clock menu more-arrow no yes mobile
Bagel cut in half with cream cheese in the middle.
An everything bagel with cream cheese from Shelsky’s.
Carla Vianna/Eater NY

The Best Bagels in New York City Right Now

From Russ & Daughters to Absolute Bagels and Tal, these are the city’s top bagels

View as Map
An everything bagel with cream cheese from Shelsky’s.
| Carla Vianna/Eater NY

The bagel may or may not have been invented by Germans living in Poland in the 14th century, but here, it’s associated with Jewish American cuisine, as well as being one of the city’s most iconic foods. Revered by people all over the country, it’s rare to find a faithful duplication elsewhere. True bagels are boiled briefly before being baked. (Turn one over: If it has a grid pattern on the bottom, it was first steamed rather than boiled, and is not a true bagel.) Chewy, glutinous, and highly caloric, one’s a meal and a very satisfying one, especially when schmeared with cream cheese and layered with lox or another form of cured fish.

Even today the bagel continues to evolve, as several points on this map will demonstrate. Here are some favorites, including a Mediterranean precursor to the bagel and some stunt bagels, all good enough to be wolfed down whole without any topping at all.

Health experts consider dining out to be a high-risk activity for the unvaccinated; it may pose a risk for the vaccinated, especially in areas with substantial COVID transmission.

Read More

Riverdale Bagels

Copy Link

Faithfully furnishing bagels, bialys, and muffins to its northern Bronx neighborhood since 1992, Riverdale Bagels guarantees its bagels are boiled and not steamed. All the traditional toppings are available, but innovative spreads are being developed on a daily basis, including spicy bacon, garlic pepper, sun-dried tomato, and strawberry pepper cream cheeses.

A storefront with a neon boy with a bagel in his arm muscle.
Riverdale Bagel in the northwestern Bronx.
Google Maps

Bo’s Bagels

Copy Link

This shop was started by Andrew Martinez and Ashley Dikos in 2017 to address a lack of great bagels in Harlem. The result is a shop with bagels that have a crisp exterior and chewy inside, made the traditional way with a 24-hour fermentation, brief boil, and bake. All the classic spreads are available, as well as aggressively creative bagel sandwiches like the Andrew — featuring egg, sausage, bacon, Vermont maple syrup, and scallion cream cheese.

A glass counter with bagels in baskets and two employees by the register to one side.
The bagel case at Bo’s in Harlem.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Absolute Bagels

Copy Link

Come lunchtime, this barn of a bagel bakery boasts lines that trail out the door, the customers eager for a taste of its bulbous and reasonably priced bagels, often delivered still warm, rendering toasting unnecessary. The bagels at Absolute are a bit larger than average and glossy from their boil. The bright orange egg bagel is a favorite, and so is the everything bagel, best spread with the salty and smoky whitefish salad for an explosion of flavor.

A man in a new year’s hat smiles behind a bagel counter.
The bagel display at Absolute Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Bagel Talk

Copy Link

Sure, Zabar’s and its stellar smoked fish are just around the corner, but the bagels here have a better chew. The place throngs with customers excited for any of the bagel sandwiches, from the standard bacon, egg, and cheese to those with whitefish or cream cheese and lox. Despite having a no-toasting policy for years, owner Abid Islam now grumpily allows it.

Utopia Bagels

Copy Link

Queens bakery Utopia Bagels is famed for its soft, airy bagels with a crisp exterior. In a video for Eater, shop co-owner Scott Spellman attributes the following to two things: having skilled workers who make bagels by hand, and keeping everything — from the ingredients, to the kettle, to the oven, to the baking techniques — the same as they were when the shop first opened 40 years ago. Bagels go for around $2 each, with bialys, flagels, and Kaiser rolls also on offer.

Between the Bagel

Copy Link

Locals rave about the bagels at this Astoria institution, and New Yorkers make pilgrimages from other boroughs to snag them. The range of bagels is vast. On a recent visit Asiago and jalapeno sesame bagels were available, and the roster of cream cheeses and other miscellaneous toppings is just as robust, sometimes with Korean flourishes.

