Best Restaurants in Mykonos: Guide 2026

Spilia means cave, and that is exactly what it is, built into a rock grotto on the shore at Agia Anna beside Kalafatis, tables almost on the water with the sea showing through gaps in the stone. There is nothing else like it on Mykonos. Thirty-odd years in and freshly made over, it pulls off the rare double of being a serious destination for seafood and one of the most atmospheric rooms on the island, especially once dusk arrives and the cave fills with candlelight.

Seafood is the whole point, much of it kept alive in a natural sea pool below the tables: oysters, mussels, urchins, crayfish, lobster. We reach for the sea urchin pasta, the lobster and crab linguine, a tuna tartare that more than one neighbouring table has called the best they have had, the ceviche, a plain spaghetti alle vongole. A DJ plays through the afternoon, and most days the room tips properly into a party once the light starts to go, so it lands somewhere between a long lunch and a night out. Two honest notes: it is expensive, and the kitchen can slow when the room is full, but on its day, lunch under the sun especially, it is unforgettable.

Promenade has one of the better spots on the Old Port, a good-looking room where the tables face straight out to sea and, if you time it right, you get the sunset with dinner. The menu is broad and seafood-led, the decor genuinely lovely, and on a clear evening with the light going gold it is an easy place to fall for. When it is on, the lobster and the fresh fish live up to the talk.

We have put it here because the setting and the better plates earn it, but we would be selling you short to skip the one thing reviews flag again and again: the extras add up. Bread, dips, salads, water, sides, they can land on the bill whether you ordered them or not, and fish is priced by weight. That is not a reason to stay away. It is a reason to order deliberately and check prices as you go, which is the difference between leaving happy and leaving annoyed.

Pelican sits right on the water at the Old Port, a few metres from Blue Sea beach, and it has built a following on a single promise: a tour of Greece down one long menu. The setting reels you in, tables near the sea and a clean line on the sunset, but the food holds its own. Even when it is slammed the plates come out hot and fresh, which tells you how the place is run.

We start with the Greek meze platter and the bruschetta with eggplant purée, then the seafood linguine and the parmesan spaghetti finished inside a parmesan wheel, which is exactly as good as it sounds. Calamari, grilled octopus, and mussels are safe bets, the pita arrives warm, and there is gluten-free pasta and sushi for tables that cannot agree. Portions are generous. The one caveat, and reviews echo it, is that prime real estate shows up in the bill, so order with that in mind and you will have a great night.

There is always one night, usually after a week of Greek tables, when only pasta will do. This is where we send people for it. Casa Di Giorgio hides on Mitropoleos behind the Catholic cathedral, a couple of minutes from Little Venice but a world quieter, in an old village house named for Captain Giorgio and run now by his grandson. Small candlelit rooms, a terrace made for lingering.

The kitchen keeps it honest: handmade pasta, pizza, risotto, and a Greek wine list bigger than a trattoria this size has any right to. The lobster risotto with truffle is the one people come back for, and the shrimp pasta and house sausages do not miss either. One thing worth knowing, since it comes up a lot, is that bread and the odd extra can find their way onto the bill, so give it a glance on the way out. None of that dents a lovely evening.

Pasta Fresca Barkia opened in 1978 as the first Italian on the island and has not budged from its corner of Barkia square, near the old harbour, since. The pasta display out front usually gives it away, and if you turn up after six you can watch them making it by hand, a bit of theatre the regulars still stop for. Three floors, busy and loud in the best way, and by night the room properly wakes up.

Pasta is the reason you are here. We go for the linguine with crab, the stuffed ravioli and tortellacci, the porcini-filled pasta, the black linguine with seafood, all of it landing hot with cheese finished at the table. There is fresh fish and even sushi further down the menu, and the prices stay fair for what arrives. Two honest notes from the wider reviews that match ours: the carbonara splits opinion, so we would start elsewhere, and bread and water carry a charge, same as most tables in town.

Armira is the newcomer here, and already one of our go-to answers for guests who want real Greek food without leaving Chora. It is on a quiet lane just off the main beachfront bustle, the kind of place people tell us they wandered into by accident and then could not stop mentioning. A clean white minimalist room in the old Cycladic taverna spirit, run as a proper family affair with the owner out front and her husband on the pass.

What comes out is traditional Greek, nudged a notch more refined without losing the plot, and the fish is what people rave about most, fresh enough to bring regulars back twice in a week. Beyond the catch, the slow-cooked lamb with potatoes and the beef cheek with pasta are the standouts, well seasoned and full of flavour, with pork and chicken souvlaki, chicken and potatoes, and a generous Greek salad rounding things out. Leave room for the chocolate mosaic cake. For prices that sit at the gentler end for this island, it is a genuine find.

You will spot Baboulas by the old red kaiki tied up beside it, Mathios, hand-built on Mykonos back in the early fifties, sitting right on the Gialos waterfront at the Old Port. The family has been doing the same thing here for more than thirty years, which on an island that reinvents itself every June counts for a lot. Their line is simple: keep it Greek, enjoy the good stuff, treat you like one of their own.

This is an ouzeri the old way, built for grazing rather than a tidy three courses. We order a wide spread of Petroula's mezedes, whatever came off the boat that morning, and a cold carafe, then let the afternoon go where it wants. Nothing fancy, fair for the spot, and one of the last genuinely local tables in the thick of the harbour. Come hungry and order one more plate than feels sensible.

Limnios sits up on the hillside above Agios Stefanos, three and a half kilometres or so from Chora and a stone's throw from Tourlos port. The view runs out to Delos, and the sunset from up here is one of the better ones on this side of the island. Same family for over twenty years, the second generation in charge now, and you feel it the moment you sit down.

The grill does the heavy lifting. Manolis's lamb chops have a reputation the locals will back up, and around them sits the kind of cooking you keep hoping to find and rarely do: Margarita's handmade dolmades, the meatballs, a moussaka with proper layers, the tomahawk pork, the pork in mustard and honey that regulars order on repeat. Portions are big, the house wine pours freely, and the prices, taxes and service included, stay surprisingly sane for Mykonos. Book a window or balcony table and aim for the light.

Nosotros is the easy one, and we mean that as a compliment. It is right on the sand at Agios Stefanos, an all-day brunch, bar, and restaurant where the water sets the pace rather than the room. Newer than most names here, it has quietly climbed to one of the highest-rated tables on the island, the sort of spot guests nearby end up at two or three times a week simply because it works.

The menu runs international over a Mediterranean base, which is a relief for groups that never agree. The mussels and grilled octopus have been excellent, the burger is the one regulars push you toward, and the strip loin and lamb hold their own against far pricier kitchens. Go for a long brunch with your feet near the sand, or come back at dusk and let dinner stretch as the light drops.

The name means a sheltered spot, and Apaggio lives up to it. It tucks into a quiet corner on the eastern edge of Ornos Bay, just before the Santa Marina gate, with tables set so close to the water you could nearly reach it and fairy lights overhead once the sun is gone. The Sikiniotis family run it, and it is the calm answer to the island's louder beach clubs, where we send couples and anyone after the sea without the show.

This is sea-to-table in the literal sense, the fishermen tying up steps from the dining room each morning and the kitchen keeping its hand light so the catch can speak. The baby shrimps are the dish locals quietly insist on. From there it is grilled octopus, salt-crusted sea bass, a lobster spaghetti regulars rank among the island's best, sea urchin pasta, Mykonian onion pie, slow-cooked lamb kleftiko. The wine and tsipouro lean proudly Greek. It manages taverna warmth and restaurant polish at once, and the sunset over the bay is the quiet kind that stays with you.