Italian restaurants in London
164 places
'O Ver
££Doughs and pastas made with filtered Mediterranean sea water instead of salt - a Neapolitan technique almost nobody else here bothers with.
50 Kalò
££Ciro Salvo's London outpost, fourth in Europe in the 2026 rankings and a rare high-end pizzeria in the middle of tourist London.
Central location makes it the most reachable of the top-ranked pizzerias.
67 Sourdough
££Thin-crust New York pizza served inside a working car dealership on the Great North Road, which is exactly as strange as it sounds and entirely the point.
Open Wednesday to Sunday only. Shares premises with the dealership, so the room is a showroom.
Ace Pizza
££A chewy hybrid base that refuses to pick a side between New York and Naples, on the Victoria Park village strip rather than anywhere you would pass by accident.
Al Boccon di'vino
£££There is no menu. You are brought course after course of whatever is being cooked that night, the way an Italian wedding feeds people, until you stop.
Al Dente
£Handmade pasta made in front of you for under £15, which is why the Goodge Street room fills with students at lunch and solo diners at night.
Alley Cats Pizza
££The New York-style pizzeria that all three 2026 London lists name - eighteen-inch pies, Southern Italian ingredients, and a room that behaves like a Brooklyn slice joint rather than a trattoria.
Marylebone is the original; a second site sits at 342 King's Road, Chelsea. Despite the New York framing, the restaurants sell whole pies rather than slices - the Portobello Road site is the one adding a slice hatch.
Anima e Cuore
£A Camden Town room with a reputation well ahead of its prices and its decor.
Artusi
££Peckham dining room doing classically based seasonal cooking with hand-made pasta, at prices well below its central equivalents.
Ave Mario
££Big Mamma's Covent Garden room, done as an eighties throwback. Neapolitan pizza, all-homemade pasta and T-bone fiorentina.
Vast and deliberately theatrical - the group books out well ahead and the rooms are loud by design.
Bacchanalia
££££A Mayfair room built as a Greco-Roman fantasy, designed by Martin Brudnizki, with marble sculptures by Damien Hirst and hand-painted ceiling murals by Gary Myatt.
The most-cited room in the instagrammable corpus - six of seven sources name it.
Bad Boy Pizza Society
£Twenty-two-inch New York pies sold by the slice from a counter inside Seven Dials Market - and, unusually for a market stall, a two-time National Pizza of the Year winner.
Trades on Seven Dials Market hours, not its own. The brand also runs residencies at Vinegar Yard and The Railway in Tulse Hill, and opened its first permanent restaurant - Bad Boy Pizzeria - at 419 Bethnal Green Road in August 2025. Began in 2018 as a parody university society in Southampton.
Bancone
££Watch the pasta being rolled at the counter, at prices well below the Michelin Guide average.
Bancone
££Watch the pasta being rolled at the counter, at prices well below the Michelin Guide average.
Bancone
££Watch the pasta being rolled at the counter, at prices well below the Michelin Guide average.
Bancone
££Watch the pasta being rolled at the counter, at prices well below the Michelin Guide average.
Bancone
££Watch the pasta being rolled at the counter, at prices well below the Michelin Guide average.
Bancone
££Watch the pasta being rolled at the counter, at prices well below the Michelin Guide average.
Bar Douro
££A narrow Portuguese counter lined in hand-painted azulejo tiles, under a slatted, shack-like ceiling.
The cheapest room on this list by some distance, and the only one whose look comes from tilework rather than money.
Bar Etna
£££Joe Beddia of Pizzeria Beddia in Philadelphia partnered with Four Legs to open his only restaurant outside the United States - a New York and Philly pizza site crossed with an Italian neighbourhood bar.
Bar Italia
£Open since 1949 and still on Frith Street. Coffee, a cannoli and a place to stand at the counter rather than a meal.
Long hours - the traditional Soho late stop. Counter service, minimal seating.
Barbarella
££Big Mamma's Canary Wharf room, done out as a 1970s Cinecittà film studio and named after the Jane Fonda film - T-bone steaks and filled pasta under a lot of glitter.
Opened June 2026. Steps from the Canary Wharf DLR and Jubilee platforms, and a few minutes from the Elizabeth line.
