33 Best Restaurants in Vienna, Austria

Made famous by its illustrious guests, the Café Central is one of the most famous cafés in all of Vienna. The soaring ceiling and gigantic columns are hallmarks of the landmark, which was home to Viennese literati as well as world game changers at the turn of the last century, including Leon Trotsky, who mapped out the Russian Revolution here beneath portraits of the Imperial family. There is more than the standard café fare here, with the kitchen serving salmon fillet sprinkled with roasted pine nuts; or try the Mohr im hemd for dessert, chocolate hazelnut cake dusted with powdered sugar and served with hot chocolate sauce and whipped cream. Piano music fills the marble-pillared hall in the afternoon; it can get packed with tourists, but it's worth the crowds.

Dine at Vienna's poshest restaurant while taking in the stunning, 360-degree panoramic vistas of the city's skyline from the 18th floor of the Sofitel Stephansdom. The gourmet meals, often made with seasonal, locally-sourced fare, are just as fabulous as the view. A four-course tasting menu may include roasted foie gras, fresh panfried pike perch from nearby Neusiedler Lake, and crispy lamb crown, with a dessert of peanut-butter-yogurt mousse with butterscotch ice-cream and caramalized chocolate. The ambience is centered on the spectacular ceiling, designed by Swiss multimedia artist Pipilotti Rist. She has created a magnificent visual feast, which is best viewed at sunset, as the changing colors outside have a lovely dance with the colors playing out on the ceiling above you.

In a stunningly short time, Filippou has made a remarkable impression on the Vienna dining elite, evident from its Michelin star and its Gault Millau Chef of the Year award. A seat at the prized kitchen table allows a view into the kitchen to watch the chef preparing the meal, including the famous escargot seasoned with horseradish and watercress. The dining room itself is an invitation to stay awhile; crisp, ice-blue walls are a cool complement to warm, blond-wood floors and pine tables. An abundance of natural light further softens the ambience during daylight, which is when many of Filippou's customers come to enjoy a multi-course business lunch that changes weekly. Dine outside in the garden in spring and summer and you won't regret it.

This gourmet establishment at the Palais Hansen Kempinski Hotel earned a Michelin star within months after opening. Now chef Norman Etzold has taken over the kitchen, continuing to prepare masterpieces for Vienna diners. The interior is elegant, not opulent, with ivory walls and ebony-covered chairs complementing the stark white table linens. There are two entrances, one from the hotel lobby and one at the street, a nod to locals that this restaurant is for them, too.

The classic Austrian dessert, the Sachertorte, resulted from a family saga that began with Franz Sacher, Prince von Metternich's pastry chef, and ended with Franz's son and his wife, Anna, opening the 19th-century hotel. Today, the Restaurant Grüne Bar continues the tradition of creating some of Vienna's finest cuisine. The restaurant has two menus—one with traditional Austrian fare, and one featuring more innovative dishes. The slightly less formal Rote Bar, at the front of the hotel, always has classics on offer, including Tafelspitz (boiled beef), the favorite dish of Emperor Franz Josef.

Considered one of the world's 50 best restaurants and holding two Michelin stars, this eatery is definitely the most raved-about place in Austria. Winning dishes include delicate wild boar's head with "purple haze" carrots, turbot in an avocado crust, or char in beeswax, yellow turnips, and cream. At the end of the meal, an outstanding selection of more than 120 cheeses awaits. The restaurant is in the former Milchhauspavilion, a grand Jugendstil-vintage dairy overlooking the Wienfluss promenade in the Stadtpark, the main city park on the Ringstrasse. If you don't want the whole gala Steirereck experience, opt for a bite in the more casual lower-floor Meierei, which is still stylish, with its hand-painted floor and furniture in shades of milky white.

Back when Beethoven dined at the Black Camel, it was already a foodie landmark. Since then, it has been renovated (but only in 1901) and more recently split into a Delikatessen and a restaurant. Try the former if you're in a hurry—fresh sandwiches are served at the counter. If time allows, dine in the elegant, intimate, Art Nouveau dining room. The Beinschinken (Viennese ham) is the specialty of the house and is renowned throughout Austria.

If you're lucky, you can snag a table in the idyllic garden of this low-key pub, hidden away inside a delightful Biedermeyer cobbled courtyard. The staff is young, hip, and carefee, and will gladly serve you breakfast until 3pm—both traditional Viennese-style plus vegan and vegetarian options. Vines and ivy provide cover from the intense summer sun while walls of the passageway leading from the courtyard are lined floor to ceiling with concert placards. In winter, there's nothing more cozy than to sit inside and sip the ginger apricot punch.

