The best bars and nightlife in Cannes

You would expect Cannes – Riviera headliner, with a genius for stretching a fortnight's film festival glam across an entire year – to have some star clubs. You'd be right. The Cannes experience requires lightly dressed, tanned excess  and a certain selectivity – in terms of money, looks and clothes worn. During festival time, exclusivity rides up several notches but don't let that stop you from exploring the best nightlife Cannes has to offer from a swish cabaret bolthole and a true Cannes institution in the Hotel Martinez, to the biggest club in Cannes. Here is Telegraph Travel's Cannes expert, Anthony Peregrine's top tips for a night on the town.

For further inspiration, see our guide to Cannes and the city's best hotels, restaurants and things to do. For more inspiration read our guide to spending a week on the French Riviera. 

The five-star hotel has, in its Fouquet’s bar, maybe the best cocktail spot in Cannes. From 10am through 11pm, the bar offers first-rate cocktails starring aromatic plants grown at the hotel. The man in charge is Emanuele Balestra, formerly of Trump Towers in Chicago. The setting has a sophisticated 1930s vibe – deep armchairs, beams covered in gold leaf – all of which undoubtedly justifies some ambitious prices. Cocktails start at £22, cheapest whiskey at £16 and Trump favourite Coke Zero at £8.50. 

Contact: hotelsbarriere.com
Price: ££

This place was “La Chunga” from 1956 until 2021, when it changed its name – apparently honouring a former doorman. Bang opposite the Hotel Martinez, it has been completely redesigned in recent months but  remains a plush, slightly louche Cannes institution. It starts out, early evening, as an Italo-Provençal restaurant – with, it must be said, some ambitious pricing (€46 / £39 for sea-bass fillet) before evolving into a piano and live music bar with a jazz vibe. Clientèle is, in general, sufficiently grown-up to know what a whisky-sour is, and sufficiently rich not to flinch at the ambitious prices.

Contact: luigicannes.com
Prices: ££

On the Pierre Canto Port, thus slightly off-centre, this is maybe the most up-market of Cannes nightspots. It's where I'll expect to see you when your film wins an award at Cannes. To have a whisper of a chance of gaining entry, you'll have to look both good and opulent, and have a high tolerance of over-empowered doormen and some ultra self-satisfied staff. Within is an exotic outdoor restaurant with tropical greenery décor, a new rooftop bar – Cloud Nine – and the club itself. There are inside bits and outside bits and various ambiances. These run from velvety and relaxed in the restaurant to exotic on the rooftop to upscale wild when the dancing starts around 1am. Prices are outrageous but, then, if you're counting the euros, you're in the wrong place. As the club itself boasts, “La jet-set internationale” shows up here. If that sounds like you, this is your place.

Contact: baolicannes.com
Prices: £££

The Cannes branch of the celebrated Parisian Speakeasy brings crooners and chanteuses to the Riviera, the live music accompanying food more interesting than you find in some nightspots: fillet of sea-bass, fillet of Simenthal beef. Later, live music cedes to the thump of DJ driven dancing, and so life roars on until 4am. Good eating, drinking and dancing, then, in one of the coolest spots in town.

Contact: lespeakeasy.com
Price: £££

France's number one casino company has not one but two terribly chic establishments in which you might lose whatever money you have left after a day spent in Cannes. The main one – Casino Le Croisette – is effectively built into the Palais des Festivals. It's contemporary in style – or as contemporary as you can be with classic Greek murals – and aside from games and machines, lays on a bar and useful, gold’n’red plush restaurant overlooking the port.

From midnight, move through to the Bisous Bisous (Kisses Kisses) nightclub, where the 1970s mixes with new-wave disco and house music in one of the liveliest, most LGBT-friendly spots in town.

Contact: casinosbarriere.com
Price: £

Twins Antoine and Ugo Lecorche have run the busy, convivial La Môme restaurant on fresh, Mediterranean lines since 2015. A couple of years later, they added a cocktail bar of some lively sophistication right opposite, in Impasse Florian. A successful evening might take in both. Alternatively, there’s the same group’s Le Mido restaurant, majoring on Nikkei cuisine, in which Japan meets Latin America. Le Mido is also in Impasse Florian - as is Le Moka, another, high-coloured Lecorche project, open from breakfast through lunch to 6pm.

Contact: lamomegroupe.com
Price: ££

Maybe the coolest, most welcoming and most reasonably-priced cocktail, wine and tapas bar in Cannes old town. No particularly special themed décor or anything like that. Just a most friendly spot – believe me, you can’t say that about every bar in Cannes – with whiskies, gins and tequilas from £8.50 and DJ sets from 10pm to 2.30am. It’s open from 6.30pm seven days a week in summer, every day bar Monday in winter.

Contact: bar-lendroit-cannes.fr
Price: £

At 3 Rue Suquet in the old town, Charly’s is cool but less hectically glam than establishments nearer the Croisette and, unusually, it’s open every day, from 5pm to 2:30am. As the name suggests, there’s a fine selection of wines and champagnes, plus tasting platters of cheese and charcuterie. Is particularly worth considering if you’ve passed through the first flush of youth.

Contact: 06 16 64 15 66; instagram.com/charlysbarcannes
Price: £

Simple, central, relaxed and welcoming, La Belle Epoque boasts some of the best value cocktails in Cannes. They start at £12. You may sip them from 6pm through to 2.30am. 

Contact: lebelleepoque-cannes.fr
Price: ££

Sometimes only an Irish pub will do – even in Cannes – and Morrison’s, at 10 Rue Tesseire – will do nicely. There’s live rock music Thursday through Sunday, open mic nights on Tuesdays, a welcoming atmosphere, reasonable prices (for Cannes, that is) and, next door, Morrison’s Lounge – an associated spot with karaoke, dancing and, on Mondays, quiz night. Some people resist going to British or Irish bars when abroad. Then again, some people will do anything to avoid enjoying themselves.

Contact: cannes-nightlife.com
Price: £

Every bar, venue or experience in this curated list has been tried and tested by our destination expert, who has visited to provide you with their insider perspective. We cover a range of budgets and styles, from casual pubs to exquisite cocktail bars – to best suit every type of traveller – and consider the service, drinks, atmosphere and price in our recommendations. We update this list regularly to keep up with the latest openings and provide up to date recommendations.

For more than 30 years, Cannes expert Anthony Peregrine has perpetuated the double-centennial relationship between noble Britons and the Côte-d’Azur. Few suspect he’s really a prole from Preston, Lancs.