The Best Bars in Edinburgh for a Stag or Hen Do

Edinburgh's best trick is that you can walk a whole night out. The bars worth your time sit in a few tight clusters, so a group can drift from a slick cocktail to a proper party bar without a single taxi. Here are the ones we send groups to, sorted by the kind of night you are after.

Cocktail bars with a bit of theatre

• The Alchemist on George Street does molecular cocktails with smoke, colour changes and a bit of show. It is big, group-friendly, and a good opener.
• Panda & Sons hides a speakeasy behind a fake barber shop in the New Town. Stylish and a touch intimate, so it suits a group that wants to start classy. Book ahead.
• The Devil's Advocate, tucked down Advocate's Close off the Royal Mile, is a Victorian pump house with cocktails and a huge whisky list. Atmospheric and central, and it handles groups well.

Whisky bars for a slower pint

You are in Scotland, so build in one stop that takes it seriously.

• The Bow Bar at the Grassmarket end of Victoria Street is a traditional pub with 300-plus single malts and no music or machines. Perfect for a whisky pause, not a rowdy base.
• Whiski Rooms by The Mound runs group whisky tastings daily, which makes a great structured hour before the night gets loud. Pair it with our whisky tasting if you want it organised for you.

Full-on party venues

• The Three Sisters on the Cowgate is a huge multi-bar pub with a courtyard and karaoke pods, and it runs its own stag and hen packages. It is a prime base for a big group.
• The Voodoo Rooms near St Andrew Square is an ornate bar with live-music rooms that books parties large and small.
• Out in Leith, Nauticus is a bartender's bar for a group that genuinely cares about the drinks. It is a short taxi from the centre, so treat it as a destination rather than a crawl stop.

Where the bars cluster

Two zones do most of the work. The Cowgate and Grassmarket are the beating heart of a stag or hen night, wall-to-wall bars a couple of minutes apart. George Street in the New Town is the smarter, dressier strip. Base yourself near one of them and the whole night is walkable, which is exactly why we point groups at these areas to stay.

Let us run the night

The easiest way to do a first night is to not plan it at all. Our guided pub crawl walks your group between the right bars and skips the queues, and when you are ready to keep going, our nightclubs guide picks up where the bars leave off. Or let us build the whole weekend: get a quote or talk to a planner.