Berberè
££An Italian chain that takes sourdough fermentation seriously, and routinely rated among the best pizza in London - not the sort of thing Stratford is assumed to have.
Bing Bong Pizza
££Second in Britain in 2025, cooked out of a leopard-print bar on Morning Lane rather than a kitchen anyone would design on purpose.
A pop-up inside You Call The Shots, so it keeps the bar's hours rather than a restaurant's. Not a separate address.
Bocca di Lupo
£££Regional cooking from across the whole of Italy, served trattoria-style in a buzzy Soho room. Counter seats face the kitchen.
Dishes labelled by region; small and large plate sizes of everything.
Bon Vino
££Neighbourhood Italian near London Bridge, picked out by TOPJAW alongside Flour & Grape.
Breadstall
£Berwick Street pizza slice counter, on the Soho market street rather than in a dining room. Slow-fermented dough with a crisp bottom and a puffed, almost naan-like crust.
A second site trades in Battersea.
Brutto
££Deliberately unfussy Florentine cooking; the bistecca is the order.
Burro
££Named by both The Infatuation and Time Out, and one of the few Italian openings to reach two independent guides quickly.
Café Murano
££Angela Hartnett's everyday counterpart to Murano - the same kitchen thinking at a third of the price.
Sites in Covent Garden and St James's. The pasta is made fresh at least twice a day.
Campania & Jones
£££Cooking from the Campania region in a converted dairy near Columbia Road, with pasta made by hand every day.
Close to Columbia Road flower market, so Sunday is a different proposition from the rest of the week.
Canteen
££A Portobello Road room added to the Michelin Guide in 2026, in its first year.
Carlotta
££Italian-American rather than Italian - pasta alla vodka and whole roasted fish, in a plush retro dining room on Marylebone High Street.
Carmela's Pizzeria
££A softer, foldable New York slice on Upper Street, where the competition is mostly chains.
Casa Felicia
££A Queen's Park neighbourhood Italian picked up by Time Out and named a finalist in The Italian Awards.
Cecconi's
£££Soho House group's all-day Mayfair room behind the Royal Academy - wraparound windows, striped marble, white-jacketed service.
Serves through the day, from egg-white omelette to lobster spaghetti.
Chucs Mayfair
£££Eight tables of 1950s Riviera glamour on Dover Street, from the clothing brand of the same name.
Very small - eight tables - so booking matters more than the walk-in-friendly rooms elsewhere on this list.
Circolo Popolare
££Big Mamma group's Fitzrovia room, wall-to-wall bottles and a ceiling of greenery. Booked out well ahead.
Como Garden
£££Interiors modelled on the gardens of Lake Como, with handmade pasta and small sharing plates.
Connie's Pizza
££Entered the European top 50 at 48 within a year of opening and took the 'one to watch' award with it - the only London pizzeria on that list south of the river.
From Andrea Asciuti, who founded 081 Pizzeria. Occupies the railway arches under Queen's Road Peckham station, in the old Little Kudu site. Calls its own style 'Bri-talian' - a crisp London base with Italian method.
CRATE Brewery
££Hackney Wick's first craft brewery, in a former print factory on the canal, making the beer and the pizza in the same building.
Crisp Pizza at The Marlborough
££Carl McCluskey's Crisp, previously only in Hammersmith, brought into central London inside a relaunched Mayfair pub - with the team behind The Devonshire.
TWO VENUES IN ONE. The ground-floor pub is walk-in only and pours Guinness; the pizzeria is in the basement and takes bookings through SevenRooms. IMPORTANT: pizza is not served on Mondays even though the pub is open 11:00-23:00. Pizza runs Tue-Thu 11:30-21:30, Fri-Sat to 22:30, Sun to 20:30.
Crisp Pizza at The Marlborough
££Carl McCluskey's Crisp, previously only in Hammersmith, brought into central London inside a relaunched Mayfair pub - with the team behind The Devonshire.
TWO VENUES IN ONE. The ground-floor pub is walk-in only and pours Guinness; the pizzeria is in the basement and takes bookings through SevenRooms. IMPORTANT: pizza is not served on Mondays even though the pub is open 11:00-23:00. Pizza runs Tue-Thu 11:30-21:30, Fri-Sat to 22:30, Sun to 20:30.
