Where to Find the Best Specialty Coffee in Vancouver, B.C.

Revolver Coffee

My first trip to Revolver Coffee, which was five or so years ago at the time of writing, was a formative moment in my coffee journey that has taken me from Keurig-lover to home espresso enthusiast.

It was the first time that I can remember being served a pour over coffee in a separate carafe with a tasting glass, which is now pretty standard for specialty coffee shops. 

They’re what I like to call a coffee curator (other people usually say “multi-roaster”), which means that they don’t roast coffee on their own.

Instead, they have a robust coffee program that brings in coffees from all over the world to sell in their shop.

Over the course of this guide, you’ll no doubt learn that this is, by far, my favorite type of coffee shop. 

I would say that my expectations for Revolver were high going in this last time.

I’m now more, shall we say, discerning about my coffee, and I wasn’t quite sure if it would live up to those expectations. 

I opened the door to the shop in hip Gastown and stepped into the narrow space, which puts you within a couple of feet of some of the best baristas in Vancouver no matter where you put yourself. 

When I walked back out of that door, caffeinated with two bags of coffee in hand to take home, I was completely satisfied. It exceeded my high expectations for a few reasons. 

First, the coffee here is phenomenal, and you have a ton of choices. I was already vibrating with the amount of caffeine I’d had that morning, so I had to stop myself from ordering three drinks.

They have a couple of coffees available as espresso, a rotating selection of 3-5 pour over options, and even coffee flights. 

The coffee flights come in two varieties, and they both focus on espresso.

First, you can get one espresso served three ways (as a shot, with milk, and with water).

Second is two coffees served as espresso and with milk to compare between the two coffees in the same format. 

Second, I love the coffee selection in terms of bags of beans from around the world.

When you walk into Revolver, you’re greeted with a wall, twelve feet wide from floor to ceiling, of different coffee beans from various roasters around the world.

We’re talking about everything from the best roasters in Canada, to roasters from Japan, Norway, Germany, and just about every other corner of the coffee roasting world. It’s impressive. 

I asked one barista for recommendations for a wild, fun coffee, and walked away with two – both from Alberta – a natural process Ethiopian coffee roasted by Rogue Wave out of Edmonton, and a Colombian coffee with tasting notes of pineapple and kiwi roasted by Phil and Sebastian out of Calgary (two Canadian roasters, hooray!). 

If you’re looking for an excellent selection of fun coffees from around the world available to try here, and buy to take home, I’d head to Revolver. 

Yuán Coffee

In every city that I spend enough time to really dive into the coffee scene, I walk away with what Alysha likes to call a “coffee crush.” Someone who I spend some time with chatting about coffee (and life) and who I come away raving about. 

For example, in Paris, I came away from an experience at Substance Cafe in awe of the owner’s sheer charisma and skill as he makes excellent coffee and seamlessly explains what he’s doing and what you’re drinking as he does his thing. 

In Vancouver, that person is undoubtedly Tim, the owner/barista at Yuán Coffee. 

Ironically, as soon as I walked into Tim’s space on Clark Ave on the east side of Vancouver’s downtown core, I realized that I had actually been there before.

It was the space that Oidé had been in before moving over closer to Kitsilano and Granville Island (more on them in a bit). 

Tim’s whole offering is expertly made specialty coffee using beans from roasters in East Asia.

I saw some roasters I’m familiar with – Momos (from South Korea) and Kurasu (from Japan), for example – along with a roaster from Taiwan (Coffee Stopover) that I had definitely never heard of. 

The coffee menu here will make your head spin. There are literally more than twenty options for beans, ranging from crowd-pleasing medium-dark roasts full of chocolate to delicate light roasts with tasting notes like black tea and elderflower. 

Each option is available as pour over or as espresso (though I don’t think the whole menu is available as espresso), and I watched as Tim gave each person the attention and advice they needed to help them choose the right coffee for their preferences. 

In my case, we landed on a “baby gesha” roasted by Coffee Stopover, and it was pretty clearly the single best cup of coffee I had on that trip. It was absolutely bursting with intensity and orange fruit. 

I liked this place so much that I made sure it was the last coffee I had, making a special trip out of my way to get a shot of espresso before heading to the airport. 

I wanted to try his espresso because he uses a lever machine (old school!), which is a unique way of making coffee in today’s world which has skewed further and further into programmable machines that are more a computer than anything else. 

He made me a deliciously aromatic anaerobic honey coffee that, originally, I thought was going to be a bit too process-forward, but ended up being a great balance of sweetness and acidity that I really enjoyed. 

