10 Best Restaurants in Rome
Rome’s dining scene spans haute cuisine with panoramic drama, historic-centre tasting menus, and neighbourhood tables that keep local traditions vividly alive. Around the Pantheon, Campo de’ Fiori and Via dei Banchi Vecchi, you’ll find elegant destinations and ingredient-led addresses; in Trastevere and beyond the centre, the city opens to more contemporary, international-minded cooking. Roman classics remain essential, especially pasta, offal and Jewish-Roman influences, but there is also room for Emilia’s fresh pasta, modern pizza and refined Mediterranean menus. Whether you want a long celebratory dinner, a sociable trattoria meal, or a considered stop in a residential district like Monteverde or Casaletto, Rome rewards travellers with restaurants that feel deeply tied to place.
La Pergola - Rome
Rome, Italy
La Pergola approaches Rome from above, with the city spread beneath the dining room at the Rome Cavalieri hotel. The view establishes a sense of occasion, but chef Heinz Beck’s cooking supplies the reason to stay focused on the table. Mediterranean ingredients are developed through a contemporary approach that prizes precision, balance and the progression of a complete meal. The restaurant’s renewed interiors draw on Roman materials and colours, including travertine and warm red tones, creating a setting that acknowledges the city without competing with the panorama. This is a restaurant for an extended evening, with wine and service forming part of the experience alongside the kitchen’s intricate work. Its appeal lies in the way these elements reinforce one another. Three Michelin stars place La Pergola among Italy’s most distinguished restaurants. It heads this Rome selection because it delivers a particular kind of travel experience exceptionally well: a major culinary destination whose location, atmosphere and cooking make the occasion inseparable from the city around it.
Rome’s outstanding grand restaurant, combining three-star culinary authority, a distinctive setting and the completeness expected of a major destination meal.
Il Pagliaccio
Italy
Il Pagliaccio reflects the varied culinary world of Anthony Genovese. His cooking brings Italian foundations into conversation with influences shaped by France and Asia, producing a style that is difficult to reduce to a single geographical label. The tasting-menu format gives those connections room to develop across an evening rather than asking each dish to explain the whole idea. On Via dei Banchi Vecchi, the restaurant provides an intimate setting within Rome’s historic centre. Menus such as Circus and Scintille give the kitchen different ways to organise its work, while the separate Parallels experience extends the restaurant’s interest in a more personal encounter. The emphasis is on an authored meal, with the sequence and its changing moods forming part of the attraction. Gambero Rosso’s Roma 2026 guide awarded Il Pagliaccio Tre Forchette and 94 points. Its high ranking here recognises the importance of that individual voice: a restaurant that allows visitors to encounter Rome as a contemporary, outward-looking food city as well as a guardian of its own traditions.
A highly individual fine-dining restaurant whose international outlook and sustained critical recognition add depth to Rome’s contemporary restaurant scene.
Roscioli Salumeria con Cucina
Centro Storico, Rome, Italy; Via dei Giubbonari 21, 00186 Roma RM
At Roscioli, the food shop and the restaurant are part of the same idea. The shelves and counters establish the ingredients’ importance before the meal begins, surrounding diners with the produce that gives the kitchen its character. Cured meats, cheeses and preserved delicacies are treated as central pleasures, while Roman pasta provides a more substantial anchor. The Via dei Giubbonari address places this branch close to Campo de’ Fiori, in the middle of the historic city’s daily movement. Inside, the abundance of products creates a distinctive atmosphere, making the restaurant feel connected to the practical work of choosing, storing and selling good food. Ordering a mixture of simple ingredient-led dishes and something from the kitchen reveals that relationship especially well. Roscioli appears in the Michelin Guide’s Rome selection. Its place near the top of this list reflects more than a single signature plate: it offers visitors a way to understand Italian eating through the quality of individual components and the confidence with which they are assembled.
An unusually complete encounter with Italian ingredients and Roman cooking, combining specialist retail knowledge with a compelling restaurant experience.