A brown seeded bagel with a thick layer of flavored cream cheese.
Whole wheat everything at Between the Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Hudson Bagel

Copy Link

In the contemporary fashion, the bagels are big at this very modest West Village store, with clear, distinct, and clean flavors. A sunflower seed bagel, for example, features a scatter of untoasted and unsalted seeds, making a bagel that’s not only beautiful to look at, but with a subtle flavor seen few other places. The cream cheese collection is distinctive, too, including lots of low-fat varieties among the dozens of choices.

Two bagels in a bicycle basket.
Egg and sunflower bagels from Hudson Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Brooklyn Bagel & Coffee Company

Copy Link

Despite its name, Brooklyn Bagel doesn’t have a Kings County location — instead there are five spread across Queens and Manhattan. The Astoria outpost is super popular, frequently boasting long lines for their gigantic, airy bagels. They also serve a mini bagel, probably about the size bagels were a century ago. Also note the varied collection of cream cheeses, and rotating stunt specials like gingerbread, seven grain, and sundried tomato bagels.

A pair of bagels held in two hands with thumbs sticking through the holes.
Seven-grain and sun-dried tomato bagels at Brooklyn Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Tal Bagels

Copy Link

Lox, nova, and smoked salmon aren’t the same thing — and Tal Bagels is the place to find out why, with a comprehensive menu that boasts all three. With six locations across Manhattan and too many cream cheese options to count, Tal has earned itself a reputation as one of New York’s favorite bagel shops for its hot bagels and fast service.

A red awning and a table with two diners sitting in front.
The East 86th Street location of Tal Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Ess-a-Bagel

Copy Link

This classic New York bagel shop, which first opened in 1976 near Stuyvesant Town, now has four locations — three in Manhattan and one in Dumbo — all of which still sling big, chewy, crusty bagels. In fact, some blame the original shop for originating the modern gigantic bagel. It can take awhile to pick up an order for sandwiches or a bagel with lox, but people looking to grab bagels and cream cheese can sneak to a separate counter.

An assortment of well browned bagels in a tray that cuts diagonally across the frame.
An assortment of Ess-a-Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Bagel & Schmear

Copy Link

This relative newcomer to Kips Bay (in bagel years) has become a reliable brunch spot and long lines form on the weekends. It offers a broad range of bagels and spreads for its small size, including salt and garlic, in the former category, and strawberry, olive, and lox in the latter. Bagels are big and of average squishiness.

Four differently colored bagels in a diamond pattern.
Four bagels from Bagel & Schmear.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Modern Bread and Bagel

Copy Link

This bakery is indeed modern, specializing in gluten-free bagels that aren’t half bad. Indeed, everything in the place is gluten free. The salads that can be put on bagels are innovative and often delicious, including a Tel Aviv-style egg salad, chopped fine and extensively herbed, and a tuna salad that replicates the recipe of France’s vaunted Tunisian sandwich. Another branch lurks on the Upper West Side.

A bagel on a dark gray counter with a plastic tub of egg salad.
A gluten-free bagel and egg salad.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Murray's Bagels

Copy Link

Open since 1996, Murray’s was born out of a desire for a superior neighborhood bagel shop in Greenwich Village. The result is a space with large but light bagels with a crackly crust and modest interior chew. Beyond standard cream cheeses, cured fish, and egg fillings, Murray’s specialty is substantial meat and poultry sandwiches, made from salami, hot corned beef, chicken cutlets, and just about any deli meat or fish salad one can think of.

A split bagel filled with glistening pink corned beef.
Murray’s epic hot corned beef on an untoasted garlic bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Tompkins Square Bagels

Copy Link

Bagel purists may not like this place in the East Village, with its rainbow of cream cheese options, but it has long lines at this and its other East Village location for a reason: a massive variety of menu items, some frankly weird, that’ll satisfy any appetite. It’s sometimes the only bagel place out-of-town friends have heard of, and you can expect to find the latest food fads executed in bagel form.

