New Bars, Cafés and Restaurants in Liverpool: 2026 Openings

This guide now covers 35 notable bars, cafés, pubs and restaurants confirmed open in Liverpool during 2026, from neighbourhood pubs in Woolton and Gateacre to new city-centre restaurants, coffee shops and late bars. It is a curated list rather than a database of every takeaway or temporary trader, with the focus on openings useful enough to plan a visit around.

Last checked: 24 September 2026. The main list covers Liverpool proper and keeps late-2025 openings separate. Liverpool City Region openings outside the city, including Kirkby and Southport, are not included in the 2026 count. Venues that are announced but not yet trading belong on the L1Local openings and closures tracker.

Latest Liverpool openings

September has added another run of confirmed openings. Tavern Co Social is now trading on Water Street, Slim Chickens has opened on Edge Lane, DeeDee's Den & Dive has begun its phased launch in Ropewalks, and both Elixir and Coffee King opened at the start of the month. Soho's Coffee has also started trading inside the long-running Bold Street shop.

• 18 September: Tavern Co Social, Water Street.
• 17 September: Slim Chickens, Liverpool Shopping Park.
• 12 September: DeeDee's Den & Dive, Ropewalks.
• Early September: Soho's Coffee, Bold Street.
• 2 September: Elixir Liverpool, Queen Square.
• 1 September: Coffee King, Myrtle Street.

New bars, cafés and restaurants opened in Liverpool in 2026

The table is deliberately limited to notable confirmed openings. It is not intended to count every new takeaway, temporary trader or Liverpool City Region venue outside the city boundary. For places that are announced but not yet trading, use the live openings tracker.

How this list is checked

For a venue to go into the main table, we need evidence that it has opened in 2026 and is trading in Liverpool. We prefer the venue's own site or social account, official property or shopping-centre information, council licensing records and first-hand opening announcements. Where the exact day is not securely published, the table uses a month or season rather than guessing. Rebrands and major relaunches can be included where they create a genuinely new venue, but temporary pop-ups and places still described only as coming soon are left out.

Tavern Co Social

Where: New Zealand House, 18 Water Street, city centre
Opened: 18 September 2026
Type: Bar, restaurant and sports venue

The team behind The Tavern Co on Smithdown Road has opened a city-centre second site in the former Hooters and Newz Bar unit on Water Street. The opening announcement gives 18 September as the launch date. The 120-cover venue carries over the breakfast and brunch side of The Tavern Co, then shifts towards tapas, craft beer, larger dishes and live sport later in the day.

Slim Chickens at Liverpool Shopping Park

Where: Unit 38, Liverpool Shopping Park, Edge Lane, L13 1EU
Opened: 17 September 2026
Type: Chicken restaurant

Slim Chickens has opened its second Liverpool restaurant at Liverpool Shopping Park. Liverpool Shopping Park confirms the 17 September opening. The menu is built around chicken tenders, wings, sandwiches and wraps, and the site has free parking around the retail park.

DeeDee's Den & Dive

Where: 39-41 Fleet Street, Ropewalks, with the venue promoted from the Wood Street side
Opened: 12 September 2026
Type: Live music and dive bar

DeeDee's Den & Dive is the sister venue to Diego's Demise. Post-opening coverage confirms that it opened on 12 September as a phased two-floor launch. The concept mixes country, classic rock and rock 'n' roll with a free jukebox, live performers, flavoured whiskies and American-style food.

Soho's Coffee

Where: Inside Soho's, 80 Bold Street, with access from the shop and Wood Street side
Opened: Early September 2026
Type: Independent coffee shop

A new independent café has started trading inside the long-running Soho's clothing store on Bold Street. The Guide Liverpool's opening report says owner Remy Ward is using local suppliers including Fudgemental, Cuthbert's and Neighbourhood Coffee. The café occupies the back of the ground floor, with plans for additional downstairs seating.

Elixir Liverpool

Where: 4 Queen Square, city centre
Opened: 2 September 2026
Type: Tapas restaurant and cocktail bar
More: our opening-week report

Elixir expanded from Oxton into Queen Square with a staged opening at the start of September. Elixir's own launch page lists 2 September as the official opening date, with softer opening nights on 1 and 2 September before the full launch weekend. The Liverpool venue centres on tapas, cocktails and live music.

