There’s an undeniable romance to café scenes in cities all over France. When you’re sitting at a little café table, leisurely sipping coffee or nibbling a croissant, you’ll understand why “people watching” is such a popular French pastime. But if you’re more interested in what’s in your cup than who’s walking past, we’ve come up with a wonderful selection of some of the best cafes in Bordeaux.

Cafés are abundant throughout France, and especially so in a city as large as Bordeaux. You likely won’t need to walk far to find a café or two (or five) where you can get a decent cup of coffee and perhaps even a snack. There are some cafés, however, where the coffee or the food or the atmosphere—or all of the above—make a longer walk worth it.

Some of the best cafés on our list are all business, focused on serving perfect coffee to discerning crowds, while others supplement the coffee menu with a variety of snacks or even full meals. Some are barely bigger than a shoebox, while others occupy multiple floors. With so many cafés to choose from throughout the city, and the criteria for what makes a café great being so subjective, we invite you to use this list as a starting point for your exciting exploration of the best cafes in Bordeaux.

7 of the Best Cafes in Bordeaux

L’Alchimiste Café Boutique

12 rue Vieille Tour

Ask just about anyone who knows Bordeaux and they’ll invariably say that L’Alchimiste is one of the city’s most popular cafés. The coffee connoisseur behind the café first opened a coffee roaster, providing his beans to restaurants and hotels around the city. The roasting location is still part café, but it’s the cozy outpost in the city center that really draws the crowds.

Bring your coffee cravings, but plan to eat elsewhere—this menu is all coffee. If you want to get even deeper into the science (or alchemy) of coffee, you can sign up for one of L’Alchimiste’s workshops. There are four to choose from, including one about creating latte art, and all workshops take place at the roastery location.

La Pelle Café

29 Rue Notre Dame

One of the owners of La Pelle hails from Brazil and spent some of his early years in the coffee industry in Italy, giving him an excellent multicultural background for opening a coffee roastery and café in France. He brings in beans from several different countries in Central America and Africa, and the roasting is done on-site.

You can have brunch or lunch at La Pelle, where the dishes have a somewhat unexpected international flair—most of the menu options incorporate flavors more traditionally found in Asian cuisine. There are also light snacks and sweets available to accompany your coffee.

Møna

20 rue Vieille Tour

This bright café takes its decorative inspiration from Scandinavia, as you might have gathered by the spelling of the name. Møna is well-known in Bordeaux for its gorgeous (and delicious) cakes and desserts made in-house, but there are great savory options for breakfast and lunch, too.

While you can get a variety of coffee drinks at Møna, it also boasts a great tea selection as well as organic juices and fresh lemonade. On Saturdays, you can enjoy a leisurely—and very filling—brunch.

Insider’s tip: No need to be intimidated when entering one of these wonderful cafés. Take a look at our guide for learning all the local lingo you’ll need to order coffee in France.

SIP Coffee Bar

69 Bis Rue des Trois-Conils

In addition to the great coffee you’d expect from a French café, SIP Coffee Bar in central Bordeaux also has a food menu with both savory and sweet items. It’s a great place to have breakfast, brunch, or lunch. Choose from crepes, granola, eggs, soups, salads, and sandwiches, and even some atypical (at least for France) snacks—like banana bread.

The coffee menu has a global feel, too—you can get a flat white or a bottled coffee, for instance—and the coffee served on any given day can come from a selection of European roasters. (They don’t roast their own at SIP.) The spacious café has two floors, with ample seating at tables and a few sofas, but you can get a coffee to go if you’re in a rush.

Café Piha

69 Rue des Ayres

The coffee at Café Piha is roasted on-site, so the air is heavy with the scent of coffee long before you raise your cup to your nose. The concept of getting coffee to go isn’t exactly unknown in France, but it’s certainly not standard. But Café Piha goes the extra mile to encourage customers to relax and linger over their brew, with seating that’s more couches than traditional café tables and chairs.

Tea drinkers aren’t forgotten at Café Piha, and there’s also a nice variety of pastries, snacks, and sweets on the menu. They have a number of coffee workshops you can sign up for, too, including one covering different roasting and processing methods.

Books & Coffee

26 rue St James

This Bordeaux café is frequently busy, since it’s located near one of the city’s main attractions: the Grosse Cloche. But it’s not just the location that draws the crowds, it’s the café itself, too. Books & Coffee roasts their coffee on-site, and the coffee menu includes things like coffee milkshakes, chai frappes, and matcha alongside the usual coffee drinks you’d expect at a French café.

The breakfast, brunch, and lunch menus are more extensive than your standard coffee shop, too. In addition to continental or savory breakfasts, there are sandwiches, salads, and a variety of rösti—fried potato pancakes more typical of the Alsace-Lorraine region of France. There’s even a “chicken waffle” on the daily brunch menu, plus a big brunch served on Sundays. The beverage options complement the food, with a selection of beer, wine, or cider besides all the coffee and tea.

KURO Espresso Bar

5 rue Mautrec 

It might be easy to miss a little café like KURO Espresso Bar, but the smell of roasting coffee helps lead you in the right direction. You can choose from the usual array of coffee drinks, plus an assortment of teas and freshly pressed fruit and vegetable juices. 

There are always baked goods available, made in-house, and the lunch menu features homemade and seasonal quiche and soups. Seating inside is fairly limited, but there are a few small outdoor tables on the patio if the weather is conducive to dining outside.

Well, now that you’ve explored the best cafes in Bordeaux, it’s time to use that charged-up energy on a fabulous walking tour of the beautiful city. Known for its historic sites as well as exceptional cuisine and world-famous wines, the Ultimate Bordeaux Food Tour, offers a seven-stop food tour of the best food and wine spots in all of Bordeaux.