Crisp Pizza at The Marlborough
££Carl McCluskey's Crisp, previously only in Hammersmith, brought into central London inside a relaunched Mayfair pub - with the team behind The Devonshire.
TWO VENUES IN ONE. The ground-floor pub is walk-in only and pours Guinness; the pizzeria is in the basement and takes bookings through SevenRooms. IMPORTANT: pizza is not served on Mondays even though the pub is open 11:00-23:00. Pizza runs Tue-Thu 11:30-21:30, Fri-Sat to 22:30, Sun to 20:30.
Dalla
££One of the Hackney rooms driving the current wave of London Italian cooking away from the centre.
Dalloway Terrace
£££A covered terrace at The Bloomsbury Hotel whose floral installation is changed with the season, so the room looks different in February and in July.
Named by four sources. The seasonal changeover is worth checking before travelling for a particular look.
Daphne's
£££A Draycott Avenue fixture since 1964, and still the Chelsea room people book for a long lunch.
Detroit Pizza London
££Baked in blue steel pans so the cheese caramelises against the edge - crunchy corners, cloud-like middle, and almost nobody else in London doing it properly.
Dough Hands
££A pizza residency in the back of a Hackney pub - the format that produces some of London's best pizza without a restaurant attached. Sits between New York and Neapolitan: crisp base, generous toppings.
Runs on the pub's kitchen hours, which are shorter than the pub's own. Check before travelling. Also operates in Dalston and Hackney Wick.
Eataly
££Three restaurants, a market of Italian ingredients, a cafe, a takeaway counter and a cookery school, all in one building beside Liverpool Street. Terra has a two-metre wood-fired grill.
A venue rather than a single restaurant - the format varies by which counter or dining room you use. Useful as a wet-weather or with-children option in the City.
Elephant Hackney
££A Clapton neighbourhood Italian that Time Out rates among the city's best.
Florencio
££A light, thin, crisp base from a 48-hour ferment, on a Seymour Place corner most pizza lists never reach.
Flour & Grape
£Bermondsey Street pasta-and-wine spot; short menu, low prices, long queues.
Forza Wine
£££A terrace on top of the National Theatre looking straight up the Thames - the best free view attached to a wine list in London.
Gloria
££Big Mamma group's deliberately over-the-top trattoria, with a menu that changes every month.
Gracey's Pizza
££Inside the Battersea Power Station development, on the first floor above the main circus.
Homeslice
££Twenty-inch pizzas sold whole or by the slice, with toppings split across halves. Built for groups rather than couples.
Multiple central branches; Neal's Yard is the original.
Homeslice
££Twenty-inch pizzas sold whole or by the slice, with toppings split across halves. Built for groups rather than couples.
Multiple central branches; Neal's Yard is the original.
Homeslice
££Twenty-inch pizzas sold whole or by the slice, with toppings split across halves. Built for groups rather than couples.
Multiple central branches; Neal's Yard is the original.
Homeslice
££Twenty-inch pizzas sold whole or by the slice, with toppings split across halves. Built for groups rather than couples.
Multiple central branches; Neal's Yard is the original.
ICCO
£A twelve-inch pizza from £3.95, made to order and eaten in, two minutes from Goodge Street - which is roughly a third of what anywhere else in central London charges.
Trading since 1999 and calls itself 'the People's Pizzeria'. The £3.95 is the marinara, which has no cheese; toppings push it up but it stays cheap. Counter-style and busy in the evenings - this is a quick meal, not a night out.
Il Gattopardo
£££Massimo Pasquarelli - Abruzzo-born, a decade under Alain Ducasse, previously executive chef at the Ritz-Carlton Singapore - cooking classic Italian on Albemarle Street.
Sharing is encouraged and portions are generous. Three ways to sit: the main room, the light-filled terrace, or the crudo bar. The £20 Pasta & Vino counter offer makes a Mayfair Michelin-listed kitchen unusually reachable.
Isabel
££££A Beaux-Arts dining room off Albemarle Street, with a bar downstairs that runs late.
Named by two sources for the look rather than the cooking.
Italian Greyhound
£££From the Open House Group founders; local-trattoria spirit in a more polished contemporary room.
Jacuzzi
£££Four storeys on High Street Kensington, and the most seafood-led of the Big Mamma rooms - local fish, Italian caviar, fresh pasta.