Coffee King Myrtle Street

Where: 1B Myrtle Street, Georgian Quarter, L7 7DN
Opened: 1 September 2026
Type: Coffee shop
More: our opening-week report

Coffee King's Myrtle Street café opened as the company's new Liverpool flagship close to the universities, Hope Street and the Philharmonic Hall. Coffee King's own announcement confirms the 1 September date. The site is aimed partly at students and remote workers, with Wi-Fi, plug sockets and a daytime café menu.

Chick-fil-A Liverpool

Where: 85-89 Lord Street, city centre, L2 6PG
Opened: 27 August 2026
Type: Chicken restaurant

Chick-fil-A opened its Liverpool restaurant on Lord Street on 27 August. The company's opening announcement confirms the date, while the Liverpool location page now lists the restaurant as open. This is one of the year's larger chain arrivals rather than an independent opening, but the first Liverpool site is significant enough to include.

The Angel Inn

Where: 90 Bold Street, city centre
Opened: 12 August 2026
Type: Traditional cask ale pub
More: full entry in our independents directory

The former Maggie May's premises on upper Bold Street has become The Angel Inn, a two-floor pub built around hand-pulled cask ale, stout, cider and spirits rather than a late-bar format. It is one of the year's more useful additions for drinkers specifically looking for a traditional pub in the Bold Street and Ropewalks area.

Village Cat

Where: 5-7 Allerton Road, Woolton Village, L25 7RA
Opened: 31 July 2026
Type: Independent neighbourhood pub
More: full entry in our independents directory

Village Cat is the fourth Liverpool venue from the Black Cat team. It occupies the former Coast Café Bistro site in Woolton and combines cask ale, craft beer and cocktails with two beer gardens and a smaller snug. Black Cat's official site now lists the Woolton venue as open.

The Black Horse & Rainbow

Where: 21–23 Berry Street, Ropewalks
Opened: 24 July 2026
Type: Bar, beer garden and entertainment venue
More: full entry in our independents directory

The former Red Door building on Berry Street has reopened as The Black Horse & Rainbow after a £750,000 redevelopment. The three-storey venue has a beer garden with room for around 250 people, heated outdoor terraces and a separate function room, with continental beers, cocktails and a garden barbecue menu.

The name comes from the original Black Horse and Rainbow, which ran on Berry Street from 1990. The new venue is run by DGB Hospitality Group, which operates several other bars and cafés around Liverpool.

Shrimp & Co

Where: 50–52 Hanover Street, city centre
Opened: 21 July 2026
Type: Seafood restaurant
More: full entry in our independents directory

Shrimp & Co has opened its first Liverpool restaurant near Liverpool ONE. The menu centres on seafood boils, prawns, mussels and crab with a choice of sauces and spice levels, plus grilled dishes and sharing platters. It's the chain's fifth UK site, after Leicester, Birmingham and London.

McSwiggin's: House of Stout

Where: 25 Fenwick Street, city centre
Opened: 15 July 2026
Type: Irish pub
More: full entry in our independents directory

McSwiggin's has moved into Castle Moat House, the Grade II-listed building at the corner of Fenwick Street and Lower Castle Street, empty until now. The two-storey pub mixes traditional Irish drinking-house style with live entertainment and televised sport, with stout and Irish beers doing most of the work behind the bar.

Hickory's Smokehouse Gateacre

Where: 24-26 Gateacre Brow, Gateacre, L25 3PB
Opened: 17 July 2026
Type: American smokehouse restaurant

Hickory's opened its Gateacre restaurant on 17 July, bringing the chain's Southern-style smokehouse format into Liverpool itself. Hickory's opening announcement confirms the date and address. The restaurant focuses on smoked barbecue, burgers and American-style drinks in the former neighbourhood hospitality site on Gateacre Brow.

