In Britain we have a load of royal named things, e.g “The King’s Head,” “The Prince Henry,” or animal themed pubs like “The Three Pikes,” The Red Lion (most common oub name) or something gorey like “The Hanged Man,” “The Village Chopping Block.” On that note, we also have pubs named after landmarks, e.g “The Old Oak,” “The Anvil.”
Any more modern establishment like a bar can have posher or more postmodern names. Sometimes jokey names.
I was struck by a realisation thst i don’t know how other countries name their pubs amd bars. Would be helpful to know, for understanding other cultures. I even don’t know for places like the USA, which also speak English. Excited to hear your responses!
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In the southern US, a lot of counties voted to prohibit the sale of alcohol. They thought prohibition was a good idea, despite the bad things that caused the nation to end prohibition at the national level. Usually this is because they are full of religious people, and these are called “dry” counties, as opposed to “wet” counties, where the sale of alcohol is legal.
A common name for a bar is “the county line” implying that it gets all the business from the neighboring “dry” county.
Der Goldene Adler.
It’s so bad that you usually have to ask which one.
Oddly enough in Salt Lake City, UT we have a few fun ones:
- A Bar Named Sue
- The Tavernacle (pokes fun at the mormon Tabernacle)
- Lake Effect
The Tavernacle (pokes fun at the mormon Tabernacle)

I don’t go to bars anymore these days, these places are probably closed down by now since the last time I was in one of them was almost 30 years ago.
- club 21
- the oasis
- Clint’s
- Charlie’s
most the bars I went to were practically shacks in the middle of nowhere with zero name on the outside. only way you knew it was a bar was because of the beer signs outside.
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Bastard (reykjavik)

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Mollys (NYC)

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Tequila Mockingbird (Ocean City)

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Olive or Twist (Portland)

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Wish You Were Beer (Madison)

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Pour Boy (Toronto)

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Loose Moose (Toronto)

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Plug Uglies (NYC)

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LowBrau (sacramento)

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Pour House (everywhere)

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Beer and Loathing (Omaha)
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Deja Brew (Wendell)

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Paddy o’Beers (Raleigh)

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Crow Bar (Mount Holly)

Tequila Mockingbird hits my sense of humour just right! I love that!
Cool!
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Sweden also has many old English pub names but also many others, very mixed overall.
The street in my city (Gothenburg) I go to most has these bars:
Kelly’s, Sejdeln (beer stein), King’s Head, Queen’s Head, Dansken (the danish), Republik, Down Under (Australian themed), Hops, The Abyss (heavy metal bar), Holy Moly, Bar Solo, Bongo, BIVAC, Haket (kinda “the place”, a slang word), SoHo, Ölstugan (the beer cabin), Street Life, Brewers, Le Pub, The Northern Quarter, 9:ans (the 9’s), Dirty Records, The Burger, Brygghuset (the brew house) and some more.
Yes, this is one street (both sides and some on corners and a bit up the perpendicular streets for a few).
Here’s the map (street in question is the red line):
There are about as many on the lower and upper parallel streets (combined). And that’s like 1/10th of the bars in that area, the whole city and outer areas has a total of over 1000 bars.
Those are cool pub names
Agree! Here’s some other random ones from around the city:
Silverkällan “the silver spring/well”
Henriksberg
Oceanen
Gröna brunnen (the green well)
Pustervik
Lilla London (little London, which is a nickname for the city)
Red Lion (That covers several of the ones you mentioned in the post text, haha!)
BARNET (directly translated it’s “the child/kid” but it’s also Bar + Net)
Röda Sten (the red stone)
Karl IX
Pitchers
Suggan (the sow)
The Old Beefeater Inn
Bar Robusta
Steampunk Bar
Botanico
Stranger
Golden-I
Mr P
Smöriga Bröd (buttery bread)
Izakaya by KOMO
Ölrepubliken (the beer republic)
Havsbaren Tyska Bron (the ocean bar German bridge)
Noot Nordik
Werners
Jinx Empire
Eli’s Corner
Stage Door
Holy CowMan, I could go on forever from just my memory, haha. ^^
On my first trip to NYC, in 1980, a college trip, I collected a bunch of little flyers that they were handing out in Times Square, for notorious gay clubs with names like The Meat Rack and The Man Hole.
They were a big hit in the dorm when I got back.
In my neck of the woods dive bars have the best names, we’ve got “the wooden nickel” and “the rusty nail”. These are not nice bars.
Here in Germany, traditional names for pubs are often either animals (stork, eagle, bear, lion, trout, deer, etc.) or the original owner’s name.
Not nearly as colorful as some of the other examples here but I’m not aware if there might be regional differences. My region might just be particularly boring in this regard.
“Fancy going down to ‘Erik’s Cock’ tonight?”
The reason most of our pubs are named like that is because when pubs first became a thing most people couldn’t read, so instead they’d paint a picture on a sign outside to make it easier to direct people to the pub if they asked. They were also just regular houses that had spare beer that they’d sell to the public and wouldn’t always be selling anything, that’s why they were called public houses originally too.
Additionally, a lot of them borrowed from heraldry or livery, hence the popularity of the Red Lion, the White Hart, the Crown, the Kings Arms, etc.

I didn’t think about them being actual public houses until now. Strategy games have lead me astray - you always build a dedicated tavern building in those. I suppose now i understand the distinction between a tavern and a pub, at long last.
Grew up in Florida which I feel has it’s own unique style of pub names such as: The Thirsty Turtle Captain Jack’s (or any other Captain) The Brass Ring Manatee Lagoon (or other animal or place lagoon) The Square Grooper (slang for packages of cocaine found in the water or on the shore)
Off the top of my head in Chicago:
- X’s bar
- X’s two-way
- The [evocative name]
- X’s
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(US) They vary wildly even in the same city. A lot of times, smaller dive bars will just be “[Name]'s Bar” or “[Name’s] Bar 2” if they have more than one. Reason for the numbering, as was explained to me, is that allows them to operate under the same liquor license.
Then you get the punny named ones like “The Pour House” or “Keglers”. Some are based on a gimmick like “The Fish Bowl” where you could order a giant glass fish bowl full of beer.
In college towns, they’re often clubs rather than bars/pubs, so you’ll see names like “Lazy Lizard”, “Liquid Lounge”, “Shooters”, etc. The biggest and most popular one when I went to college was called “Bent Willey’s”. Sex pun aside, it was on a sharp curve near Willey St, which is probably how they got it approved.
In France it would be mostly “Le <something>” or “Le <something> <adjective>.”
But the pubs themselves can have various “denominations” to talk about those places, and I think of 3 so far:
- bar (obviously)
- PMU (the national horse betting company)
- bistrot (a name with unclear origin, see https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bistrot) which is a place where you can both drink quickly and eat






