Tbilisi Pub Crawls: The Organized Crawls and DIY Bar Routes

Tbilisi is known for cheap drinks, chacha and bars packed close together in Sololaki and around Freedom Square, which makes it an easy city to crawl. Here's what you need to know about the organized pub crawls, which one to book, the bars I'd put on a DIY route and what a night out costs.

Tbilisi pub crawls at a glance

Four operators run the crawls you can book online. They overlap more than their names suggest: all of them walk you between central bars, hand you a shot at each one and end late, often at a club.

Prices are the ones the booking sites list in US dollars. At about 2.73 lari to the dollar, a $31 ticket is roughly 85 GEL.

The organized pub crawls in Tbilisi

City Pub Crawl

The City Pub Crawl is the classic format: a guide, a group, a welcome shot at each of 5 bars and clubs, and bar games and contests between rounds. It meets at 9 PM at Crossroads Bar on Shalva Dadiani Street, where the guide waits with an orange flag, and every stop is within walking distance in Sololaki, so the night never depends on a taxi.

This is the crawl I'd book on a first night. Sololaki is where most of the city's good bars already are, the walk between stops is short, and starting at Crossroads means you begin in the most social bar in town. The ticket covers entry and the 5 shots; anything else you drink, you buy at the bar.

Irine's Pub Crawls

Irine's starts at 9 PM in the lobby of the Fabrika hostel on Egnate Ninoshvili Street, on the left bank of the river. The first stop is a wine bar with unlimited Georgian wine and cheese boards, and then the group moves through 4 local bars with a welcome shot at each. It runs about 5 hours, the longest of the four, and takes guests from 18.

The wine start is what sets it apart. You get a proper look at Georgian wine before the night turns into shots, and the crowd from the Fabrika hostel means plenty of solo travelers in the group. The same host also runs a chacha-focused version of the night.

Legendary Pub Crawl

The Legendary Pub Crawl meets on Freedom Square at 8 PM and runs about 4 hours in four stages: a wine and cheese tasting at a small wine bar, an expat bar with games, a pub with beer and pool, and finally a club playing house and techno until the early hours. Drinks along the way are included on at least one of its listings.

It suits people who want the club at the end without working out the door policy alone. The price moves a lot between platforms, from about $20 to $37, so compare before you book.

Tbilisi Pub Crawls

Tbilisi Pub Crawls runs a few themed nights rather than one fixed route. The Party Animal crawl is built for big, loud groups, with local bars, games and shots. A craft beer tour visits 4 local pubs instead, and an all-in-one alcohol tour has run on Fridays and Saturdays in some seasons. Schedules change through the year, so check the dates before you plan around one.

Which Tbilisi pub crawl to book

All four are good nights out. The difference is what you want the evening to be.

• City Pub Crawl if you want the short walks of Sololaki, games, and a start at the city's friendliest cocktail bar.
• Irine's Pub Crawls if you want Georgian wine before the shots, or you're staying on the left bank near Fabrika.
• Legendary Pub Crawl if the point of the night is to end in a techno club.
• Tbilisi Pub Crawls' craft beer tour if you'd rather taste Georgian beer than drink shots.

Skip the organized crawls if you're with a group of friends already, or you mostly want good drinks, which the city's cocktail bars pour for 14 to 20 GEL without a ticket. A ticket buys you company and a guide; a group that has both is better off with one of the DIY routes below, and the money goes on drinks instead.

What a Tbilisi pub crawl is like

The night follows the same arc on every crawl. The group gathers at the first bar, the guide hands out the first shot and a game to break the ice, and by the second stop people are swapping travel plans. Groups lean toward backpackers and solo travelers, which makes it easy to talk to anyone.

Expect to keep moving: 5 stops in about 4 hours leaves under an hour in each bar, and the stops are close together, so you walk more than you ride. The later stops get louder, and the crawls that end at a club hand you over to a door that has its own rules. Tbilisi's techno clubs are serious about who gets in, and a crawl guide helps but doesn't guarantee entry.

Most bars on the crawl routes are small, and the welcome shot is often the strongest drink of the stop. Pace yourself by ordering beer or wine between shots; the crawl ends around 1 AM and Tbilisi's nightlife keeps going long after.

