednesday to Sunday, 7:00 PM to midnight.
Address: Jl. Raya Lungsiakan, Kedewatan, Ubud.
Best for: A quiet, serious drink. The bar the professionals choose.
Booking: Direct on +62 361 9086 528. Worth calling ahead — fifteen seats go quickly.
The Lair
The Lair is the most atmospheric bar on this list and the hardest to leave.
You reach it by following lanterns down beneath the Campuhan ridge, a descent that is properly cinematic: stone walls, low light, and then a bar carved into the side of the ravine above the Wos River. Calling it a cave bar undersells the setting. The deck looks straight out into the jungle, and on a quiet night you can hear the water.
The drinks are better than the setting would need them to be. The team works with premium spirits and carefully sourced ingredients, and the menu is presented on cards rather than a list, which turns choosing into part of the evening.
It is small, and it fills. Weekends need booking, and arriving before dark is worth it for the walk down.
Best for: Atmosphere, a first date, showing someone Ubud for the first time.
Where: Beneath the Campuhan bridge, above the Wos River.
Booking: Direct with the bar, ahead of weekends.
Jati Bar
Jati Bar is the long-sunset option, and the one to choose when you want the view to do half the work.
It sits below an elevated lotus pond at Four Seasons Resort Bali at Sayan, open-air, with close to 360-degree views over rice paddies, rainforest and the sacred Ayung River in the valley below. The bar opens at midday and shifts character as the light goes: juices and afternoon tea early, a jazz-lounge evening bar later.
The drinks programme is the reason to make the trip out of the centre. Cocktails are barrel-aged for a minimum of thirty days in locally sourced coconut, bamboo and teak, alongside artisan terracotta casks, which produces a rounder and more layered drink than a bar of this kind usually bothers with. The menu was built with Sufian Mahmoud, the Four Seasons group's zero-waste head bartender. Ask for the barrel-aged gin martini, or the pandan colada if you want something that tastes like where you are.
Hours: Daily, 12:00 PM to midnight.
Best for: Sunset, a slow afternoon, a drink that justifies the drive.
Booking: Through Four Seasons Resort Bali at Sayan.
The Sayan House
The Sayan House is a Japanese-Latin restaurant with one of Ubud's best sundowner terraces attached, and the bar is worth the trip on its own.
The restaurant sits in a garden above the Ayung gorge at Sayan, about ten minutes from the centre, and the fusion is real rather than decorative: Japanese technique meeting Mexican, Peruvian and Brazilian flavours, in dishes like guacamole rolls and king prawn jambalaya. The Sunset Bar opens at 4:00 PM and runs house signature cocktails alongside a proper wine list and a premium whisky selection.
The reason to come is the hour before dark, with the valley going gold below you and something Peruvian arriving from the kitchen. Stay for dinner or move on afterwards; both work.
Hours: Bar from 4:00 PM.
Address: Jl. Raya Sayan No.70, Sayan, Ubud.
Best for: Sundowners over the gorge, drinks that come with a serious kitchen behind them.
Booking: Direct through the restaurant.
Ibu Susu
Ibu Susu is where you go when you want the drinks to be serious but the evening to include dinner.
It is Balinese owned and Balinese run, which is rarer at this level than it should be. Owner and head bartender Ketut built the list after years working bars in Melbourne, and he has brought that technical grounding back to local ingredients rather than away from them. The kitchen runs eclectic pan-Asian share plates alongside, so a table can settle in from the afternoon without deciding whether it is eating or drinking.
The bar sits on Jalan Monkey Forest, near the Monkey Forest itself, and reads relaxed rather than reverent. It is open from midday until late, which makes it one of the more flexible bookings in this guide.
Hours: Daily, from 12:00 PM until late.
Best for: Cocktails with dinner, a table that wants to stay put.
Booking: Through the bar's own site, or WhatsApp on +62 813 3896 8223.
Whisper Cove
Whisper Cove is the quiet one, hidden up an unassuming stairway on the second floor above Maluku Restaurant on Monkey Forest Road.