On my second visit in a couple of days, we chatted for a long while about coffee and barista competitions (Tim is a competitor in the Canadian competition), and over the course of that conversation, I knew that Alysha was going to proclaim Tim my coffee crush du jour. 

Prototype Coffee

In the grand scheme of coffee roasters in Vancouver, I liked the approach at Prototype the most.

So much so that I went back for seconds after a great first experience to try the two coffees that the barista recommended to me on my first visit. 

I love that they call their cafe a tasting room, which, when you see their menu, is an accurate description of what they’ve got going on. We’ll get to that in a second. 

First, let’s talk about the location. It’s on E Hastings St., but past the stretch that is a little sketchy.

It’s a somewhat industrial area, and I almost walked right past the entrance, which is tucked away under a staircase for the building it’s in. 

When you enter, you’ll see a long hallway-esque space, with the coffee bar on the left.

They brew espresso with a deconstructed espresso machine and a grinder that I legitimately thought was a microscope, and they brew their filter coffee with a GINA, which is a cross between a V60 and an immersion brewer like the Clever or Hario Switch.

I had never seen this particular brewer before, but it seems like a fun brewer that blends the best of both styles. It’s also beautiful, though it takes up a lot of space, so it’s probably better suited for cafe life versus home brewing. 

As you’re looking at their brewing setup, your eyes will also surely be drawn to the four Aillio countertop roasters, which is something I have never, ever seen before in a cafe.

Usually, if it’s a “roasting HQ” or something like that, you’ll see a big drum roaster somewhere in the space.

But in this case, there are four mini roasters going, which I assume is how they are able to roast in small batches and have over a dozen coffees (23 coffees when I was there!) available on the menu. 

I love the fact that they’re maximizing their space by trying different, more efficient tools (in terms of space at least) than most other coffee shops I’ve ever been to.

Several of these tools, including the GINA brewer and the odd looking grinder (from Weber Workshops), are things I’ve never seen before.

That’s all fun, but the real question here is how was the coffee? And that, my friend, brings us back to the fact that I went back at 8:00 am before driving back home to Portland to get seconds, driving across the city (and out of the way) to get there. 

The coffee was fantastic. The GINA brewer brews a cup that is balanced in terms of acidity and sweetness, but also in terms of body.

On my first trip, I was already fairly caffeinated, so I tried one filter coffee, a Colombian coffee with a 360 hour anaerobic fermentation that was a roller coaster in terms of flavors (though it made me realize that I really only ever want a single cup of anaerobic coffees, not a whole bag).

It was wild and exciting, and was exactly what I was hoping it would be. 

As I was leaving, I was chatting with the barista, who recommended the Colombian gesha they had, saying it was the best coffee they’d had in a while.

Plus, if I was into the ferment-y flavors, I should really try a coffee from Mexico that they had on espresso. 

Which is exactly what I did the next morning. Both were excellent. 

If you’re a coffee nerd looking to try a wide variety of coffees, including some really special small lot, experimental offerings, it’s well worth the detour. 

Oidé Coffee

On one of our recent trips to Vancouver, Oidé was high on my list of cafes to visit. But they were early on in their lifecycle and had limited hours, and I managed to miss them.

Mostly because of a scheduling error on my part – they were in the process of a soft launch at a brand new location when we were in town, and I totally forgot that they were only open Thursday to Sunday at that particular time.

After doing other stuff on Sunday, the day we arrived, I realized this on Monday morning, and Alysha says I was grumpy for the rest of the morning (which is probably true). 

On our next foray up to Vancouver a few months later, I managed to stop by and it was exactly what I was hoping for.

Mostly because they are a multi roaster that brings in both Canadian roasters (like Luna, one of my favorites!) and other roasters from around the world (like Dak, who was featured on the bar when I arrived).

I actually stopped by twice during that short stint because they were brewing a special coffee (Candy Crush by DAK) the day after I showed up, which I had to try (for science – it was magically fruity and juicy).

Fast forward a couple of years to my most recent trip to Vancouver last fall. 

I had previously visited Oidé in their somewhat temporary location over to the east of the city center (where Yuán is now), and to be honest, the vibe in their new location is extremely similar with lots of exposed cement and a slightly unfinished (intentionally so) feeling. 

The coffees they serve rotate constantly, and they had two roasters I’m very familiar with – Coffee Collective from Denmark and Dak from Amsterdam – on filter when I was there last, with even more roasters available if you were buying beans. 