A bagel store interior with all sorts of pastries displayed and line of customers waiting to order.
Expect a line at Tompkins Square Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Forest Hills Bagels

Copy Link

Head for Forest Hills Bagel for a more comfortable bagel experience. The interior is laid out like a diner, and an opulent counter display offers a large range of flavored cream cheeses and their surrogates, including low-fat dairy spreads and those made from whipped tofu. The bagels remain the focus, however, with a very nice cinnamon raisin for sweet bagel lovers, and poppy and sesame bagels that don’t stint on the seeds.

A cinnamon raisin bagel is cut in half with cream cheese at Forest Hills Bagel in Queens.
A cinnamon raisin bagel from Forest Hills Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Russ & Daughters

Copy Link

For the better part of the last 100 years, the only way to get a bagel at Russ & Daughters was to wait in line — out the door and around the corner. Today, this New York institution has two additional locations, each with a slightly different focus, at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and on Orchard Street. Their bagels and bialys are soft and chewy, but sturdy enough to hold their own against toppings like cream cheese, smoked fish, or pastrami-cured salmon.

Bagels in various forms hang from baskets on the wall of Russ & Daughters.
Find bagels and bialys at Russ & Daughters.
Bess Adler/Eater NY

Bagels for You

Copy Link

This modest Forest Hills bagel bakery does little to advertise itself, offering a broad range of cream cheeses and perhaps the city’s best garlic bagel. (What are its features? The garlic is neither rancid nor overcooked.) Apart from that, the shop offers a handful of stunt combinations, including a blueberry bagel with scallion cream cheese that isn’t half bad.

Baskets of bagels on the wall some empty.
Bagels run out fast at Bagels for You.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Kossar's Bagels & Bialys

Copy Link

Bialys — a flat, round, unboiled roll with chopped onions in the center that’s a cousin of the bagel originating in Bialystok, Poland — are a grand New York tradition, and Kossar’s is the ultimate place to score them. New owners have updated the shop, which opened in 1936, but they still use the same original recipe. Good bagels available, too.

A storefront with a red awning and red patio furniture in front.
Kossar’s Bagels & Bialys on the Lower East Side.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Williamsburg pizzeria Leo might be better known for its slices, but don’t sleep on its stellar bagels. Only available on weekends, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. (or sold-out), they’re worth planning a morning around. Follow Apollo Bagels on Instagram for information on pop-ups happening at restaurants across the city.

Two hands cheers two halves of a bagel with dill, lox, and cream cheese.
Williamsburg pizzeria Leo sells bagels on weekends.
Luke Fortney/Eater NY

Bread Brothers Bagel Cafe

Copy Link

This East Williamsburg spot can’t decide if it wants to be a bodega or a bagel bakery. Luckily, the bagels are damn good in all the usual permutations, which are alternated, so that the selection on any given day may be limited to six. This will help you make a decision. The lox and scallion cream cheese are a particular delight, while the everything pumpernickel offers something lesser-seen, even if it’s a little sweet.

A hand holds a ark bagel sprinkled with seeds.
The pumpernickel everything bagel is on the sweet side.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Bagel Pub

Copy Link

This small chain of Brooklyn bagel shops turns out plump bagels with lots of chew, perfect for an egg and cheese sandwich or good enough on their own. Breakfast sandwiches are available in myriad forms, including those with hash brown, turkey bacon, and chipotle cream cheese. Expect a line that snakes toward the door on weekends, with a selection of inventive bagels — egg everything, pumpernickel everything — visible in a row of stainless steel baskets that are regularly replenished.

