The Best Wine Bars in Tbilisi

Tbilisi is known for its wine. Georgia has been making wine for about 8,000 years, and the capital pours amber qvevri wine, rare grapes and natural wine by the glass in small bars all over the center. Here's what you need to know about the 7 wine bars I'd pick, what a glass and a tasting cost, what to order, and how to string two or three bars into one evening.

The best wine bars in Tbilisi at a glance

Tbilisi's wine bars are small and personal, and several are run by winemakers themselves. Most pour by the glass, most sell bottles to take away, and amber wine is on nearly every list. Here is how my 7 picks compare.

The 7 best wine bars in Tbilisi, ranked

My order runs from the bar I'd send a first-time visitor to, down to the more specific picks. All 7 are worth a glass; the ranking is about who gets the most out of a single evening.

1. Vino Underground

If I had one evening and one wine bar, it would be this one. Vino Underground is a brick-walled basement on Galaktion Tabidze Street, a few minutes from Freedom Square, opened by a group of six natural winemakers. It was the first bar in Tbilisi devoted to natural wine, and it still drinks like a winemakers' bar: the list leans on small producers making amber wine in clay qvevri buried in the ground, with little or nothing added.

Glasses cost 10 to 20 GEL and bottles 35 to 120 GEL. It opens at 2 PM daily, so it works for a late-afternoon glass as well as an evening one, and it runs tastings too. Skip it if you want a full dinner menu; this is a place to drink, snack and talk.

2. Ferment Wine Bistro

Ferment is where I'd book dinner with the wine as the main event. It sits on the ground floor of a 19th-century building just off Gudiashvili Square, about 5 minutes' walk from Freedom Square, and it belongs to winemaker Rezi Tsetskhladze.

The list goes deep on rare Georgian grapes, qvevri wine and natural producers, and the kitchen cooks modern Georgian food to match. That means you can pair a skin-contact white with a proper plate instead of a bowl of nuts. It suits couples and small groups who want one long sit-down evening. For a quick glass on the way somewhere else, pick Wine Point instead, and on a Friday or Saturday I'd reserve a table here rather than walk in.

3. Sadzvele Wine Hub

The newest name on my list is also the biggest. Sadzvele opened in fall 2024 inside the 1896 Wine Factory N1 building on Vasil Petriashvili Street, and it runs as a wine bar, a wine school and an event room in one.

There are about 200 wines, qvevri on display and the factory's oldest cellar visible through glass, so a glass here comes with a small museum visit. Tastings are bookable, and this is where I'd book one if you want structure: someone walking you through grapes and regions instead of you guessing from a list. Wine Factory N1 also holds Kikodze Bar for cocktails and Teko's for tacos and margaritas, so the night carries on without a taxi.

4. Wine Point

Wine Point is my pick for a first tasting on a budget. It's a small bar on Ingorokva Street near Freedom Square with a list that leans toward pet-nats, amber wines and sparkling, which suits anyone who finds big tannic reds hard work. The room is small, so it works best for two to four people, and the weekend buffet is the cheapest good evening in this guide.

5. 8000 Vintages

8000 Vintages is a wine shop and bar with four branches in Tbilisi, and the one I use is on Kote Afkhazi Street in the Old Town. It works more like a bar than Vino Underground does: it opens at noon, pours glasses for 8 to 16 GEL and sells bottles from 28 to 90 GEL straight off the shelf.

The list mixes big wineries with small producers, which makes it a good place to try a famous label and a family qvevri wine side by side. Order a cheese and charcuterie board or a plate of pkhali with it, and ask for a sommelier tasting if you want one. It's my choice for a relaxed afternoon glass between sights in the Old Town.

6. Wine Code

Wine Code sits across the river in Avlabari, and it's the bar for people who want the story behind the glass. The staff talk you through terroir, there's a cellar room with a small qvevri on display, and the list includes a blue-tinted wine that takes its color from Saperavi skins. Order it once, if only to see it.

The tasting pours four wines plus high-proof spirits for 35 GEL and needs booking, so eat something first. If the spirits leave you curious, chacha, Georgia's grape brandy, is distilled from the skins and seeds left over after winemaking, and the strong homemade kind starts at about 45%.