Kiku Hifi

Where: 40 Gradwell Street, Ropewalks
Opened: 13 July 2026
Type: Coffee shop and listening bar
More: read our full Kiku Hifi guide or see the directory entry

Kiku Hifi is a Japanese-inspired café by day and a listening bar by night, built around vintage hi-fi equipment, records and resident DJs rather than a background playlist. It's from the team behind Suono, Liverpool's Tokyo-inspired listening bar. By day it serves speciality coffee and pastries from local roaster Little Moments; by evening the menu shifts to cocktails, wine and beer.

Goldie's

Where: 8 Colquitt Street, Ropewalks, L1 4DE
Opened: 6 July 2026
Type: New York-style pizza slice bar

Goldie's moved from being the pizza operation inside PINS Social Club into a standalone Colquitt Street venue on 6 July. The opening announcement gives the date. The venue sells 22-inch New York and New Haven-inspired pies by the slice or whole, with a drinks list that includes local and craft beer. Goldie's official site now lists the Colquitt Street address and daily hours.

The Dubliner

Where: 2 Temple Court, Cavern Quarter, L2 6PY
Opened: July 2026
Type: Irish pub

The Dubliner opened in the former Revolution and Revolver site at Temple Court after a major refurbishment. Post-opening information from the venue's PR team was published on 9 July and confirms it was already open, with live music, Irish sport and daily trading planned. Because the exact first trading day is not clearly stated, this guide records July rather than guessing a date.

Dock & Brew

Where: 352B St Mary's Road, Garston
Opened: July 2026
Type: Independent coffee shop
More: full entry in our independents directory

Dock & Brew is a new family-run coffee shop on the corner of St Mary's Road and Garston Old Road, converted from a former blinds showroom. It serves speciality coffee, cakes and changing daily specials, sit-in or takeaway. It's a genuinely local opening rather than another city-centre hospitality unit, which makes it one of the more useful additions this year if you're actually in Garston.

Twenty

Where: Smithdown Place, south Liverpool
Opened: 16 May 2026
Type: Food, natural wine and independent retail venue

Twenty opened inside the former bank at Smithdown Place on 16 May. Its launch coverage confirms the date and describes a mixed venue combining seasonal small plates and natural wine with floristry and independent retail. It sits slightly outside the conventional restaurant model, but the food-and-drink offer is substantial enough to include.

McNasty's

Where: 43 Seel Street, Ropewalks, L1 4AZ
Opened: Spring 2026
Type: Irish pub and live music bar

McNasty's replaced the former Zanzibar nightclub on Seel Street with an Irish-pub format built around Guinness, live music, sport and late opening. Liverpool's current licensing register confirms the venue and operator, while contemporary visits show it trading by spring 2026. The precise first public trading day has not been located in a sufficiently strong source, so the guide records the season rather than attaching a false exact date.

Lane & Brew

Where: 83 Lark Lane, Aigburth
Opened: Spring 2026
Type: Café and Mediterranean restaurant
More: full entry in our independents directory

Lane & Brew started as a breakfast and brunch café before extending into an all-day restaurant. Mornings are eggs Benedict, toast and sandwiches; later on, the kitchen turns Mediterranean and Turkish, with kebabs, pasta and seafood. It's family-friendly and dog-friendly, with evening service ending earlier than most conventional restaurants.

CasaCillo

Where: Duke Street, city centre
Opened: June 2026
Type: Italian restaurant

The Cillo family launched CasaCillo on Duke Street in June, alongside sister venue Botanico. The launch report describes a 36-seat restaurant with an all-weather terrace and tableside Italian cooking. It is a separate dining concept rather than another Botanico room, so it is counted as its own 2026 opening.

White Tiger

Where: King's Dock
Opened: 19 May 2026
Type: Contemporary Indian restaurant
More: full entry in our independents directory

White Tiger has opened on the waterfront with a menu split between what the owners call "Indian Soul" and "Hakka Fire", pairing traditional Indian dishes with Hakka and Indo-Chinese flavours. It was founded by Merseyside doctors Meenal Abhyankar and Dhanya Kalathil, who met at the school gates and bonded over Indian food and twenty years of building lives in Liverpool. It's a locally founded concept in an area otherwise dominated by hotels and arena visitors.