Inside it is dark wood, low light and velvet, a modern-vintage speakeasy played straight. It works best as a nightcap rather than a destination for the whole evening: somewhere to end up after dinner when you want one more drink and a conversation you can actually hear.
Walk-ins are welcome, but weekends and peak hours are worth booking.
Hours: 6:00 PM to 1:00 AM. Closed Mondays.
Address: Monkey Forest Road, second floor, above Maluku Restaurant.
Best for: A quiet nightcap, a small group, the end of the night.
Booking: Through WhatsApp on 0811 4252 5000.
Copper Kitchen & Bar
Every other rooftop in this guide needs a car. Copper needs a pair of shoes.
It sits on top of Bisma Eight on Jl. Bisma, a few minutes from the centre, looking out over the tree canopy rather than down into a valley. The bar builds signature cocktails on local ingredients with proper technique, alongside a wine list taken more seriously than most hotel bars bother with, and a kitchen running international-Asian cooking on local produce underneath it.
The greenery does the work here. You are level with the treetops rather than above a ravine, which makes it the easy after-dinner rooftop rather than the one you plan an evening around. There is a pool up there too, though that one is for guests.
Hours: Daily 7:00 AM to 11:00 PM
Address: Bisma Eight, Jl. Bisma, Ubud.
Best for: A rooftop within walking distance of dinner.
Booking: Direct through Bisma Eight.
Apéritif Bar at Viceroy Bali
The bar attached to Ubud's most formally appointed restaurant, and good enough that plenty of people come only for this.
L'Apéritif is the fine dining room at Viceroy Bali, overlooking the Petanu river gorge, and its cocktail bar runs as its own destination before or after dinner. The register is glamorous in a way little else in Ubud attempts — guests have compared the dining room to stepping into The Great Gatsby — with service standards to match. The wine programme behind it is one of the strongest in town.
Pair it with dinner upstairs, or treat it as the opening act and eat elsewhere.
Hours: 5:30 PM to 11.30 PM
Address: Viceroy Bali, Jl. Lanyahan, Petulu, Ubud.
Best for: A properly dressed drink, and the wine list.
Booking: Direct through Viceroy Bali.
Choosing by Occasion
For the best drink in Ubud: Night Rooster. Folklore on the menu, fermentation behind the bar, and a kitchen good enough to make it dinner.
For where the bartenders drink: Kawi. Fifteen seats, no theatre, and the Locavore teams in the corner on their night off.
For atmosphere above everything: The Lair. Nothing else in Bali is built into a ravine like this.
For sunset: Jati Bar over the Ayung, or The Sayan House terrace ten minutes down the road. Arrive by five for either.
For a late one: Apéritif Bar, open until 11:30 PM, with the cigar humidor if that is your evening.
For drinks with dinner: Ibu Susu, where the share plates are as considered as the list. Night Rooster if you want the food to be the reason. Planning the meal itself? See our guide to the best restaurants in Ubud.
For one more, quietly: Whisper Cove.
For a bar crawl: Ibu Susu, Whisper Cove and Night Rooster are all walkable from central Ubud, so build the evening around those three. Kawi, Jati Bar, The Sayan House and Apéritif Bar each sit outside the centre and are better treated as their own trip.
For the most formal drink in Ubud: Apéritif Bar at Viceroy. Black-tie energy in a town that mostly does not do it.
For a rooftop you can walk to: Copper, on top of Bisma Eight. The only one in this guide that does not need a car.
How to Book Bars in Ubud
Night Rooster books directly through Revasi, with real-time availability and instant confirmation. Reserve at Night Rooster.
The rest book through their own channels. Apéritif Bar takes reservations online, by phone and by email. Ibu Susu takes them through its site and by WhatsApp. Jati Bar books through Four Seasons and The Sayan House through the restaurant. Kawi takes a phone call. Copper books direct through Bisma Eight, and Apéritif through Viceroy Bali. Whisper Cove books through WhatsApp. The Lair is best contacted directly.
Most of these bars welcome walk-ins, and most of them still fill on a Friday. The rule of thumb: two people midweek, walk in. Four people or a weekend, book. Kawi is the exception — with fifteen seats, call ahead whatever the night.