The best bars for a DIY bar crawl in Tbilisi

A bar crawl in Tbilisi works without a guide because the good bars sit within a few streets of each other. The best bars in Tbilisi for a long, quiet drink and the best stops for a crawl aren't the same list, though. These are the ones I'd build a crawl around, ranked by how well they work as crawl stops: social, close together and easy to walk into. Each entry says where it is and what to order.

1. Crossroads Bar

Crossroads is the best cocktail bar in Tbilisi to make new friends, and the stop I'd put first on any crawl. It's at 30 Shalva Dadiani Street in Sololaki, a few minutes from Freedom Square, and the room is open and social, with a real mix of expats and locals. It's easy to walk in alone and leave with people to carry on the night with, which is the job a crawl guide does anyway.

The week runs on events. Wednesday is the expat meetup, the best night for a solo crawl; Tuesday and Sunday are karaoke; Thursday is live music. The City Pub Crawl meets here too, so on crawl nights you can join a group at 9 PM or start your own route from the same bar.

Start with the Pinelet, the bestseller: gin, pinecone liqueur, lime and simple syrup, with a soft pine aroma. Later in the night, the Walnut Ember is bourbon, red vermouth and walnut bitters finished with oak smoke. The small kitchen serves until midnight, and mini quiches at 7 GEL are the cheapest way to line your stomach before the next stop.

2. Chacha Time

Every Tbilisi crawl needs a chacha stop, and Chacha Time at 5 Geronti Kikodze Street is the one I'd pick. It pours more than 40 chachas from across Georgia, including barrel-aged and single-grape bottles, in 25 ml measures and tasting flights, plus fruit tinctures for anyone who finds the classic too fierce.

The cocktails make chacha easier: a Chacha Sour, a Chacha Spritz, and the Old Georgia, an Old Fashioned built on chacha aged in smoked oak barrels. The kitchen does nadughi with matsoni and ajika and fried garlic bread with cheese sauce, which both belong in the middle of a long night. It's quieter on weekdays, when the bartenders have time to talk you through the bottles.

3. Warszawa

Warszawa is a tiny Polish-themed bar at 19 Aleksandr Pushkin Street, right by Freedom Square, with old Polish newspapers covering the walls and only a handful of seats. On a busy night the crowd spills onto the pavement, and that is half the fun.

It has some of the cheapest drinks in the center: draft beer and flavored chacha shots, with watermelon the one people come back for. I'd use it as the first stop of a cheap night or the last stop before a taxi, because it's loud, quick and on the square every taxi can find.

4. Lado by Valiko Mansion

Lado is a vintage, eclectic cocktail bar on Gudiashvili Square in Sololaki, a few minutes from Freedom Square. Weeknights are calm. On Friday and Saturday it fills with a pre-club crowd, which makes it the right stop for the hour before you head to a club.

Order the Yellow Mellow, the house signature. There's light food too, salads, bruschetta and pasta, and the square outside is one of the prettiest corners of Sololaki to stand in with a drink between stops.

5. Abragi

Abragi is a Georgian craft beer bar on Shalva Dadiani Street, the same street as Crossroads and a few minutes from Freedom Square. It pours drafts you won't find anywhere else in the city and does mini tastings, so you can try three or four small pours instead of committing to a pint.

The bottle fridge covers most of the Georgian scene: Megobrebi, Underground, Svia, Otia's Ezo, Amphora and NaturAle. On a Sololaki crawl it's the natural second stop, close enough to Crossroads that you barely notice the walk.

6. Tsota Tsota

Tsota Tsota is a small craft beer pub in Sololaki that pours Megobrebi, one of the better Georgian breweries. It does a tasting plate for the undecided and burgers for the hungry, which makes it my pick for the food stop on a beer crawl.

It's a calmer room than the cocktail bars, good for the stretch of the night when the group wants to sit down and talk rather than shout. The Georgian craft scene has grown fast, and an evening across Abragi, Tsota Tsota and Process covers most of what is worth tasting in Tbilisi craft beer.

7. Process Craft Beer Bar

Process is a tiny bar on Merab Kostava Street in Vera, opposite the Stamba hotel. Its taps carry Georgian craft beer from NaturAle, Megobrebi, Underground and Alkhanaidze alongside its own draft, and the odd styles are the reason to come: a tomato gose, a tarragon sour, a cherry ale.