Crabbish

Where: 52 Duke Street, city centre
Opened: 21 April 2026
Type: Seafood-boil restaurant

Crabbish specialises in Louisiana-style seafood boils: seafood, potatoes, corn and seasoning cooked together and poured onto a paper-covered table, bibs and gloves provided, eaten with your hands. You can order smaller mixed-seafood bags or large group packages with lobster tails, prawns, mussels and clams. It's Crabbish's second UK site after its original in Manchester.

Parliament Square Coffee

Where: Cook Street, business district
Opened: 27 March 2026
Type: Speciality coffee shop, bakery and brunch venue

Liverpool-founded Parliament Square Coffee opened its largest site yet on Cook Street: 3,500 square feet with a sit-in café, a separate takeaway counter and an in-house bakery led by former Bakesale baker Jess Garland. There's also a bookable meeting room for up to 12, useful if you work around Castle Street. It's the brand's third Liverpool site, after Parliament Street and Clarence Street.

Baby Temp'l

Where: Beneath The Liverpool pub, James Street
Opened: March 2026
Type: Basement Irish bar

Baby Temp'l is an underground Irish bar beneath The Liverpool pub, focused on live music and late-night drinks. It's smaller and more intimate than the large Irish-themed venues that have opened around the city centre in recent years, and it's a short walk from James Street station and the waterfront.

Bistro Lao

Where: 16 Rodney Street, Georgian Quarter, L1 2TE
Opened: March 2026
Type: Laotian restaurant

Bistro Lao opened on Rodney Street in March from Wai and Vikki Teh, the family behind Tiger Rock. The opening report describes the restaurant as a separate Laotian concept based on family recipes, while Liverpool City Council's licensing register confirms the Rodney Street premises.

Permit Room Liverpool

Where: Exchange Court, 1 Dale Street
Opened: 5 March 2026
Type: Indian café, restaurant and bar

Dishoom made its Liverpool debut with a Permit Room inside Exchange Court, a Grade II-listed former bank building. Permit Room is a more informal, drinks-led concept than Dishoom's main restaurants: curries, grilled dishes and bar snacks, with cocktails and music doing a lot of the evening's work. At around 5,250 square feet, it's one of the largest restaurant arrivals of the year.

DeLuca's

Where: 2 Concert Square
Opened: 25 February 2026
Type: Sports bar, games venue and nightclub

DeLuca's is a 700-capacity venue across three floors in Concert Square: a Game Lounge with big screens for live sport, a Club Room with pool, shuffleboard and darts, and an all-weather terrace overlooking the square. Underneath it all is One Below, a separate late-night club, which makes DeLuca's closer to a sports bar and entertainment complex than a conventional bar.

Gracy's

Where: 50 Brunswick Street, city centre, L2 0PL
Opened: February 2026
Type: Bar, live music and private function venue

Gracy's launched in February in the former Liver Suite behind the Moody Blues bar, close to the waterfront and Royal Liver Building. Launch coverage introduced it as a standalone venue for live local bands, themed nights and private events, while Gracy's current official site confirms the Brunswick Street address, daytime food and drink offer and private bar/function use.

Deco Lounge

Where: 65-67 Bold Street, city centre, L1 4EZ
Opened: February 2026
Type: All-day café-bar

Deco Lounge took over the former LEAF premises on Bold Street in February. Loungers' official venue page confirms the current site and all-day café-bar format, while the operator's launch material confirms it opened in February. It is a chain opening, but the reuse of one of Bold Street's largest hospitality spaces makes it a significant change to the street.

Bold Street Coffee at The Climbing Hangar

Where: The Matchworks, Units 14 and 15, 40 Speke Road
Opened: February 2026
Type: Coffee shop and brunch café

Bold Street Coffee's first South Liverpool site sits inside The Climbing Hangar at The Matchworks, but you don't need to climb or book anything to use it. It's the same speciality coffee, breakfast and filled brioche buns as the Bold Street original, with longer weekday hours that make it a genuine option if you work near Speke Road.

Botanico Duke Street

Where: Duke Street, city centre
Opened: 30 January 2026
Type: Italian-inspired all-day restaurant

The former Il Forno on Duke Street has become a new city-centre branch of Botanico, run by the same Cillo family that opened the original Botanico in Woolton Village in 2023. It moves through the day from coffee and pastries to lunch, afternoon tea and evening dining, with Italian cooking as the throughline and a Sunday roast alongside it.