Say if it is an occasion. Small bars are good at birthdays and anniversaries when they know in advance, and hopeless at them when they find out at the table.
Practical Information
Getting around. Central Ubud is walkable, and Jl. Monkey Forest in particular has several of these bars within a few minutes of each other. Sayan, Kedewatan and the Viceroy grounds all need a car. Grab and Gojek work throughout, though availability thins late at night in the outer areas.
Closing times. Ubud runs early. Assume last orders somewhere between 11:00 PM and midnight and plan the running order accordingly: view bars first, speakeasies last. Whisper Cove at 1:00 AM is the latest on this list.
Payment. All the bars here accept international cards alongside Rupiah. Prices are typically quoted before tax and service charge, which each venue sets for itself, though most in Ubud land around 21% combined.
Non-alcoholic drinks. Ubud is unusually strong here. Night Rooster and Jati Bar both take zero-proof drinks as seriously as the rest of the list, which matters in a town with as many wellness travellers as this one.
A note on scooters. Do not ride one after drinking. Ubud's roads are dark and narrow, the bends are blind, and the hospital is in Denpasar.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best bar in Ubud?
Night Rooster, by most measures. It is listed on Asia's 50 Best Discovery, carries Tatler Best recognition for 2025 and 2026, appears on the Top 500 Bars list and holds a Taste Makers Award. Every cocktail is built around an Indonesian myth or folk tale, the team distils, ferments and infuses in house, and the Eccentric Eats food menu is good enough to eat a full dinner from. For atmosphere rather than technique, The Lair beneath the Campuhan bridge is the other answer.
What should I order at Night Rooster?
Ashes, the bar's most popular cocktail: vodka and whisky with blowtorched dehydrated fruit, house fortified wine and palm sugar syrup, finished with a cinnamon stick lit at the table. Then order from Eccentric Eats. The arancini, made with mushrooms grown at Locavore NXT and served with kimchi emulsion, and the beef heart pastrami sando are the two plates to start with.
Does Ubud have good nightlife?
Ubud has good bars rather than good nightlife. There are no clubs of any scale and most close between 11:00 PM and midnight. What it does have is a concentration of serious cocktail bars run by people working with local botanicals, fermentation and house-made ingredients. If you want a late night, Seminyak or Canggu. If you want a good drink, Ubud.
Do I need to book bars in Ubud?
Not usually for two people midweek. Yes for weekends, for groups of four or more, and for the smaller bars, which have few seats and fill first. Kawi has fifteen seats and is worth calling ahead for on any night. Night Rooster can be booked directly through Revasi with instant confirmation.
What time do bars in Ubud close?
Most run until somewhere between 11:00 PM and midnight. Apéritif Bar closes at 11:30 PM, Jati Bar at midnight, Kawi at midnight, and Whisper Cove goes latest at 1:00 AM. Plan an Ubud evening to start around six rather than ten.
Where can I drink with a view in Ubud?
Jati Bar at Four Seasons Sayan has the widest view, close to 360 degrees over rice paddies, rainforest and the Ayung River. The Sayan House Sunset Bar looks over the same gorge from ten minutes down the road and opens at 4:00 PM. The Lair has the most dramatic setting, built into the ravine above the Wos River beneath the Campuhan bridge. All three are best before dark.
Are there speakeasies in Ubud?
Yes, two worth knowing. Apéritif Bar occupies a colonial-style building in the Viceroy Bali grounds with a 1930s drinks list and a cigar humidor. Whisper Cove is hidden on the second floor above Maluku Restaurant on Monkey Forest Road and works best as a nightcap. Kawi in Kedewatan is not billed as a speakeasy but is just as hard to find.
Which Ubud bar is best for non-drinkers?
Night Rooster and Jati Bar both build zero-proof drinks with the same ingredients and technique as the rest of the list, rather than offering a token mocktail. Ubud's wellness crowd means this is better catered for here than in most of Bali.
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Regilio
Co-founder, Revasi
Passionate about the intersection of hospitality and technology. Helping restaurants discover digital tools to transform their dining room experiences and turn first-time guests into regulars.