The group's grandest London site. Four floors, so ask which one you are seated on.
Japes
££Chicago deep dish, which almost nothing else in central London attempts - a pie built in a pan deep enough that the cheese pull becomes the point of it.
Also in Greenwich and Camden. Deep dish is slow to cook - expect a wait that a Neapolitan pizzeria would not ask of you.
L'Antica Pizzeria da Michele
££The London arm of the Naples institution founded in 1870, 28th in Europe in 2026. A very short menu, done the Naples way.
Naples-born chain; Baker Street is the branch named in the 2026 rankings.
L'Antica Pizzeria da Michele
££The London arm of the Naples institution founded in 1870, 28th in Europe in 2026. A very short menu, done the Naples way.
Naples-born chain; Baker Street is the branch named in the 2026 rankings.
L'Antica Pizzeria da Michele
££The London arm of the Naples institution founded in 1870, 28th in Europe in 2026. A very short menu, done the Naples way.
Naples-born chain; Baker Street is the branch named in the 2026 rankings.
La Tua Pasta
£Fresh pasta cooked to order at a Borough Market stand, with sauces that change with the season.
Market trading hours only - closed when Borough Market is closed.
Langosteria London
££££The Milan seafood group's first London site, inside the Old War Office - spaghetti with clams and sea urchin, and prices to match the address.
Lardo
££A London Fields room with a wood oven, open since 2012 and still on the lists.
Lauretta's
££Proudly thin with a puffy charred crust, on Columbia Road - which means Sunday lunch is flower-market chaos and the rest of the week is evenings only.
Closed Mondays; evenings only Tuesday to Friday, and lunch only on Sunday. Web presence is Instagram rather than a site.
Legare
££Opened 2019 by Jay Patel (ex Barrafina) and chef Matt Beardmore (ex Trullo), in the warehouse streets by Tower Bridge.
Neighbourhood Italian in the historic Shad Thames warehouse quarter.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Lina Stores
££The mint-green Brewer Street deli since 1944, now with restaurants attached.
Fresh pasta counter and deli; the restaurants came much later than the shop.
Little Earthquakes
££Neil Rankin of Temper doing deep-dish built on the frozen supermarket pizzas he grew up on - the joke and the cooking are both entirely serious.
A residency inside the Railway Tavern rather than a restaurant of its own, so the pub's hours govern it. Time Out places it in Dalston; the pub is on the Stoke Newington side of the boundary.
Locatelli at The National Gallery
£££Giorgio and Plaxy Locatelli's return after Locanda Locatelli closed, on the mezzanine of the Sainsbury Wing. Handmade pasta is the reason to go - the cappellacci stuffed with peas in particular.
80 seats. Runs on gallery hours, so dinner is early: 11:30-19:30 Sun-Thu, to 22:15 Fri, to 20:15 Sat. Bar Giorgio on the ground floor does espresso and maritozzi for a shorter stop.
Luca
£££Italian cooking through British produce, from the Clove Club team.
Macellaio RC
£££A butcher's counter that became a restaurant - Piedmontese Fassona beef hung in the window and cut to order.
Made in Italy
££Sold by the half-metre on a wooden board, on the King's Road since long before London cared about Neapolitan dough.
Mamma Dough
££South London's own sourdough chain, and the one whose head pizzaiolo took Pizza Chef of the Year in 2025 - a title that usually goes somewhere far more fashionable.
Three sites: Brixton (Coldharbour Lane), Ladywell and South Norwood. Brixton is the one the guides name.
Manteca
£££Chris Leach and David Carter's nose-to-tail Italian with hand-rolled pasta and a salumeria on site.
Whole-animal butchery feeding a menu of house-cured salumi and hand-rolled pasta.
Mercato Metropolitano
£Italian-founded food hall with more than forty traders, heavy on pizza, fresh pasta, arancini and fritto misto.
A venue, not a restaurant - the traders inside change. Six minutes from both Elephant & Castle and Borough.
Mercato Metropolitano
£Italian-founded food hall with more than forty traders, heavy on pizza, fresh pasta, arancini and fritto misto.
A venue, not a restaurant - the traders inside change. Six minutes from both Elephant & Castle and Borough.