A hand clutches a yellow bagel adorned with red onion, tomato, and chipotle cream cheese.
Chipotle cream cheese is one of a handful of inventive options at Bagel Pub.
Luke Fortney/Eater NY

Shelsky's Brooklyn Bagels

Copy Link

Modernist bagel shop Shelsky’s has all the classics in small, dense form, but it sports a few spicy outliers, like its numbing Sichuan peppercorn bagel and chili crisp cream cheese. Indicative of the appetizing shop’s contemporaneity, the preparation of the bagels here shows extra care: A sourdough starter is employed in the kitchen, actual egg goes into the the egg bagels, and chopped cheese and Taylor ham sandwiches come served on a bagel or bialy.

Bagel cut in half with cream cheese in the middle.
Shelsky’s everything bagel with cream cheese.
Carla Vianna/Eater NY

Terrace Bagels

Copy Link

This bagel shop sandwiched between Prospect Park and Green-Wood Cemetery ensconced in a double storefront produces one of the city’s broadest range of bagel flavors and a correspondingly large array of cream cheeses. One of our favorites is the egg everything bagel, which enriches its multiple herbal flavors with egg; another is the cinnamon raisin bagel with a sweetened cinnamon crust on the outside, a combo that can reasonably be termed a dessert bagel.

Three bagels, one crusted with cinnamon, on a gray tabletop.
Plain, cinnamon raisin, and egg everything bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Bagel Supreme

Copy Link

This Bay Ridge bakery offers a bagel so big and bulbous the holes have nearly disappeared, and one is almost enough to be shared by two. The shop furnishes views of the nearby Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, and there’s a park across the street where you can eat your purchases in fine weather. (It also sells subs on rolls baked on the premises.) Its most unusual product is the French toast bagel, which is sweet, sticky, and covered in powdered sugar.

Three bagels pressed tight in a triangle formation.
Salt, plain, and French toast bagels at Bagel Supreme.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Tasty Bagels

Copy Link

Tasty Bagels in Bensonhurst, a rare Italian bagel shop, was founded in 1983. This hub of bagel innovation owns up to inventing the big wheel bagel in 1984, a giant disk of a bagel layered with meat and cheese and cut in wedges. Ten years later, the flagel was born here — a flattened bagel that fits in a single slot in a toaster without being cut. Apart from novelties, and a lengthy menu of hero sandwiches, all the regular bagels are available in exemplary renditions.

A flattened bagel against a blue striped background.
Behold the original flagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Riverdale Bagels

Faithfully furnishing bagels, bialys, and muffins to its northern Bronx neighborhood since 1992, Riverdale Bagels guarantees its bagels are boiled and not steamed. All the traditional toppings are available, but innovative spreads are being developed on a daily basis, including spicy bacon, garlic pepper, sun-dried tomato, and strawberry pepper cream cheeses.

A storefront with a neon boy with a bagel in his arm muscle.
Riverdale Bagel in the northwestern Bronx.
Google Maps

Bo’s Bagels

This shop was started by Andrew Martinez and Ashley Dikos in 2017 to address a lack of great bagels in Harlem. The result is a shop with bagels that have a crisp exterior and chewy inside, made the traditional way with a 24-hour fermentation, brief boil, and bake. All the classic spreads are available, as well as aggressively creative bagel sandwiches like the Andrew — featuring egg, sausage, bacon, Vermont maple syrup, and scallion cream cheese.

A glass counter with bagels in baskets and two employees by the register to one side.
The bagel case at Bo’s in Harlem.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Absolute Bagels

Come lunchtime, this barn of a bagel bakery boasts lines that trail out the door, the customers eager for a taste of its bulbous and reasonably priced bagels, often delivered still warm, rendering toasting unnecessary. The bagels at Absolute are a bit larger than average and glossy from their boil. The bright orange egg bagel is a favorite, and so is the everything bagel, best spread with the salty and smoky whitefish salad for an explosion of flavor.