They had three options on pour over, two base options (both from Coffee Collective) and one fancy option in a smaller serving size (a processed coffee from Dak), which is what I went with because it’s the kind of coffee I want to try, but not buy a whole bag of beans of. 

They use an Orea to brew their filter coffee, and it was an excellent brew that emphasized the sweetness and minimized the funk in a coffee that I could see being extremely funk-forward if you aren’t careful. 

Nemesis Coffee

I am enamored by Nemesis Coffee. Everything from the design of their cafes, to the upside down heart logo and color blocked packaging, to the coffee itself, is beautiful.

They have a few locations in Vancouver – one in North Vancouver, one on Great Northern Way (their newest and most gorgeous), and the original in Gastown, which is where we found ourselves on a sunny Tuesday morning. 

We entered the cafe from the street, and immediately my eye was drawn to the left hand side, which features floor-to-ceiling windows and hanging plants (very hip), along with light wood tones that are used throughout the space. 

The second thing my eye was drawn to is their coffee packaging, which is all bold colors and looks pretty spectacular when it’s stacked together with all of their different offerings. 

As I was researching before our trip, I found A LOT of praise for Nemesis, especially over the past few years when it seems like their business has exploded.

The result was high expectations, and I’m happy to say they more than lived up to them. 

They had a couple of filter coffee options and a couple of espresso options, including a decaf coffee from India with watermelon as a tasting note (sadly, I didn’t get to try it on either of my two trips to Nemesis).

On that first trip, I went with a Costa Rican coffee that was juicy AF. I watched the barista brew it with a Kalita Wave (I think), and later noticed they were experimenting with an Origami Dripper, which is a fun brewer! 

On my second trip, which was to their location at the Polygon in North Vancouver, I spent a little more time interacting with the staff. I ordered their two espressos to try side-by-side – a coffee from Honduras and a natural process coffee from Brazil. 

The Brazil came out first, and I took a sip. It was juicy and full-bodied, and in the middle of that sip, the other coffee came out.

The barista brought it over and must have understood what I was doing, because as I went to take a sip of that second coffee, he stopped me and said I needed water first (he was right), which he ran and grabbed. 

We then had a short conversation about espresso ratios and he gave me some insight into how they dial in their new espresso beans (which he had just done that morning).

They keep a shorter ratio for that Brazilian coffee to highlight the fruitiness and body, and use a longer ratio to bring out the brightness and acidity of the coffee from Honduras. 

On the counter, there was a whiteboard with ratios and brew times for each of the espressos they were currently brewing, which tells me that they’re serious about their coffee. 

Pallet Coffee Roasters

Pallet Coffee Roasters has multiple locations around Vancouver, but if it makes sense for you, you should definitely go to their HQ and Roastery up on Alexander St. in Railtown, just a few blocks east of Gastown. 

It’s a beautiful space – an old steel foundry built in 1923 that they converted into part espresso bar and cafe, part roastery, and part training facility (there’s a separate coffee bar in the back corner that, when I asked what it was for, the barista said it was for training sessions with new baristas). 

It’s a lovely space with some seating – not a ton – and lots of natural light thanks to the big skylights in the ceiling and windows along the back wall. 

The second I looked at the menu, I recognized the El Vergel estate in Colombia, and immediately knew I wanted the anaerobic coffee from them.

They’re doing some fun things in terms of fermentation and experimentation, and basically every time I see a coffee from them, I’m down to try it.

Specifically if it has the “Guava Banana” notation on it, which this one did. In my experience, those coffees tend to be wild and exciting. 

At this point, I was the only person in line for coffee. Usually, I try to avoid ordering a filter coffee that takes 3-4 minutes to make when it’s busy, and I felt good about the timing here.

Unfortunately, the second I ordered it, a mini-rush began and 5-6 people came in over the next several minutes. 

I admire the efficiency and calmness of both baristas, who worked together to make sure people were getting their coffee (including me) and getting to order, often running between stations.

Clearly, they’ve done this a few times before, and I see why that training station is so important. 

The coffee was good – rich and fruity, with a definite funk from the anaerobic fermentation. Like I said above, I’m not sure I’d buy a bag of it, but it was definitely worth trying once!

Pallet also has locations in Kitsilano and Downtown Vancouver, among other places around town. It’s a mini empire at this point. 

Propaganda Coffee

Propaganda Coffee is in an older building in Chinatown, just east of the downtown core of Vancouver (and just a short walk east from Gastown).