Mercato Metropolitano
£Italian-founded food hall with more than forty traders, heavy on pizza, fresh pasta, arancini and fritto misto.
A venue, not a restaurant - the traders inside change. Six minutes from both Elephant & Castle and Borough.
Motorino
£££Luke Ahearne and Stevie Parle call it London-Italian rather than Italian - the distinction is the point, and the cooking earns it.
Mucci's
££Every starter is £10 and every main £20 - one of the first London restaurants to build its whole menu around fixed pricing by course, rather than a time-limited offer.
Owner Giuseppe Mucci introduced the 10/20 pricing so regulars could order without watching the bill. Menu runs from cicchetti through pasta and pizza to steak and fish. Terrace seats around 50. At the World's End end of King's Road, a long walk from any tube - the King's Road buses are the practical way in.
Murano
££££Angela Hartnett's Mayfair dining room, starred within four months of opening in 2008.
Named after the Venetian glass-making island. Northern Italian cooking in a formal Mayfair room.
Napoli on the Road
££Named best pizzeria in Europe for the third year running. Michele Pascarella's Chiswick pizzeria, a long way from the tourist centre and worth the journey.
Ranked #1 in Europe by 50 Top Pizza three consecutive years to 2026. Began as a truck touring London's food markets. Now three sites: Chiswick (the original), Richmond, and Soho - where the basement runs a tasting menu and is filed separately as napoli-on-the-road-soho.
Napoli on the Road
££Named best pizzeria in Europe for the third year running. Michele Pascarella's Chiswick pizzeria, a long way from the tourist centre and worth the journey.
Ranked #1 in Europe by 50 Top Pizza three consecutive years to 2026. Began as a truck touring London's food markets. Now three sites: Chiswick (the original), Richmond, and Soho - where the basement runs a tasting menu and is filed separately as napoli-on-the-road-soho.
Napoli on the Road
££Named best pizzeria in Europe for the third year running. Michele Pascarella's Chiswick pizzeria, a long way from the tourist centre and worth the journey.
Ranked #1 in Europe by 50 Top Pizza three consecutive years to 2026. Began as a truck touring London's food markets. Now three sites: Chiswick (the original), Richmond, and Soho - where the basement runs a tasting menu and is filed separately as napoli-on-the-road-soho.
Napoli on the Road Soho
£££London's first pizza tasting menu, from the pizzaiolo whose Chiswick room has been named Europe's best three years running. Seven courses, four of them pizza, in a basement under the a la carte floor.
TWO FORMATS IN ONE BUILDING. Ground floor is a la carte and seasonal; the basement runs the tasting menu at around GBP 65 a head, with the wine pairing charged on top. Book the basement specifically - it is not the default.
Noci
££A short, frequently changing pasta menu drawn from across the Italian regions, at prices well below the central equivalents.
NoMad London
££££A three-storey glass atrium filled with plants, inside the former Bow Street Magistrates Court opposite the Royal Opera House.
The building is the draw - a working courthouse until 2006.
Norma
£££Sicilian cooking with the Moorish influence kept in, across four floors of a Fitzrovia townhouse.
Ombra
££Named for the Venetian term for a small glass of wine. Fresh pasta, seasonal vegetables and organic wine by the Regent's Canal.
Ornella
£££Milanese cooking on Wilton Way from the team behind Roman-influenced Lupa in Highbury - a butter-yellow corner site done simply.
Osteria Angelina
£££Itameshi - Italian cooking through a Japanese lens - with eight fresh pastas made in a glass-walled corner of the dining room.
Sister to Angelina in Dalston, but a different format: Dalston runs a set kaiseki tasting menu, Spitalfields is a la carte and faster. Executive chef Usman Haider oversees both.
Osteria Vibrato
£££A compact Soho osteria from Charlie Mellor with a 300-bin list of natural and biodynamic wine - Italian at its backbone, French alongside it.
Padella
£A short menu of hand-rolled pasta at low prices, which is why the queue exists.
Original site opened in Borough Market 2016; now also Shoreditch and Soho, where limited bookings are taken.
Padella
£A short menu of hand-rolled pasta at low prices, which is why the queue exists.
Original site opened in Borough Market 2016; now also Shoreditch and Soho, where limited bookings are taken.