A man in a new year’s hat smiles behind a bagel counter.
The bagel display at Absolute Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Bagel Talk

Sure, Zabar’s and its stellar smoked fish are just around the corner, but the bagels here have a better chew. The place throngs with customers excited for any of the bagel sandwiches, from the standard bacon, egg, and cheese to those with whitefish or cream cheese and lox. Despite having a no-toasting policy for years, owner Abid Islam now grumpily allows it.

Utopia Bagels

Queens bakery Utopia Bagels is famed for its soft, airy bagels with a crisp exterior. In a video for Eater, shop co-owner Scott Spellman attributes the following to two things: having skilled workers who make bagels by hand, and keeping everything — from the ingredients, to the kettle, to the oven, to the baking techniques — the same as they were when the shop first opened 40 years ago. Bagels go for around $2 each, with bialys, flagels, and Kaiser rolls also on offer.

Between the Bagel

Locals rave about the bagels at this Astoria institution, and New Yorkers make pilgrimages from other boroughs to snag them. The range of bagels is vast. On a recent visit Asiago and jalapeno sesame bagels were available, and the roster of cream cheeses and other miscellaneous toppings is just as robust, sometimes with Korean flourishes.

A brown seeded bagel with a thick layer of flavored cream cheese.
Whole wheat everything at Between the Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Hudson Bagel

In the contemporary fashion, the bagels are big at this very modest West Village store, with clear, distinct, and clean flavors. A sunflower seed bagel, for example, features a scatter of untoasted and unsalted seeds, making a bagel that’s not only beautiful to look at, but with a subtle flavor seen few other places. The cream cheese collection is distinctive, too, including lots of low-fat varieties among the dozens of choices.

Two bagels in a bicycle basket.
Egg and sunflower bagels from Hudson Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Brooklyn Bagel & Coffee Company

Despite its name, Brooklyn Bagel doesn’t have a Kings County location — instead there are five spread across Queens and Manhattan. The Astoria outpost is super popular, frequently boasting long lines for their gigantic, airy bagels. They also serve a mini bagel, probably about the size bagels were a century ago. Also note the varied collection of cream cheeses, and rotating stunt specials like gingerbread, seven grain, and sundried tomato bagels.

A pair of bagels held in two hands with thumbs sticking through the holes.
Seven-grain and sun-dried tomato bagels at Brooklyn Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Tal Bagels

Lox, nova, and smoked salmon aren’t the same thing — and Tal Bagels is the place to find out why, with a comprehensive menu that boasts all three. With six locations across Manhattan and too many cream cheese options to count, Tal has earned itself a reputation as one of New York’s favorite bagel shops for its hot bagels and fast service.

A red awning and a table with two diners sitting in front.
The East 86th Street location of Tal Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Ess-a-Bagel

This classic New York bagel shop, which first opened in 1976 near Stuyvesant Town, now has four locations — three in Manhattan and one in Dumbo — all of which still sling big, chewy, crusty bagels. In fact, some blame the original shop for originating the modern gigantic bagel. It can take awhile to pick up an order for sandwiches or a bagel with lox, but people looking to grab bagels and cream cheese can sneak to a separate counter.

An assortment of well browned bagels in a tray that cuts diagonally across the frame.
An assortment of Ess-a-Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Bagel & Schmear

This relative newcomer to Kips Bay (in bagel years) has become a reliable brunch spot and long lines form on the weekends. It offers a broad range of bagels and spreads for its small size, including salt and garlic, in the former category, and strawberry, olive, and lox in the latter. Bagels are big and of average squishiness.

Four differently colored bagels in a diamond pattern.
Four bagels from Bagel & Schmear.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Modern Bread and Bagel

This bakery is indeed modern, specializing in gluten-free bagels that aren’t half bad. Indeed, everything in the place is gluten free. The salads that can be put on bagels are innovative and often delicious, including a Tel Aviv-style egg salad, chopped fine and extensively herbed, and a tuna salad that replicates the recipe of France’s vaunted Tunisian sandwich. Another branch lurks on the Upper West Side.