Armando al Pantheon
Centro Storico, Rome, Italy; Salita de’ Crescenzi 31, 00186 Roma
Just beside the Pantheon, Armando al Pantheon offers a persuasive reason to eat close to one of Rome’s most visited monuments. Founded in 1961, the restaurant remains associated with the Gargioli family and a repertoire grounded in Roman and Lazio traditions. Its appeal is the continuity between place, family and food, rather than a pursuit of novelty. The menu moves through recognisable local territory, from pasta to offal, lamb and preparations involving anchovies. A sour-cherry tart offers a fitting conclusion, keeping dessert within the same regional frame. The compact room reinforces the sense of a restaurant with its own established habits, even as visitors from around the world pass through the surrounding streets. Current Michelin Guide inclusion supports its standing, but Armando’s importance within this selection is also cultural. It provides an accessible encounter with the dishes and rhythms that make Roman dining distinctive. Reserve through the restaurant’s own booking system and allow the meal to become part of a slower exploration of the neighbourhood, rather than a brief pause between monuments.
A longstanding family restaurant that maintains a clear Roman identity in one of the city’s busiest visitor districts.
SantoPalato
Rome, Italy; Via Gallia 28, Rome 00183, Italy
SantoPalato treats the Roman trattoria as a living form. Sarah Cicolini and Mattia Bazzurri draw on the city’s robust culinary traditions, including its appetite for offal and its Jewish-Roman inheritance, while giving the cooking an individual contemporary direction. Pasta remains an important part of the experience, alongside dishes that encourage diners to explore beyond the most familiar Roman favourites. The restaurant’s current home is on Via Gallia, a detail worth noting for anyone relying on older recommendations for its former Piazza Tarquinia address. The move continues a project that began in 2017, with wine and the conviviality of the table forming part of its identity. The atmosphere belongs to a restaurant intended for engaged, sociable eating rather than a ceremonial tasting experience. Recognition in Gambero Rosso’s Rome coverage reflects its position in the city’s current food conversation. SantoPalato earns its place here because it makes tradition feel productive: a source of ingredients, techniques and ideas that can support a distinctive restaurant without losing its connection to everyday Roman appetite.
A distinctive contemporary trattoria that keeps Roman culinary traditions active while giving them a personal and critically recognised interpretation.
Trattoria da Cesare al Casaletto
Rome, Italy; Via del Casaletto 45, Rome 00151, Italy
Trattoria da Cesare al Casaletto is a reminder that some of Rome’s most rewarding tables sit beyond the historic centre. Leonardo Vignoli and Maria Pia Cicconi took over the restaurant in 2009, bringing broad hospitality experience to a place already woven into Monteverde’s neighbourhood life. The result is a trattoria whose confidence comes from understanding what its regulars value. Roman cooking provides the foundation, with careful ingredients and traditional preparations taking precedence over elaborate presentation. The terrace adds to the appeal of a leisurely meal, while the straightforward dining room keeps the focus on the table. This is an address to approach with an appetite for a full lunch or dinner, allowing the restaurant’s repertoire to make its case over several courses. Condé Nast Traveler has recognised Cesare as a notable Rome restaurant. Its inclusion here reflects the combination of food, continuity and setting: a chance for visitors to experience the city’s restaurant culture in a residential district, where a celebrated kitchen still functions as a local gathering place.
A respected neighbourhood trattoria that combines Roman culinary continuity with experienced hospitality, balancing the city-centre and fine-dining selections.
La Gatta Mangiona
Rome, Italy; Via Federico Ozanam 30–32, Rome 00152, Italy
La Gatta Mangiona helped establish the idea that a pizzeria could be exacting about ingredients without losing its informal character. Giancarlo Casa and his partners have pursued that approach since opening in 1999, refining dough maturation and developing toppings that range from familiar combinations to more personal inventions. Supplì receive similar attention, making the fried opening bites worth considering alongside the pizza. The Monteverde setting feels appropriately removed from the grander rituals of central Rome dining. Cat-themed details lend the room a playful identity, while the wine and craft-beer selection invites more thought than the usual automatic order of a drink with pizza. The experience is sociable, but the choices behind it are deliberate. La Gatta Mangiona ranked 39th in 50 Top Pizza Italia 2026 and received Tre Spicchi in Gambero Rosso’s Pizzerie d’Italia 2026. Its place in this selection recognises the restaurant’s sustained contribution to Rome’s pizza culture and the pleasure of encountering ambitious food in an easygoing, neighbourhood format.