Padella
£A short menu of hand-rolled pasta at low prices, which is why the queue exists.
Original site opened in Borough Market 2016; now also Shoreditch and Soho, where limited bookings are taken.
Padella
£A short menu of hand-rolled pasta at low prices, which is why the queue exists.
Original site opened in Borough Market 2016; now also Shoreditch and Soho, where limited bookings are taken.
PaStation
£Fresh pasta under a tenner in generous portions, near Tottenham Court Road. Built a following online rather than through the guides.
Paulie's
££The Paulie's Pie - fennel-seed pepperoni under hot honey - sold by the slice or whole on Commercial Street, with enough room to actually sit down.
Popolo
££A narrow Rivington Street room doing Italian and North African small plates from an open counter.
Ria's
££Thick, crisp-edged Detroit pies - baked in a rectangular steel pan so the cheese caramelises against the sides - matched to a natural wine list. Almost nothing else in London commits to this style.
Founded 2023 by a husband-and-wife pair out of tech. Notting Hill is the original; a second site opened in Soho at 29 Foubert's Place, W1F 7QF, with a downstairs wine cave.
River Café
££££Michelin-starred simplicity on the Thames, where Jamie Oliver and Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall both trained. The terrace tables are the ones everyone wants.
Informal in atmosphere, upmarket in cooking; the riverside seats book furthest ahead.
Roma Pizza
£Roman-style thin-crust pizzas at £5 on Brick Lane, from the Made of Dough team.
RESOLVED 2026-08-23: trading. Google and Hardens had it as permanently closed; the venue site, Yelp (reviews to March 2026) and Time Out all show it open at 224 Brick Lane. Roman-style thin-crust from the Made of Dough team.
Rosina
££££Adam Byatt spent two decades building a modern British reputation and then opened an Italian restaurant on the corner of Wandsworth Common.
Sale e Pepe
£££Serving the same classic Italian menu off Sloane Street since 1974 - the kind of room that stopped being built decades ago.
Sale e Pepe Mare
££££Ligurian coastal cooking at The Langham, carrying over the original Sale e Pepe's cacio e pepe finished tableside in a cheese wheel.
Santa Maria
££A small Ealing pizzeria that built its reputation on strict Neapolitan method before the current wave arrived.
Santa Maria
££A small Ealing pizzeria that built its reputation on strict Neapolitan method before the current wave arrived.
Santa Maria
££A small Ealing pizzeria that built its reputation on strict Neapolitan method before the current wave arrived.
Santa Maria
££A small Ealing pizzeria that built its reputation on strict Neapolitan method before the current wave arrived.
Santa Maria
££A small Ealing pizzeria that built its reputation on strict Neapolitan method before the current wave arrived.
Santa Maria
££A small Ealing pizzeria that built its reputation on strict Neapolitan method before the current wave arrived.
Santi
££East Village's own Italian rather than a Westfield unit, doing pizza and pasta for the people who actually live in the athletes' village.
Sarv's Slice
£Slice counter in the Filmworks development by Ealing Broadway.
Sette
££££Knightsbridge Italian at the top of the market, and one of very few genuinely ££££ Italians left in London.
Short Road Pizza
££The most decorated pizza in Britain right now, cooked in the back of a Leyton brewery pub. Romana bases - thin, long-fermented, crisp to the edge - with American toppings on them.
A RESIDENCY, NOT A RESTAURANT. Runs inside Exale Brewery's pubs - William The Fourth in Leyton and Three Colts in Bethnal Green - so the kitchen's hours are shorter than the pub's. Founded by Ugo and Kate on Short Road, Leytonstone.
Sky Garden
£££A planted glass dome on top of 20 Fenchurch Street. Entry to the garden is free with a booked slot; the restaurants inside it are not.
The free-entry distinction is the thing readers get wrong. Free slots are released on a rolling window and go first.
Sodo Pizza
££Sourdough bases, natural wine and local craft beer, a short walk from Clapton Pond - a neighbourhood pizzeria that the city lists keep finding anyway.
Three sites: Clapton, Walthamstow and Deptford.
Sorella
££Robin Gill's Clapham room - the team behind The Dairy - cooking the Amalfi Coast through British produce.
Sparrow
££Spaghetti with pistachio pesto, lobster linguine, spicy vodka rigatoni.