They serve beans exclusively from Canadian roasters, which I appreciate because it’s a lens that I don’t usually see at home on the American side of the Pacific Northwest. 

They had coffees from Monogram, Phil & Sebastian, and Pilot when I was there last, and I like that you can see their current lineup on their website. 

Originally, I discovered Propaganda due to a recommendation from a barista at a different spot, who spent an hour with me talking about the coffee scene in Vancouver and called out Propaganda as their favorite shop in town.

Their specific recommendation was to go find Monogram, one of their favorite coffee roasters in Canada. 

So, we made the journey over to Chinatown. And I did exactly what that barista told me – try Monogram. 

I waltzed up to the bar and told the barista that I was here on a recommendation from another place, and I was told to try Monogram. Lucky for me, they had it available both as a filter coffee, and as espresso (they had 2-3 different coffees available for both).

I went for a filter coffee, and asked if he had a recommendation between the Ethiopian or Kenyan coffee. 

The next thing that came out of the barista’s mouth told me I was in good hands: he asked me if I liked Kenyan coffees. Kenyan coffees are polarizing. They’re often high in acidity, which is my jam but I imagine most people aren’t as into them.

I said I loved Kenyan coffees, and he said “great, they’re really good right now” (or something to that effect). 

Alysha had found a seat at the window, so I went and joined her and watched the barista brew the coffee with a Kalita Wave (that they covered during the drawdown to keep heat in, which I found interesting), and a few minutes later the coffee was served in a diner mug. 

The coffee on that first visit was great – a punch of both acidity and that bright red fruitiness (think blackberry or raspberry) that you often get with Kenyan coffees. 

On this latest trip, I revisited Propaganda on my first day in the city, and as soon as I saw it on the menu, I knew I wanted the Phil & Sebastian Panama Hartmann Maragogype Natural, which I’ve never had but have read about. 

It was brewed on a Kalita Wave, and it was like drinking fruit punch. Super sweet and fun, but the kind of coffee I want exactly one cup of (probably not a whole bag).  

Overall, a great place to grab coffee if you find yourself over in Chinatown, and worth the detour if you’re wanting to try some fun Canadian coffee roasters, which they rotate through over time.

Modus Coffee

Modus is a coffee roaster that has a location in Vancouver on W Broadway, which is not necessarily the most quaint location in Vancouver, but is fairly central if you’re in the downtown core (which I view as Downtown, Yaletown, the West End). 

I like how they organize their menu by flavor profile (rather than by country of origin and farm), and I also like how they organize their physical cafe menu to communicate what coffees are available with which brew methods. 

I had been here before and the coffee was good, but it was one of the places I wanted to revisit on this trip because I had only been here once, whereas I usually like to hit places more than once if I have the time. 

The first thing I read on Modus Coffee’s website as I was compiling my list of places to go was “no blends or dark roasts here,” and I was head-over-heels in love.

Modus is a micro-roastery in Vancouver, with a cozy cafe on W Broadway in Mt. Pleasant with pink walls and a warm, inviting atmosphere.

They opened the current location after two years of searching and a crowdfunding campaign. 

I like the way that they’ve developed their own way of thinking about coffee’s different flavor profiles. They have a group of six different flavor profiles, and they rotate through different coffees under each profile throughout the year.

They range from “the Coast,” which is big and forgiving, to “the Opus,” which is exotic and complex. 

In terms of their coffee menu, they have a couple of options on espresso, a batch brew coffee (usually a crowd-pleasing blend), and several options on pour over, spanning their bean and flavor profiles. 

When I was there, they had a few options available for pour over at the cafe, and I went with the Kenyan coffee, which fell under the “Opus” category.

Promising notes of cantaloupe and blood orange, it was an excellent example of a light roast that was more balanced than many Kenyan coffees out there, which all tend to gravitate towards more raspberry and blackberry (on my palate, at least).

This coffee was much sweeter, resulting in a more balanced cup.

Still plenty of sparkly acidity, but it also had a little something else going on. 

On this latest trip, I ended up with a pour over of a pink bourbon from Daniel Ortega’s farm in Colombia, and I’m fairly certain I’ve had this exact coffee from a different roaster (multiple times). 

I noticed that they were using a dripper I had never actually seen in real life before – the Cafec Flower 27 – which the barista explained that they recently switched to because it’s a deep, narrow brewer and the owner thinks that the shape leads to a sweeter brew. 