The controversial architect Adolf Loos (famed for his pronouncement "Ornament is a sin") laid the foundation stone for this coffeehouse in 1899. Throughout the 20th century, this was a top rendezvous spot for Wien Secession artists, along with actors, students, and professors, because of its proximity to the Academy of Fine Arts, the Theater an der Wien, and Vienna's Technical University. Gustav Klimt, Egon Schiele, and Josef Hoffmann all enjoyed sipping their melange here. Apart from the eye-catching 1930s-style steel globes, the ambience is much like that of other cafés in town, with red upholstery, marble-topped tables, and black bentwood chairs. On weekdays at noon, a tasty daily special, such as rucola salad with potato puffs seasoned with a creamy garlic sauce, guarantees a full house.

When you're ready to collapse after taking in all the art at the fabulous Albertina, take a break at the museum's on-site eatery where you will find a variety of options including sushi, Mediterranean, and Italian. In summer you can sit outside on one of the city's nicest terraces and enjoy the view of the Burggarten.

The origins here go back to 1683, when this spot opened as one of the city's official Stadtheuriger (wine taverns), to provide Turk-fighting soldiers with wine before going off to battle. Below the Esterházy palace, the atmosphere is like that of a cozy cave, with the maze of rooms offering some of the best wines of any cellar in town, plus a typical Viennese menu noontime and evenings. Ordering seems back to front: food orders are taken at the counter, while a waiter comes to the table to take your order for drinks. The best choice for meat lovers is roast pork with dumplings and cabbage. The wine tavern is closed July and August, but the restaurant and garden are open all summer long.

The easiest way for Viennese to experience sleek, suave, New York–style power dining—short of paying for a round-trip plane ticket—is to book a table at this Italian hot spot in the heart of Vienna. If they can, that is. Wait-listed weeks in advance, this modernist extravaganza has brought a touch of big-city glamour to Alt Wien, and everyone from foodies to fashionistas loves it. Seafood is so fresh it's flown in daily for the kitchen to prepare specialties, such as shrimp marinated in lemon and served on a bed of Tuscan beans, or roasted sea bass in a couscous salad of cucumber and avocado. For beef eaters, the chef prepares a special piquant sauce poured over a rib-eye steak.

This Wiener schnitzel institution might be touristy, but it's known for breaded veal and pork cutlets so large they overflow the plate and still attracts locals, too. The cutlet is hammered—you can hear the mallets pounding from a block away—so that the schnitzel winds up wafer-thin. It's delicious because the quality (as well as the size: half a pound each) is unrivaled; don't forget to add lemon juice. The potato salad made with Styrian pumpkin seed oil (the oil is an Austrian specialty) is the best in town, and if you want to try the recipe at home, you can even buy its cookbook. If this location is full, try the one just around the corner, at Bäckerstrasse 6.

The best place for a bite of traditional food near the Kunsthaus Wien and the Hundertwasser House is Gasthaus Wild. Formerly a wine tavern, it's now a down-to-earth beisl (the equivalent of a pub, also called a gasthaus), where the menu changes regularly but almost always features local dishes. Be sure to try the Schinkenfleckerl (delicious pasta squares stuffed with ham and cabbage), and, most importantly, check out the selection of wild game when in season. The restaurant also offers fine wines (mainly Austrian) and an extensive dessert menu.

One of the friendliest places in Vienna, this wood-panelled wonderful old cellar—just across the street from the Konzert Haus—offers some of the heartiest home cooking in town. Come here to enjoy dishes that hail from Carinthia, one of the best being the Kas'nudeln (potatoes and spinach pasta filled with cheese and onion), best served with green leaf salad. Another favorite is the Tafelspitzsulz mit Kernöl und Zwiebeln (cold cut of beef in aspic served with onions). You'll want to use the Semmel (white bread roll) to sop up that last drop of dark-green pumpkinseed-oil dressing. In clement weather, the outdoor area has an appealing beer garden-esque atmosphere.

Dating back four centuries, this engaging old-world house sits in the heart of Old Vienna. It is one of the country's top addresses for beer connoisseurs and serves brews, both draft and bottled, Dunkeles (dark) and Helles (light), from the Gösser brewery in Styria. Of the four eating areas, many diners opt for the covered courtyard, where beer seems to taste better no matter the weather. Beyond the obligatory (but first-class) Wiener schnitzel with potato salad, another good choice is the Kas'nocken (pasta dumplings topped with melted Tyrolean mountain cheese).