Spring
££££Skye Gyngell's dining room in the New Wing of Somerset House - a nineteenth-century drawing room in blonde wood and blush, under a porcelain petal installation by Valeria Nascimento.
One of the few rooms on this list where the cooking is cited as often as the setting.
Spring Street Pizza
££A Michelin-starred chef leaving fine dining to make eighteen-inch New York slices under a railway arch. The dough is a biga fermented past forty-eight hours, which is where the thin, foldable, properly charred base comes from.
Tom Kemble, previously of Bonhams, opened this in 2025 in the arches off O'Meara Street - a few minutes from Borough Market, London Bridge and the Shard.
Sucre
£££A Soho basement lit by cut-glass chandeliers, over an open fire kitchen.
One source calls it impressive but just subdued enough not to feel gimmicky, which is the distinction this whole list turns on.
Sud Italia
£Wood-fired pizza from a stall in Old Spitalfields Market - one of the few genuine market pizzas in central London.
Market trading hours only.
Tattu
£££A Joyce Wang Studio room built as a Chinese courtyard, around a full-size cherry blossom tree.
The only venue here named by two editorial sources and no blog, which is unusual in this corpus.
The Dover
£££Italian-American cooking on Dover Street, in the mould of a New York supper club.
AMBIGUOUS SOURCE: clustered from a heading that may belong to a neighbouring Dover Street venue. Confirm the identity before publishing.
The Ivy Chelsea Garden
£££A walled garden behind the King's Road, dressed seasonally, with a conservatory for the months it is too cold to sit outside.
A chain, and the article says so - the garden is the reason it is here, not the kitchen.
Theo Randall at the InterContinental
£££Theo Randall spent fifteen years running the kitchen at The River Cafe before opening this Park Lane dining room.
Hotel dining room, so it keeps longer and more reliable hours than most of the independents on this list.
Theo's Pizzeria
££The Camberwell pizzeria that made its name on house chilli oil, and is the reason people from other postcodes end up on Grove Lane.
Tiella
££A trattoria run with the sensibility of a pub - strangers talk to each other, and the polpette recipe is a family one.
Trullo
£££Tim Siadatan (ex St John, Moro) cooking a frequently changing seasonal menu of hand-made pasta and charcoal-grilled meats.
Highbury trattoria, long regarded as one of London's best neighbourhood Italians.
Vincenzo's
£Twenty-inch pies cut into slices you eat standing up - the closest thing London has to an actual New York slice shop, rather than a restaurant doing New York pizza.
Slices are grab-and-go from 5pm; whole 16-inch pizzas are takeaway. The original Vincenzo's is in Bushey, outside London - the Shoreditch site opened late 2025.
Voodoo Ray's
£Enormous New York slices sold until the small hours, which is the only specification that matters at that time of night.
Serves well past midnight at weekends. Slices, not whole pizzas.
Wandercrust
££Proper Neapolitan bases in Greenwich, which the area has an unusual amount of for its size.
Weezie's
££Thin crust, British-sourced toppings, pints of Guinness and a serious wine list, in a courtyard five minutes from Victoria - which is not where anyone looks for good pizza.
Yard Sale Pizza
££Started in a back-yard oven in Homerton in 2014 and grew into east London's default good pizza without ever becoming a chain you would avoid. British ingredients, proper vegan options, and consistent across every branch.
Six London sites - Clapton, East Dulwich, Hackney Road, Leytonstone, Walthamstow and Finsbury Park. Clapton is the original.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
Zia Lucia
££Offers four different doughs including a 48-hour and a charcoal base, which makes it the most useful of the group for gluten-sensitive diners.
If everything else is full
Reliable rather than remarkable. These are chains — worth knowing about when you need somewhere open, not worth a journey.
Franco Manca
£Sourdough pizza at a price nothing else central matches, from an operation that began on a Brixton Market stall in 2008.
Pizza Pilgrims
££Started as a Soho market cart in 2012 and now runs across London. Seventh in the 50 Top World Artisan Pizza Chains list.
Rudy's Pizza Napoletana
££Naples by way of Manchester, and AVPN-accredited - which means the dough, the flour and the oven all meet the Neapolitan association's own standard. The most reliable cheap Neapolitan pizza in central London.