13 best wine bars in Tokyo – natural wines included

Owned by husband and wife team Guillaume and Chloe Dupeperier, Apéro has gained a loyal fan base since opening in 2014. This Aoyama wine bar and restaurant is adored for its family recipes, which are lovingly prepared with locally sourced organic produce. 

Apéro caters to families, couples and solo diners alike in its bright and relaxed space with azure blue accents. The menu features hearty dishes like butternut squash risotto (¥1,600) and lamb tagine (¥5,200), as well as nibbles like melon topped with prosciutto (¥2,200) and charcuterie boards (half ¥1,900, whole ¥3,300) for picking at alongside a glass of wine.

Speaking of wine, all of the dishes here come with their own suggested pairing – a lively glass of the pink 'Whistler Skeleton in a Tutu' for the signature soufflé made with Valrhona chocolate, for instance. The selection changes seasonally and is curated by Apéro's Simon Bianco, who's in charge of sourcing labels exclusively from passionate wine makers in France.

Around the corner from two-Michelin-star restaurant Florilège is a small but edgy wine shop with an impressive variety of vino. The term ‘avant-garde’ comes to mind when one steps into the industrial interior, where bottles of natural wine are stacked in brightly coloured wire mesh racks that juxtapose the otherwise bare concrete walls. 

Just as farm-to-table restaurants want diners to know where their produce comes from, No. 501 wants its patrons to get acquainted with the people who produce the wines stocked here. As a result, every bottle in the shop has a special story, whether it’s the fruity Pastafarian from the Unico Zelo microbrewery in Australia, or the creamy Chard à Canon chardonnay by the French artisanal winemaker Nicolas Arnou.

At the back of the shop, you can sit at the bar where, alongside glasses of wine, you can order from a weekly food menu of seasonal dishes created to pair with the bottles from the cellar. 

With a food menu of gyoza, ramen and grilled pork skewers, Senrogiwa makes wine culture more accessible by combining it with the unpretentious fun of an izakaya. This funky DJ bar crossed with an izakaya is one of the newest residents in the Ebisu-Minami neighbourhood, where the owner regularly spins eclectic vinyl records from his personal collection.

The venue offers over 40 kinds of white, red, rose and orange wines with artful labels from all over the world. Bottles you'll find range from biodynamic vino like the Calcarius Orange Puglia Falanghina from Italy to Senrogiwa’s original brand of sparkling wine produced by Hitomi Winery in Shiga prefecture. Glasses of wine go for around ¥715, while a bottle hovers at around ¥3,690.

This charming cellar-bar, hidden in the relaxed Hatagaya neighbourhood near Shibuya, specialises in natural wine. The remarkable interior is a cavernous, all-blond timber room, with the cellar set further back from the bar through an enormous porthole-like entrance. This commanding feature creates a dramatic contrast to the clean, linear design of the surrounding space.

There are two long communal tables with seats to enjoy your wine, as well as some standing room areas. Glasses start from ¥1,000, or you can select a bottle from the cellar and drink it in-situ for ¥3,000 corkage. For snacks, there’s a house-made cheese and cured-meat plate as well as a selection of small dishes from local French and Italian restaurants run by the owner’s friends.

If you've grown tired of paying absurd mark-ups for inferior bottles of vino, head to this basement wine bar and restaurant in Aoyama. A casual sister establishment of the upscale restaurant Julia in Jingumae, this W Aoyama dishes up modern seafood dishes, pasta and dishes of charcoal-grilled cuts of meat and fish to pair with both old and new world wines.

Most of the dishes are seasonal, including the signature seafood platter which can be ordered in single portions or for sharing. With offerings like grilled carrots and burrata, you’re get a simple yet delicious bounty of dishes showcasing the best of the season’s produce. 

The wine list is made all the more impressive by the fact that the bottles are being sold at retail price, with a corkage fee of just ¥900 if you want to drink them with your meal. French and US producers are best represented, though there's a bottle for just about every taste (and budget) here.

This wine shop crossed with an Italian restaurant is hidden in a narrow back alley in Tamachi, with its storefront painted in a vivid shade of green. In an annex to the side of the building, you’ll see a small production room filled with enormous stainless steel fermentation vessels for making small batch wine in autumn and apple cider in winter. 

If you’re looking to stock up on a few bottles for your home, you’ll find a selection of Wineman’s wines and ciders in the shop upstairs, which also carries a wide variety of imported wines (primarily Italian) from indie winemakers with quirky labels. The second floor also doubles as a casual dining space where you can sit around a long communal table and order a cheese platter and bowl of pasta to pair with a glass of red or white. 

The downstairs dining area is a slightly more formal space with an open kitchen for when you want to treat yourself to a full course meal. Seasonal specialities include the firefly squid gnocchi in a herb butter sauce (¥2,800) and white truffle spaghetti carbonara (¥2,000).

The cosy wine bar, which seats just eight along its counter, is tucked into the back streets of Tomigaya, a few minutes’ walk from Yoyogi-Hachiman Station. There’s a regularly changing selection of domestic wines, ranging from the fresh, vibrant palate Japanese wines are known for, to richer, meatier drops. We love anything from the Okunota Winery, especially its golden and fruity Hanamizuki Blanc, as well as Takeda Winery’s light and refreshing Sans Soufre Sparkling. Wines start around ¥700 a glass. Dishes range from ¥500 to ¥1,500 and include snacks like bruschetta, locally made cheese and a kiwi and avocado salad.

Tucked into a quiet street at the affluent Nishi-Azabu area, Osozakura is part liquor store, part wine bar. The store’s interior charmingly blends modern Japanese design touches like muted earth tones and timber and bamboo textures with homely traditional elements like daruma dolls, maneki-neko lucky cats and ukiyo-e paintings.

Take a seat around the horseshoe bar and choose from 15 sommelier-selected wines to drink by the glass, or more than 350 to drink by the bottle. An overwhelming 95 percent of the wine selection here is domestically produced. The tasting set is the best way to sample a few di erent varieties, priced at ¥1,500 for three glasses. If you’re buying a bottle as a gift, you can choose to have it wrapped in artisan-made furoshiki (wrapping cloth) for an extra-special, authentic Japanese touch.

Tiny even for Tokyo standards, Bar à vin is a wine bar tucked under the stairwell to its sister restaurant Maison Cinquante Cinq. There’s standing room only, around a central table, and wines are available by the glass along with a short menu of French-inspired snacks to sustain you. In such an intimate setting it’s easy to strike up a conversation with the person next to you on which wine they are enjoying. Otherwise, leave it to the sommelier who will bring out the selection of wines he’s just opened for the night.

Tucked away on the 4th floor of Ebisu’s Atre building is this stylish, well-stocked kaku-uchi of Kimijimaya. Kaku-uchi are part liquor stores, part bars, meaning Kimijimaya has you covered whether you’re looking to buy high-quality sake and wine to take home or have a tipple in-store.

The space is neat and well-organised, and the eponymous owner – who also moonlights as a rock musician – is passionate about creating a space where people can drink authentic, unique and good quality tipple at reasonable prices. Sit at the counter by the window for some people-watching while you sip, or just hang out around the standing table in the centre of the bar area.

Giving off a relaxed, local vibe, Lug serves up great coffee and a simple lunch menu during the day and has a very impressive rum selection by night, boasting over 150 different bottles. Unobtrusively located in the far back corner is a walk-in wine cellar that’s stocked with 100 percent natural wine bottles. Sommelier Honzawa-san, or ‘Pon-chan’ by all who know her, is passionate about natural wine and is constantly rotating the wines available by the glass so that customers can expand their palate.