This great corner pub and takeaway shop is favored by members of the city’s restaurant community. Beer varieties and styles include regional German and Belgian brews, and British-style craft brewing. The special focus is on locally made beers and natural wines. Snacks include oversized bags of Spanish Torres chips, as well as tins of Perello olives, based on traditional pub snack offerings.

The entrance to this Queen Street lounge is hidden at the back of a faux barber shop with a bright red storefront. A giveaway that it’s a facade: Haircuts and shaves are priced at 25¢. Downstairs, the bar comprises multiple rooms with more energy than most speakeasy-style spots and an advanced menu with drinks for under £10. The Red Panda is a savory mix of gin, tomato and sriracha, topped with Guinness foam. The Birdcage is made with scotch and Aperol flavored with spiced cinnamon smoke.

One of Edinburgh’s top breweries has a taproom with a view of its vast tanks. The bar at the end of the white brick-walled space has nine beers on tap, including its bestselling super crisp, German-style pilsner. A couple of fridges are filled with such Newbarns cans containing, for instance, easy-drinking Table Beer Mosaic and potent 11% Plain Dark Beer, a stout. In lieu of serving food, Newbarns keeps delivery menus on hand from such local spots as Razzo Pizza Napoletana.

At this small, sunny natural bar and wine shop from Matt Jackson, any bottle on the shelf can be opened for a £10 surcharge. Among wines he might pour by the glass are the refreshing white Bel from the Czech Republic and the deep-flavored, engagingly titled red wine & Walked Abroad In Lychee Showers that’s made with Italian grapes by Leisure Wine in south London. To accompany the pours, small plates and snacks include such dishes as beef and carrot jerky, salami picante and steamed crab buns.

What used to be a prop-and-costume warehouse is now an exceptional restaurant with Scandi-style decor and one of the country’s best wine lists. There’s an emphasis on natural bottlings and back vintages, with more than a dozen Jura wines and several heavy-hitting barolos. Cocktails include a spiced rum old fashioned and booze-free negronis. It’s well worth ordering the £85 tasting menu with local ingredients such as scallops with smoked roe; for an additional £65, you’ll get the wine pairings.

Just a quick walk from Edinburgh Castle, this pub hides down a few steps on a dead-end street. A red sign gives it away, as do some outdoor tables. An extensive, rotating selection of beers highlight small UK breweries such as Leith Juice from Campervan Brewery, along with some imports like Oude Geuze Boon, from Belgium. In addition to the requisite whisky pours, several well-chosen British ciders are on hand.

In a former Bank of Scotland building, this restaurant has high ceilings, vast windows and a very good, long, Old World wine list punctuated with a few New World selections. Options include the 2005 Didier Dagueneau Silex (£330 a bottle) and the Double Pinot from Westwell in Kent. The daily-changing, Anglo-Mediterranean menu—with such dishes as linguine with mussels and lemon and succulent, crispy porchetta with turnip tops—is wonderful.

Behind a handsome, blue, big-windowed storefront, this clean, modern bar is squarely focused on wines from around the world, plus cheese and small plates. The list has such English sparklers as Albury Estate Classic Cuvée. There’s citrusy Yannick Chablis and rich, spicy Kunin Syrah from Santa Barbara, California. The food menu features alluring grilled cheeses, including taleggio and bacon jam, to go with sausage rolls and cheese and charcuterie boards.

1820 Rooftop Bar, above busy Princes Street and the Johnnie Walker superstore, is packed with merchandise and immersive experiences. It’s one of the best places to look out over Edinburgh, drink in hand. Along with such cocktails named for flavors as Maple + Nutmeg (with rye and amaro), there are zero-proof drinks and pours from the house bottles like Blue Label blended whisky (at £18).

This destination cocktail bar in Leith pays homage to the area’s past in seagoing and shipping. The menu makes for lovely reading: It shouts of trade routes with drinks like Sweet Victory (vodka, lemongrass sorbet, bitters and sparkling sherry) and a history of making wine and then whisky bottles: The Great British Drink Off features vermouth, whisky and rejuvenated apple cordial. The long whisky list is worth a journey.

On a well-traveled street in Edinburgh’s Old Town, the Bow Bar offers an absurdly fine escape from the tourist madness. The place stocks more than 300 whiskies on the crowded shelves of its wooden back bar, from single-cask selections to new releases. A handful of beers and ales are on tap at the cozy, red-ceilinged spot with no-frills tables and chairs. This place is hardly unknown, having been crowned best bar at the Scottish Hospitality Awards three times in the past five years.