Neatly tucked away in a quiet and quaint area of the Old City, this ancient inn goes back half a millennium (Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert all dined here). Yes, it's touristy, yet the food, including all the classic hearty dishes like goulash soup, Wiener schnitzel, and Apfelstrudel, is as good as that in many other beisl. You can hear its age in the creaking floorboards when you walk through some of the small, dark-wood-panel rooms. The Mark Twain room has walls and ceiling covered with signatures of the famed who have been served here.

A few doors down from the Hofburg Palace, Julius Meinl am Graben opened as a caterer to the Habsburgs in 1862 and has remained Vienna's most posh grocery store. On the first floor up is a cozy salon, all dark wood and deep-orange banquettes. The window tables have stunning views over the Kohlmarkt. Allow the excellent staff to guide you through the daily changing menu with their expertise and charm. Note: after 7 pm you enter via an outdoor elevator on Naglergasse.

Down and down you go, into one of the friendliest cellars in town, where Stelze (roast pork) is a popular feature, along with outstanding regional wines—Grüner Veltliner among them—by the glass or, rather, mug. This was originally the storehouse for wines from the Melk Abbey in the Danube Valley and dates from 1438, but was rebuilt in the 18th century. It's a complex of six cavernous rooms; the most atmospheric has low-arched vaults right out of a castle dungeon. The menu has the usual Austrian fare like Schnitzel plus a vegetarian lentil curry (rare for places this traditional).

Even though night owls flock to the bar at Motto am Fluss until the wee hours, this sleek eatery serves an inspired selection of dishes when the sun is up, too, like tuna steak with creamy avocado sauce. The building overlooks the Danube and resembles an ocean liner, with a retro 1950s interior of checkerboard floors below and gigantic, globe-mirrored lamps above. Chairs and tables are of a heavy, varnished, dark timber. The dining room is sprawling and has huge windows through which you can watch the city's twinkling lights.

In case its name doesn't give it away, the proximity to the opera house should be a clue that among the dinner guests will be many of the city's regular operagoers, sitting for a meal before the show. Located on a side street near Kärntnerstrasse, this restaurant focuses on traditional Austrian dishes. Other favorites on the menu include pork roast with cabbage and dumplings covered in a light caraway sauce, and roasted veal liver with marjoram gravy over buttered rice. The decor is stark white and the interior long and narrow, making it the perfect contrasting canvas for the warm comfort food it serves.

This fashionable establishment is in the basement of the 19th-century Vienna Stock Exchange and shares an enormous space with the flower shop Lederleitner. The chef creates a new menu of Mediterranean specialties each week. If you have a light appetite, ask for a smaller portion. Although this eatery is named after Theophil Hansen—the ornament-crazy architect of the Börse—the decor is sleek and modern; note the superb contemporary artwork adorning the walls.

Set within the Museum of Applied Arts (MAK), this warm and stylish restaurant offers fresh, locally grown fare under high, coffered ceilings and with furnishings and flatware to feed appetites for design. Everything is either made on-site or commissioned from independent local enterprises. Dishes might include tasty European char tartare with red-cabbage mayo and miso, or octopus stew with broad beans and chorizo.

This "beautiful pearl" is one of the most popular dining spots for locals in Leopoldstadt. It offers traditional Austrian comfort food, including Tafelspitz—boiled beef, the favored dish of Emperor Franz Josef—and Wiener schnitzel, but its real palate pleasers are the wide selection of vegetarian dishes on the menu. Avocado salad, pumpkin cream soup, spinach ravioli, and red lentil soup are among the top favorites. The interior is surprisingly spacious, so the restaurant can get crowded, but not cramped. The staff is friendly, and seems to tolerate well the children who can't resist roaming the vastness.

Many restaurants have set up shop in former stalls on the market square in the artsy neighborhood that has sprung up around Karmelitermarkt, just across the Donaukanal, including Skopik & Lohn. The menu features international fare, such as roast chicken with figs and chestnuts, and linguine with fresh chanterelle mushrooms (which only grow two months out of the year). The interior is rather minimalist and modern, except for artist Otto Zitko's massive doodling spree on the ceiling. The black-and-white art creeps like a vine onto the walls---you'll want to get out your markers and color it in.