Bold Street Coffee at Duke Street Market

Where: Duke Street Market, 46 Duke Street, L1 5AS
Opened: January 2026
Type: Coffee and brunch counter

Bold Street Coffee opened a new Duke Street Market site in January, adding its speciality coffee and all-day breakfast menu to the market. GSG Hospitality's announcement confirms the opening, and Duke Street Market now lists the kitchen and its current hours.

Shandon Bells

Where: 88 Hope Street, Georgian Quarter, L1 9BW
Opened: January 2026
Type: Irish pub and cask ale house

Shandon Bells opened next to Liverpool Philharmonic Hall in January as an Irish-themed traditional pub. Liverpool CAMRA's current entry records the January opening and lists regular and changing cask beers. That makes it relevant both to the general new-pub list and to the craft and cask section below.

Chapel & Barrel

Where: Hotel Indigo, 10 Chapel Street, L3 9AG
Opened: January 2026
Type: Restaurant and bar

Chapel & Barrel replaced the former Marco Pierre White restaurant inside Hotel Indigo with a more casual restaurant-and-bar format. Opening coverage published on 5 January confirmed the venue had launched, while Hotel Indigo's current dining page lists Chapel & Barrel as its operating restaurant.

Still worth knowing from late 2025: Dead Crafty on Allerton Road

Where: 97 Allerton Road, Allerton, L18 2DD
Opened: 12 December 2025
What it is: The second site from Dead Crafty Beer Company, whose original bar and bottle shop is at 92 Dale Street in the city centre.

The Dale Street bar built its reputation on range: taps that rotate through independent breweries, and fridges holding a couple of hundred bottles and cans to drink in or take away. The Allerton Road site brings that to south Liverpool, where the strip already has the evening trade but had nothing doing craft beer at that depth.

It is the one late-2025 beer opening that still changes where you would go for a drink in 2026, which is why it is here rather than left off for being a few weeks early.

Our Dead Crafty entry covers the Dale Street original. Source: Dead Crafty Beer Company.

New craft beer and beer-led openings in Liverpool

Searches for new craft beer bars bring a lot of people to this guide, but not every new pub above is really a craft-beer venue. These are the openings where the beer offer is a central reason to go.

Dead Crafty is the only venue in that table that opened in 2025, so it is not included in the 35-place 2026 count. It stays here because its Allerton Road site materially changed the south Liverpool craft-beer choice going into 2026.

If you want the established places rather than the new ones, our best craft beer bars in Liverpool guide covers the taprooms and pubs. Dead Crafty on Dale Street, Black Lodge Brewing's taproom near King's Dock and the Ship & Mitre are longstanding options and are not part of the new-opening count.

If you would rather someone else picked the venues, the operator's Liverpool craft beer tour runs on Saturdays at 1.30pm, lasts about three and a half hours, visits four venues and includes ten one-third-pint beers. You can book the tour through LoveToVisit. It starts in Liverpool city centre and is for over-18s only. This is an affiliate link, so L1 Local may earn a commission if you book through it, at no extra cost to you.

What this year's openings show

The expanded list makes one thing clear: 2026 has not been only a city-centre restaurant story. Water Street, Queen Square, Bold Street, Duke Street, Ropewalks and Liverpool ONE have taken a lot of the bigger openings, but Woolton, Gateacre, Garston, Lark Lane and Smithdown have all added venues aimed much more directly at people who live nearby.

The formats are mixed too. There are independent cask pubs, listening bars, speciality coffee shops, a Laotian restaurant, seafood boils, Italian dining, a smokehouse, sports bars and major chain arrivals. That makes the year harder to reduce to one trend, but it also explains why broad searches for new Liverpool bars and cafés are landing on the same page.

For beer specifically, the strongest new additions are spread across several parts of the city: Village Cat in Woolton, Shandon Bells on Hope Street, The Angel Inn on Bold Street, Goldie's on Colquitt Street and The Black Horse & Rainbow on Berry Street all give drinkers something different from another generic late bar.

Opening dates and hours can change. Check directly with a venue before making a special trip. For announced openings, closures and the newest changes, use the L1Local openings tracker.