A bagel on a dark gray counter with a plastic tub of egg salad.
A gluten-free bagel and egg salad.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Murray's Bagels

Open since 1996, Murray’s was born out of a desire for a superior neighborhood bagel shop in Greenwich Village. The result is a space with large but light bagels with a crackly crust and modest interior chew. Beyond standard cream cheeses, cured fish, and egg fillings, Murray’s specialty is substantial meat and poultry sandwiches, made from salami, hot corned beef, chicken cutlets, and just about any deli meat or fish salad one can think of.

A split bagel filled with glistening pink corned beef.
Murray’s epic hot corned beef on an untoasted garlic bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Tompkins Square Bagels

Bagel purists may not like this place in the East Village, with its rainbow of cream cheese options, but it has long lines at this and its other East Village location for a reason: a massive variety of menu items, some frankly weird, that’ll satisfy any appetite. It’s sometimes the only bagel place out-of-town friends have heard of, and you can expect to find the latest food fads executed in bagel form.

A bagel store interior with all sorts of pastries displayed and line of customers waiting to order.
Expect a line at Tompkins Square Bagels.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Forest Hills Bagels

Head for Forest Hills Bagel for a more comfortable bagel experience. The interior is laid out like a diner, and an opulent counter display offers a large range of flavored cream cheeses and their surrogates, including low-fat dairy spreads and those made from whipped tofu. The bagels remain the focus, however, with a very nice cinnamon raisin for sweet bagel lovers, and poppy and sesame bagels that don’t stint on the seeds.

A cinnamon raisin bagel is cut in half with cream cheese at Forest Hills Bagel in Queens.
A cinnamon raisin bagel from Forest Hills Bagel.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Related Maps

Russ & Daughters

For the better part of the last 100 years, the only way to get a bagel at Russ & Daughters was to wait in line — out the door and around the corner. Today, this New York institution has two additional locations, each with a slightly different focus, at the Brooklyn Navy Yard and on Orchard Street. Their bagels and bialys are soft and chewy, but sturdy enough to hold their own against toppings like cream cheese, smoked fish, or pastrami-cured salmon.

Bagels in various forms hang from baskets on the wall of Russ & Daughters.
Find bagels and bialys at Russ & Daughters.
Bess Adler/Eater NY

Bagels for You

This modest Forest Hills bagel bakery does little to advertise itself, offering a broad range of cream cheeses and perhaps the city’s best garlic bagel. (What are its features? The garlic is neither rancid nor overcooked.) Apart from that, the shop offers a handful of stunt combinations, including a blueberry bagel with scallion cream cheese that isn’t half bad.

Baskets of bagels on the wall some empty.
Bagels run out fast at Bagels for You.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Kossar's Bagels & Bialys

Bialys — a flat, round, unboiled roll with chopped onions in the center that’s a cousin of the bagel originating in Bialystok, Poland — are a grand New York tradition, and Kossar’s is the ultimate place to score them. New owners have updated the shop, which opened in 1936, but they still use the same original recipe. Good bagels available, too.

A storefront with a red awning and red patio furniture in front.
Kossar’s Bagels & Bialys on the Lower East Side.
Robert Sietsema/Eater NY

Leo

Williamsburg pizzeria Leo might be better known for its slices, but don’t sleep on its stellar bagels. Only available on weekends, from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. (or sold-out), they’re worth planning a morning around. Follow Apollo Bagels on Instagram for information on pop-ups happening at restaurants across the city.

Two hands cheers two halves of a bagel with dill, lox, and cream cheese.
Williamsburg pizzeria Leo sells bagels on weekends.
Luke Fortney/Eater NY

Bread Brothers Bagel Cafe

This East Williamsburg spot can’t decide if it wants to be a bodega or a bagel bakery. Luckily, the bagels are damn good in all the usual permutations, which are alternated, so that the selection on any given day may be limited to six. This will help you make a decision. The lox and scallion cream cheese are a particular delight, while the everything pumpernickel offers something lesser-seen, even if it’s a little sweet.