The Best Craft Beer Bars in San Francisco

A working brewery and tap room on 18th Street that produces around 800 barrels per year, most sold on-site. Mission Ferment Works specialises in California-style pale ales and lagers with a clean, West Coast sensibility: dry-hopped without becoming hazy, crisp without being thin. The tap room is narrow, loud, and exactly right for the neighbourhood. Thursday evenings have the best crowd and the freshest kegs.

Order: Flagship California pale ale or the current dry-hopped lager.

Thirty-eight taps in a design-forward space that attracts the tech industry crowd who take their craft beer as seriously as their product roadmaps. SoMa Tap Exchange has one of the strongest national selection in the city: six handles dedicated to East Coast IPAs, four to West Coast, and a rotating panel of sours from the country's best producers. The tap list updates Monday and Thursday. Worth visiting on both days.

Order: East Coast IPA versus West Coast IPA side-by-side. The contrast is the lesson.

A small tap room on the edge of Clarion Alley with 20 handles of Bay Area craft and a wall of local art that rotates monthly. Clarion Alley Tap is the most Mission-feeling bar on this list: unpretentious, community-oriented, and genuinely local. The tap list favours smaller Bay Area producers who do not have their own retail space, which means you will find beers here that are not available anywhere else in the city.

Order: Anything from a Bay Area producer you do not recognise. That is the point of coming here.

A bar that has been on Haight Street long enough to have served both the neighbourhood's current residents and their parents. Haight Street Beerworks converted from a general-beer bar to a craft-only tap room in 2016 and has not looked back. The 26-tap list covers California craft with genuine depth: the list shows you the difference between five Northern California IPAs, not just five IPAs. The building has original Victorian woodwork that survived the conversion intact.

Order: Northern California IPA flight. Four glasses, four very different expressions of the same idea.

The only bar in San Francisco dedicated exclusively to cask-conditioned and barrel-aged craft beer. Inner Richmond Cask Room runs 12 engines serving cask ales and 8 taps of barrel-aged beers, with a cellar of approximately 400 bottles for the serious drinker. The atmosphere is quiet and wood-panelled. The prices are high and worth every dollar. Come for one glass and plan on staying for three.

Order: Cask-conditioned pale ale and a bottle from the barrel-aged cellar. Compare them directly.

A shared brewery facility and tap room run as a cooperative by seven small San Francisco breweries that cannot individually afford Dogpatch warehouse rents. The result is a tap room where all seven producers pour simultaneously, giving you 28 handles of beer that exists nowhere else in the world. The rotating ownership model means a different brewer is typically behind the bar each day of the week. Come on a Thursday when the barrel programme releases new batches.

Order: Ask which brewer is on today and try their latest batch. Then try a second brewer's version of the same style.

The Castro's best craft beer bar runs 22 taps with a smart mix of California session beers and occasional national selections. Castro Tap House is where you come when you want good beer without the beer nerd atmosphere. The crowd is inclusive, the music is good, and the bar has been an anchor of the neighbourhood since 2015. The sidewalk seating fills immediately on any evening with weather above 60 degrees Fahrenheit.

Order: California session ale. Two of them. This is a relaxed visit.

A hillside tap room on upper Kansas Street with views across to the Bay on clear days. Potrero Hill Pour House has 20 taps that favour Northern California craft and a roof deck that is open whenever the San Francisco fog permits, which is more often than visitors expect. The beer list is not the deepest in the city but the setting makes it one of the most enjoyable places to drink in San Francisco on a clear afternoon.

Order: Bay Area pale ale. Roof deck. Bay view. End of instructions.

North Beach gets a lot of tourists and most bars in the area cater to them at the expense of quality. North Beach Brew Garden is the exception: a 30-tap bar that maintains a serious craft beer programme despite the foot traffic. The tap list covers California, the Pacific Northwest, and a rotating international selection. The outdoor seating along Columbus Avenue fills regardless of weather. Reserve a spot inside when possible.

Order: Pacific Northwest IPA or the rotating international handle. Avoid the tourist-facing specials board.

The most underrated craft beer bar in San Francisco by a significant margin. Glen Park Station Tap has 18 taps of California craft at prices that would be considered reasonable in Chicago and are considered almost charitable in San Francisco. The bar is small, the crowd is local, and the owners have been buying carefully since opening in 2019. The house lager at 6.50 dollars is the best value pint in the city.

Order: House lager. Then ask what the latest California small-batch IPA is.