A highly recognised pizza specialist whose craft, accessibility and informal setting broaden the guide beyond restaurants built around multi-course meals.
Glass Hostaria
Rome, Italy; Vicolo del Cinque 58, Rome, 00153, Italy
Glass Hostaria gives Trastevere a different culinary register. Chef Cristina Bowerman’s cooking draws on an international frame of reference, bringing Asian and Latin American influences into conversation with Italian ingredients and contemporary technique. The menu’s appeal lies in that freedom of association, with flavour and texture guiding combinations that move beyond a familiar regional repertoire. The setting reinforces the restaurant’s character. A former carriage workshop provides height and architectural interest, creating a modern dining room within one of Rome’s most atmospheric neighbourhoods. It is a considered environment for an evening built around the kitchen’s ideas, offering a change of pace from the lively trattorias and bars in the surrounding streets. Glass Hostaria’s Michelin star is an established part of its reputation, reaffirmed in Michelin’s 2026 coverage of Bowerman and Rome. It earns its place here for the individuality of its perspective and the breadth it adds to the city’s dining story. For travellers, it is a reminder that contemporary Roman restaurants can be internationally curious while remaining closely tied to their particular location.
A distinctive chef-led restaurant that offers an outward-looking contemporary meal in a neighbourhood more often associated with traditional Roman dining.
Retrobottega
Centro Storico, Rome, Italy; Via del Velabro 9, 00186 Roma
Retrobottega entered a new chapter in 2026, moving from its original historic-centre premises to the upper reaches of Palazzo Rhinoceros on Via del Velabro. Alessandro Miocchi and Giuseppe Lo Iudice remain the chefs behind the project, now working within the Jean Nouvel-renovated building associated with Alda Fendi’s arts foundation. The location places contemporary cooking beside a particularly evocative stretch of ancient Rome. The kitchen continues to favour inventive Italian combinations. A published menu pairs ossobuco cappelletti with mackerel and broth, while other dishes bring vegetables, smoke and carefully judged acidity into focus. The tasting option offers a way to follow the kitchen’s choices; individual dishes allow a more self-directed meal. Menus change, so these examples describe the approach rather than a fixed promise. Current Michelin Guide inclusion supports its culinary relevance. Retrobottega merits a place for the ambition of this new setting and the individuality of its food, although the recent move makes up-to-date booking directions and a fresh assessment of service particularly important.
A distinctive contemporary kitchen in a newly significant setting, included with a review flag for relocation-related map, imagery and consistency checks.
Colline Emiliane
Rome, Italy; Via degli Avignonesi 22, Rome, 00187, Italy
Colline Emiliane offers a journey north without leaving Rome. Close to Piazza Barberini, the restaurant centres on the cooking of Emilia, where fresh pasta, cured meats and generous sauces form a distinctive culinary language. Its longstanding presence gives visitors an opportunity to explore Italy’s regional diversity within the capital itself. Pasta-making is integral to the experience, with the work visible near the entrance and the results forming the natural centre of a meal. Tagliatelle with ragù, green lasagne and preparations involving culatello illustrate the territory, while the display of desserts provides a tempting reason to leave room for a final course. The atmosphere is traditional and focused, suited to diners who take pleasure in familiar forms executed with care. The restaurant is included in the Michelin Guide’s Rome selection. It completes this guide because a useful account of the city should leave space for institutions whose authority comes from sustained attention to a particular regional cuisine. Colline Emiliane offers precisely that, making handmade pasta a compelling destination in its own right.
An established regional specialist whose handmade pasta and Emilian identity add meaningful variety to Rome’s restaurant selection.