The 9 best coffee spots in Adelaide

This buzzy backstreet café is easily one of Adelaide's most popular spots for your morning brew and arvo pick-me-up. Keeping the city caffeinated with its sustainably sourced beans since 2013, Exchange has grown from a small specialty coffee bar to a cosy café with a full brunch menu. Come with a group and split their one-litre carafe of filter coffee, or sip on a cuppa of the house or guest espresso, all made with sustainably sourced beans. 

There’s something very Melbourne about Coffee In Common over in Hindmarsh – the warehouse-style layout screams back streets of a hip inner-city suburb – and perhaps it’s by virtue of the café’s 2015 Victorian beginnings. These days, the minimalist Bacon Street den serves mugs of brew from its streamlined, central bar and utilises beans from its on-site roastery – smells like perk-up spirit. Coffee In Common’s yield makes for pour-overs and batchies, spotlighting both single-origin and house blends. Meanwhile, the reserve pour-over menu highlights rare drops and the signatures list sees cups with the likes of a lychee cold brew. Wash it all down with a sweet or savoury brunch plate – a matcha strawberry bagel or creamy kimchi udon, respectively. 

Situated along the banks of Thebarton’s River Torrens slice, Bloom is without a doubt one of Adelaide’s most aesthetically pleasing cafés. Gum trees shade the courtyard out-back, which is tangled with vines and lined with herbs of green, while the converted tram barn innards nail the balance between contemporary and homely Farm-fresh plates and coal-fired creations are a big hit at Bloom, but their caffeine is equally as divine. Adelaide-based 1645 Coffee Roasters are to thank for the beans that waft their way around the dining hall – ground ‘n’ ready for all the batch-brew, pour-over and espresso staples, hot and cold alike. An Espresso Martini is bound to funk things up a bit, too – a cup of Joe with the most.

New on the coffee hotspot scene is A Place Coffee – a concrete-forward nook in Bowden where the sun’s rays illuminate bench-top pastries and quirky artworks add a splash of colour to the otherwise minimalist caffeine quarter. The quiet urban street and bike path locale welcomes street-front chit-chatting, cycle-watching and all-importantly sipping at the community hub. Melbourne’s Market Lane beans are A Place’s mainstay beans of choice, with a rotating guest-roaster list featuring Australian makers, too. Espresso, pour-over and batch brew, plus a wee non-coffee drinks selection take centre stage – decision-making, no worries. Pair your daily dose with a fresh-baked good or two – a cardamom sourdough scroll or weekly-alternating toastie, perchance?

After almost a decade in business, it’s safe to say that Elementary Coffee knows a thing or two about balanced beverages. A city centre emporium along with a more recent Torrensville café serves up the good stuff, aka in-house roasted beans where the facilities are on show for a healthy dose of awe-inspiration. While both locations pour a mean cup of Joe, Elementary’s Torrensville home is one to admire. Corrugated high ceilings, exposed beams, an open floor plan and a central service bar are a pleasing concoction for the eyes – and meticulous filter coffees are equally as pleasing for the taste buds too, offering a cleaner, smoother and less acidic taste compared to espresso machine counterparts.

Long-time crowd favourite, My Kingdom For A Horse is the city’s multi-award-winning coffee roastery with three Adelaide outposts. The OG Wright Street locale seats a mega 120 people in its bright-white, retro-ish eatery and caffeine haunt, while its Pirie and Waymouth Street frontiers serve those in quick-sticks mode with their more-so takeaway style. My Kingdom’s energy beans are prepared behind the scenes of the Wright Street café, and they take pride in their ‘seasonal coffee, roasted locally’ ethos for all your espresso and filter-brew needs. But that’s not all – My Kingdom For A Horse is renowned for its wildly intricate latte art. They’ve even claimed bragging rights to the best latte art in South Australia. Trot on over, stat. 

Sweet tooths, look away – heaven on Earth awaits at Mascavado Café and Pâtisserie. While java isn’t at the forefront of Mascavado’s enterprise, consider it a coffee spot with all the sides and extras. The southeast city locale and Norwood hotspot churn out delicate desserts that are bang on time with social media trends, as well as ol’ faithful treats alike – strawberry matcha numbers and butter croissants, respectively. In terms of coff, sate your soul with a brew of Adelaide’s very own Monastery Coffee beans or go the extra mile for a Mont Blanc with the addition of cream, nutmeg and orange zest that will be well worth your time.

Small in size, yet biblical to the coffee aficionados of Adelaide – DayJob has mastered its caffeinated craft to a tee. The wee, warehouse-like joint gets around the machine and drip tools, highlighting Adelaide-based Kindred Coffee in all its glory. Some fine latte art skills are on show, as are buttery, flaky pastries and an assortment of chunky toasties that never fail to fill the gap – the eggplant parmigiana number with mozzarella, provolone and house-made nap sauce will have you sorted. DayJob’s Halifax Street locale is intimately shared with East End Flower Market too – smell the roses of success and the beans of haste in one fell swoop, seven dang days a week.

It’s bean juice o’clock at Richmond’s Devour Café Pâtisserie. The neighbourhood corner store may be cosy-sized, but it sure doesn’t lack in caffeine supply – or early-morn doughnuts, for that matter. The sun’s beams capture ONA Coffee’s slow-motion, batch-brewed vapours every day of the week, as well as the glisten of cold drip during the summer months. Famed for their breakfast baos, Devour also dishes out inventive fare that has spread the good word around Adelaide. Specials sound a little like: rendang beef burgers, Japanese-inspired breaky wraps, plus egg and bacon rolls that’ll have you weak at the knees. The super cute latte art compliments the treats just nicely.