Best Rooftop Bars in Reykjavik for Sunset Drinks and City Views

I moved to Reykjavik from Akureyri fifteen years ago, and I still remember the afternoon I first climbed the stairs to a rooftop bar in this city and looked out over the red-roofed downtown toward the water. Something clicked. After spending years in smaller towns where the tallest buildings were the church and the school, standing above Laugavegur with the whole harbor spread below me felt like seeing the place I had chosen to live in for the first time. Since then, I have made it something of a personal project to find every vantage point in this city where you can drink a good cocktail while the light does its impossible things across the sky in summer or the northern lights flicker on the horizon in winter. Reykjavik is a small capital, but its relationship with elevation is complicated and rewarding. Not every sky bar here is obvious, and the best rooftop bars in Reykjavik are not always the ones that appear first in your search results. Some are tucked into boutique hotels. Others sit atop buildings that look unremarkable from the street. A few have outdoor terraces that qualify as rooftop in all but name. What they share is a willingness to embrace the climate rather than hide from it, with heated patios, wind barriers, and blankets on every chair. Let me walk you through the places I keep coming back to.

The Sky Bar at 101 Hotel: Intimate Heights on Hverfisgata

The 101 Hotel occupies a handsome black timber building on Hverfisgata in the heart of the 101 Reykjavik district, and its Sky Bar is one of those places that looks modest from the outside but rewards you the moment you step onto the roof. The terrace is not large, maybe a dozen tables arranged along the southern edge of the building, but the view west toward the old harbor and the mountain backdrop is exactly what you want when you are settling in for sunset. I have brought visiting friends here at least a dozen times, and every single one of them has gone quiet when they first saw the light hit the water. The cocktail menu leans Scandinavian, with locally produced gins and aquavit featuring prominently. The signature drink I keep ordering is their Nordic spritz made with Brennivín, elderflower cordial, and sparkling wine, which sounds strange on paper but works beautifully in practice. Summer evenings bring a crowd, so arrive before seven if you want a table without circling the block. Winter is actually when this place shines for me personally, when the heating lamps are blazing and the darkness makes the city lights below feel closer and more vivid. One thing most tourists do not know is that the 101 Hotel was once a furniture showroom, and the original concrete floors are still visible in the bar area downstairs, a quiet nod to the building's past that most people walk right past on their way to the elevator.

Kex Hostel: Industrial Courtyard with Mountain Views

Kex Hostel sits in a converted biscuit factory on Skúlagata, and the building alone is worth the visit even if you do not drink. The exterior is a gaunt grey slab of corrugated metal and weathered brick, the kind of structure that was built to last a century and not to be beautiful, but the moment you step through the industrial doors and into the main bar area, you understand why this place has a reputation that extends far beyond Reykjavik. The bar is a long wooden counter salvaged from a gymnasium, and the space is filled with mismatched furniture, vintage maps, and a stage where local bands play several nights a week. What makes it relevant to this list is the covered courtyard at the back, which functions as an outdoor space in all but the most brutal weather because it has a retractable roof and serious heating infrastructure. On mild evenings in summer, they slide the roof back and you can see the sky while drinking locally brewed beers like Einstök or Ólafsvöllu. The crowd here skews younger and more international than at the hotel rooftop bars, a mix of backpackers, local musicians, and the kind of creative types who gravitate toward spaces with character. The food menu is short but solid, focused on hearty Nordic bar food like rye bread with smoked trout and mustard butter. I will tell you that this is not the place to come for a quiet romantic evening, but it is absolutely the place to come when you want to feel the energy of this city in its most honest form. The best nights I have had here were when a local band started playing around ten and the crowd grew from twenty to a hundred in the space of an hour.

Harpa Concert Hall: Culture and Water Views at the Harbor Edge

Harpa is Reykjavik's most recognizable building, and it sits at the southeastern corner of the old harbor like a giant glass hive stacked against the sky. The concert hall was designed by artist Olafur Eliasson and architect Henning Larsen after the 2008 economic collapse, and it became a symbol of Iceland's ability to turn crisis into something beautiful. The building has multiple entrances and levels, and the rooftop areas are technically accessible to ticket holders during performances, but the public-facing spaces around the building's perimeter offer some of the most striking harbor views you will find anywhere in the city. I spend a lot of time here because I attend at least one concert a month during the winter season, and the moments before a show begins, standing on the southern terrace with the harbor spread out below and the Westfjords visible on clear days, are among my favorite in Reykjavik. The Efsti Dagurinn restaurant on the ground floor has floor-to-ceiling windows facing the water, and while it is not technically a rooftop bar, the view from the tables nearest the glass wall feels like you are sitting above the harbor. Concert tickets here are reasonably priced by international standards, with most performances in the 3,000 to 8,000 ISK range, and the building itself is free to enter during daytime hours when there are no rehearsals happening. The one complaint I have is that the outdoor terraces close early in winter and are sometimes blocked off entirely during bad weather, which means your view can be limited to the glass walls and whatever the wind is doing outside.

Lebowski Bar: Laugavegur Institution with a Second-Floor Terrace

Lebowski Bar takes its name and its entire aesthetic from the Big Lebowski, which means the interior is a dense shrine of white Russian cocktails, bowling pins, and images of Jeff Bridges that somehow works as a coherent whole rather than a chaotic mess. The bar has been on Laugavegur for over a decade, and it occupies the ground floor of a corner building with a second-floor terrace that is one of the most casually pleasant outdoor drinking spaces in the city center. I want to be honest here because I am recommending this place, but the terrace is small, the seating is basic, and on busy weekend nights it can feel more like a fire escape with chairs than a destination in its own right. Come on a weekday afternoon in summer, though, when the sun is still high at eight in the evening and the terrace is nearly empty, and you will understand why I keep coming back. The drink to order is the original white Russian, made with Reyka vodka and Tia Maria, and it is genuinely excellent, rich without being cloying. The bar does not serve food, but they do not mind if you bring in takeout from one of the hot dog stands on the street below, which is a local practice that most tourists never discover. Laugavegur itself is worth discussing because this street is the commercial spine of downtown Reykjavik, a two-block stretch of fashion boutiques, record shops, and cafes that transforms completely depending on the hour and the season.

Slippbarinn: Waterfront Terrace at Icelandair Hotel Marina

The Icelandair Hotel Marina is a converted fish processing plant on yet another waterfront site, this time on Caleta Street in the 101 district, and the hotel bar called Slippbarinn has one of the most consistently beautiful outdoor terraces in the city. The terrace overlooks a small marina full of private boats, and on clear days you can see across the water to the volcanic islands of Akurey and Engey. I came here for the first time on a July evening when the sun had been circling the horizon for hours and showed no sign of setting, and I stayed for three drinks because I kept getting distracted by the light and forgetting I had ordered another round. The cocktail menu here is more ambitious than at the typical hotel bar, with a house cocktail program that changes seasonally and features Icelandic ingredients like rhubarb, birch syrup, and skyr in unexpected combinations. The food is excellent too, leaning toward seafood given the waterfront location, and the fish and chips here is among the better versions I have had in the city. The crowd is a mix of hotel guests and locals who know about this place, which means it does not feel touristy despite being attached to a major hotel chain. Parking in this neighborhood is genuinely difficult on weekends, and I have circled the block many times looking for a spot, so I would recommend walking from the city center or taking a bus rather than driving if you plan to spend an evening here.

Bergsson Mathús: Garden Terrace on Teikjasund

Bergsson Mathús is a small restaurant and café on Teikjasund near the old harbor, and while