There's chacha and Georgian cider for anyone off beer by then. It's small, so it works best as a stop for 3 or 4 people rather than a crawl group of 15.

8. Dedaena Bar

Dedaena Bar is a live music bar in Dedaena Park on the left bank, and the place a lot of locals go before a club. It pours Alkhanaidze beer, cocktails, chacha and a house Georgian gin, and the kitchen does veggie burgers and falafel wraps.

There's face control at the door, and registering online for a QR multi-pass makes getting in easier. I'd make it the last bar of a left bank crawl, because the crowd here is already on its way to the clubs.

9. Fabrika

Fabrika is a converted Soviet sewing factory at 8 Egnate Ninoshvili Street, now a hostel, bars and a big courtyard. Non-guests are welcome and locals use it as much as travelers do, which is why Irine's Pub Crawls starts in its lobby.

There's no cover, beer runs 7 to 10 GEL and cocktails 14 to 20 GEL, and DJs play from Thursday. The courtyard is the easiest place in the city to start a night with strangers, since half the people there are looking for someone to go out with.

Three DIY bar crawl routes

Each route keeps the walking short and puts the louder bars later. Start around 8 PM, an hour before the organized crawls, and the first stop will still have seats.

The Sololaki crawl: cocktails, beer and chacha

Sololaki has the densest run of good bars in the city, all within walking distance of Freedom Square.

This is the route I'd do on a Wednesday, starting at the Crossroads meetup and taking whoever you meet along with you.

The craft beer crawl: Sololaki to Vera

Three stops and a longer walk in the middle, for a slower night that's about tasting rather than drinking fast.

The walk from Sololaki up to Kostava Street is the one stretch on any route where I'd consider a taxi, especially after the second stop. Process sits on the edge of Vera, the quieter, leafier side of the center, so it's a good place to end a slower night.

The left bank crawl: Fabrika to the clubs

The left bank route starts in Fabrika's courtyard, walks along the pedestrian stretch of Aghmashenebeli Avenue in Marjanishvili, where bars and restaurants with outdoor tables make it easy to hop from one to the next, and ends at Dedaena Bar before the clubs. Fabrika to Dedaena Park is a short taxi ride, or a walk on a warm night.

The Old Town bar streets

Old Tbilisi looks like crawl territory, and Erekle II Street, with its outdoor tables under string lights, is a lovely place for one drink. Shardeni Street is the tourist strip, though, and beer there costs 9 to 14 GEL against 5 to 9 GEL a few streets away. I'd walk the Old Town at dusk for the views, then cross to Sololaki to do the actual drinking.

What a bar crawl costs in Tbilisi

Drinks in Tbilisi are cheap by European standards, and the gap between a DIY crawl and a booked one is mostly the price of the ticket.

A DIY Sololaki crawl of two beers, two cocktails and a glass of wine, plus a taxi home, comes to about 54 to 91 GEL. Add a local club night and it's 69 to 116 GEL. A crawl ticket costs about the same as that whole DIY night before you buy a single drink beyond the welcome shots, so the honest comparison is company and a guide against roughly double the spend.

Tips for a bar crawl in Tbilisi

A few things make the night smoother, and none of them are obvious on a first visit.

• Order taxis in an app. Bolt and Yandex Taxi run around the clock and fix the price before you get in; across the center it's 8 to 15 GEL. The Tbilisi taxi apps are the only way I'd get home after a crawl.
• Carry some cash. Cards work in bars, but club doors and a few small places want lari, and money in Georgia is easiest from a bank ATM rather than an exchange booth at 2 AM.
• Eat in the middle of the night. Khinkali are the city's late-night food, about 7 to 10 GEL for 8, and the best khinkali in Tbilisi are worth planning a stop around.
• Drink the tap water. It's safe, and a glass between rounds is the difference between a good morning and a lost one.
• Go alone if you like. Solo travelers are welcome everywhere on these routes, English is common in mixed-crowd bars, and the city is relaxed at night; the Tbilisi safety picture after dark is about taxis and drinks, not streets.
• Catch a band. Thursday at Crossroads is live music night and Dedaena Bar is a live music bar, and live music in Tbilisi is a good way to slow a crawl down for an hour.