Hartford Dive Bar Guide

If there was ever an East Coast town perfect for a neighborhood dive bar, it might be Hartford with its potent city core but relaxed atmosphere when compared to some of its more populous East Coast neighbors. The city’s dive bar options each cater to unique communities, many of them serving the same types of unassuming regulars for decades.

One great example of a community-focused, durable Hartford dive bar is The Spigot Café, opened in 1963 as part of a pizza shop operated by David Taylor who also happened to work a full-time job in between shifts. Today, the bright red building is a dive bar icon within the city, recent renovations adding a bit of polish to the interior spaces while preserving the signature red exterior color and daring to add credit cards as a payment options.

Downtown Hartford has its own bit of divey drinking in the form of Pigs Eye Pub, owner of easily the best dive bar tagline in the city, “Oinkin and boinkin since 1997.” The spacious dive bar sits on the second floor of a downtown building and includes decorations including a few installations built out of items left behind by drinkers, including strung-up hats dangling from the ceiling.

These options and others provide a way to explore some of the nooks and crannies of Hartford, the kind of East Coast city that makes casually discovering each option an enjoyable (divey) experience.