The 9 Best College Bars in Budapest

Opened in 1968, Ibolya Espresso is an iconic café and bar in Budapest's downtown. Ibolya is deeply anchored in Budapest's collective memory as two generations of local residents have been coming here for everything from first dates to business meetings over the past half-century. Ibolya's interior furnishings evoke the design items of the communist era: the Mid-century modern-inspired light fixtures feature orange plexiglass, while chairs are topped with sticky, red faux leather upholstery.

Mélypont is a cavernous, below-ground bar situated on a quiet backstreet in downtown Budapest. The interior, which features highly amortized pieces of communist-era furniture, usually fills to capacity with students from the neighboring law and political science colleges of Eötvös Loránd University. Every time I visit Mélypont I'm amazed that this wallet-friendly student bar can continue to exist in an otherwise elite and highly-priced neighborhood—let's hope it stays that way.

Grinzingi, an unpretentious downtown wine tavern, has a simple formula: serve cheap drinks in the center of Budapest that's otherwise teeming with overpriced, tourist-oriented bars. But what gives Grinzingi its native spirit is its longevity, the variety of its patrons, and the “interior design.”

Fahéj is a cute café and bar on a quite backstreet in Budapest's downtown. Fahéj eschews the trendy vibes and the tourist-targeting approach of many other places in the neighborhood, relying instead on a loyal group of regulars, both young and old. This they do by serving low-priced drinks inside an atmospheric space that features two high-ceilinged rooms with wooden floors, bookshelves, and small round tables.

It’s easy to miss Altair, a homey, below-ground teahouse on a sleepy side street in Budapest's Palace Quarter, but you shouldn't. Defying space limitations, they've squeezed myriad tiny nooks and crannies that are separated from one another by curtains, pillows, and wooden beams.