7. Warehouse at Stamba

Warehouse is the least formal wine bar here, and that's the appeal. It sits in the Stamba courtyard on Merab Kostava Street: walk past the plant pergola and the entrance is on the left. There is no menu. A few open bottles stand on ice, Georgian and European, and you pick from whatever is open.

It doubles as a bottle shop, so it's the easiest place on this list to buy wine for the suitcase, and it keeps evening hours, from 3 PM to midnight. Skip it if you need a printed list to choose from. Come if you like being told what's good tonight.

More natural wine bars and shops in Tbilisi

The 7 above are the ones I'd plan an evening around. These are smaller or more specific, and good to know if you're staying nearby or chasing a particular producer.

What to order at a Tbilisi wine bar

Order Georgian. The European bottles are fine, but the reason to drink wine in Tbilisi is the stuff you can't find at home: amber wine, grapes you've never heard of and natural producers who sell most of what they make inside the country.

My rule for a first round is one amber, one red and one surprise. An amber wine fermented on its skins shows you what Georgia does differently, a Saperavi shows you the flagship red, and the surprise is whatever the bartender is excited about that night.

If you fall for a style, the Georgian wines to look for by name include Mukuzani for oak-aged Saperavi and Tsinandali for a dry white blend of Rkatsiteli and Mtsvane.

What wine costs in Tbilisi bars

Wine is cheap here by Western European standards, and good wine is cheaper still. A glass in most wine bars costs 8 to 18 GEL, which means three glasses at Vino Underground come to 30 to 60 GEL. Most bars take cards, so you rarely need a stack of lari, though cash still helps in Georgia for small cafes and market stalls.

Wine bars by neighborhood: plan your evening

Tbilisi's wine bars cluster in four areas, and picking one area for the night saves you taxis and lets you drink at a gentle pace.

Sololaki and Freedom Square. This is the best wine neighborhood in the city. Wine Point is on Ingorokva Street, Vino Underground is on Galaktion Tabidze Street, and Ferment is just off Gudiashvili Square, all a short walk apart. Sololaki's old merchant streets also make the walk between them a pleasure. If half your group would rather drink cocktails, 41 Art of Drinks, a basement cocktail bar, is a few doors along from Vino Underground on the same street.

The Old Town. 8000 Vintages is on Kote Afkhazi Street, and the lanes around it hold plenty of small bars with wine by the glass, plus Erekle II Street with its outdoor tables and string lights. It's the area for an afternoon glass after walking the old town's lanes and balconies.

Vera. Sadzvele Wine Hub sits in Wine Factory N1 on Vasil Petriashvili Street, and Warehouse is in the Stamba courtyard on Merab Kostava Street. Vera's leafy streets connect the two, and both have food and cocktails close by, so this is the area for a longer, later night.

Avlabari. Wine Code is the reason to cross the river. Avlabari, on the left bank, is quieter in the evening, so I'd go for the tasting and come back to Sololaki afterward.

My favorite way to do it is one neighborhood, three stops, one dinner:

Ordering the ride in an app is the easy part of the night: taxis in Tbilisi run around the clock, and the unlicensed cars waiting outside late-night venues are the ones that overcharge.

Which wine bar suits you

• Your first night in Tbilisi: Vino Underground. It's the clearest introduction to natural and qvevri wine, and it opens early enough to start there.
• Dinner and wine as one plan: Ferment Wine Bistro, with a table booked for a weekend.
• A proper tasting with someone explaining: Sadzvele Wine Hub or Wine Code. A booked wine tasting in Tbilisi costs about 35 to 45 GEL in the bars, and they need notice.
• Drinking well on a budget: Wine Point's weekend buffet or its 10 to 15 GEL wine of the day.
• Buying bottles to fly home with: Warehouse or 8000 Vintages, where the shelf is the menu. The best wine shops in Tbilisi carry wider stock if you want a case.

Where a wine bar is the wrong pick:

• You want to see where the wine is made. A bar can't show you a vineyard. A Kakheti wine tour from Tbilisi puts you in cellars 2 hours away, from about 100 GEL on a budget group tour.
• Your group mostly drinks beer or cocktails. Galaktion Tabidze Street handles a mixed group, but a dedicated wine bar will bore them.