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Start a Top 5 for Dive BarsEditor’s picks
Press picks, until locals rank their own Top 5s. Sourced from the local food press. As seen in Santa Fe Reporter and Santa Fe New Mexican. Updated July 2026.
The Matador · Downtown
The Matador is a basement bar under West San Francisco Street that the Santa Fe Reporter calls the city's punk-rock dive, all graffiti-covered walls and cheap drinks. This is an atmosphere pick more than a menu one. Head down the stairs, order a cheap well drink, and take in the stickered, scrawled-over walls and whatever is on the turntable.
Evangelo's · Downtown
Evangelo's Cocktail Lounge has been a downtown standard on West San Francisco Street since 1971, a cash-only lounge that stays open when little else does. The Santa Fe Reporter's dive-bar feature and a later Santa Fe New Mexican news piece both mark it as a genuine local fixture. Bring cash, order a classic cocktail at the bar, and stay late.