I definitely can’t argue with the result because the cup of coffee the barista made me was EXTREMELY sweet, full of oranges, and as it cooled it became intensely floral. Great coffee. 

I really enjoyed Modus – both the coffee, the space, and the seemingly robust events calendar they have going on.

I’m not an expert in Vancouver’s geography, but their location on a busy, multi-lane road seems like it probably doesn’t get a whole lot of foot traffic.

Still, worth the detour if you want to try some coffees from one of Vancouver’s best and brightest microroasters. 

Timbertrain Coffee Roasters

Timbertrain Coffee is in Gastown, around the corner from Revolver and a block or two from Nemesis, and I think that’s part of the reason why they’re not higher on this list. 

I do love the space they’re in. It feels very spacious (despite being narrow and relatively small) thanks to the high ceilings and big windows, and the train carriage seating along the wall across from the bar is a fun touch. 

They have a classification system for their coffees that breaks them into three categories: classic, curious, and wild. It reminds me of the way Proud Mary here in Portland talks about their coffees.

There were two wild coffees available as pour over, and I went with a coffee from Colombia from their separate pour over menu.

They also had a couple of coffees available as espresso, and a batch brew drip coffee too. 

The barista headed to the back end of the bar, and brewed it with a Kalita Wave. The coffee was fine – I think they needed to do some dialing in to bring out the brightness a little more – and the serving tray was gorgeous. 

They also have a location called the “depot” in East Vancouver, and another new location (“the outpost”) in Port Moody. 

Sunny M Specialty Coffee

Sunny M is a coffee shop down in Richmond, a city just south of Vancouver (it feels like a suburb, but it’s also the fourth biggest city in British Columbia).

If you’re looking for a rotating selection of some of the best roasters in the world, this is a great spot for you (as long as you can get down there). 

The first thing to know is that it’s essentially in a strip mall in Richmond. We drove into the parking lot, parked, and as soon as I walked in the door I knew I was in the right place. 

Why? Because lining the walls of the shop was a graveyard of old coffee bags featuring the likes of Manhattan Roasters (from the Netherlands), Gardelli Coffee Roasters (from Italy), and other famous roasters from around the world. 

This is a multi-roaster cafe… ish (more on that in a second), and when we visited they had coffees from Onyx (the USA), Gardelli (Italy), and Hatch (Canada) available to try.

I saw a coffee from India roasted by Hatch, which is not something I’ve really ever tried, so that’s the one I went with after the friendly barista (and owner) presented me with a few options. 

I say that they’re multi-roaster-ish because, when we were there, they had a little mini coffee roaster going on one of the three tables inside the small cafe.

There were some coffees on the shelf that were roasted by Sunny M, so they’re clearly experimenting with small batch roasting. However, the majority of the coffee here is roasted by others, which is where the “ish” comes from. 

It’s down near the airport, so it’s a good stop for coffee if you’re driving from Seattle / the USA into Vancouver, or if you land in Vancouver and are picking up a rental car. 

Honorable Mentions: Other Great Shops (That I Haven’t Visited)

Think of this as a section of places that showed up in my research, but I didn’t personally make it to while I’ve been in Vancouver for whatever reason (usually distance from the city center). 

Because Vancouver is a big city, there are way too many coffee shops to make it to (especially because I like to revisit my favorites on every trip). 

Or, in this case, even in four trips that span about three weeks in total. 

So I’m going to use this section as a place to house other recommendations I’ve gotten (or found myself) for coffee shops in and around Vancouver that I haven’t personally made it to yet, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t!

Plus, that will make it easy for me next time I’m in Vancouver, because I’ll have my “must-do” list in one place.

R Ki Coffee Lab: Located down near the airport (near Sunny M, mentioned above), R Ki is a roaster that I’ve had before, but I couldn’t find the time to make the 35 minute journey on the SkyTrain down to their shop on my latest trip. 

Hooray: Another roaster that I’m familiar with, but was about an hour away (to the east) from downtown Vancouver and wasn’t in the cards. 

Moving Coffee: Another coffee roaster south of the city center that just didn’t make sense for my itinerary, they are about 30-40 minutes south of the city center, just east of the previous two entries in this section. 

All three of these would be on your way to or from the airport OR to or from the border with the U.S., which makes them relatively easy to access if you have a car and are arriving in either of those ways.

The Best Vancouver Coffee Shops, Mapped

Here are all the coffee shops mentioned in this guide plotted on a map so that you can see how they might fit into your Vancouver itinerary. 

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