Best Indian Restaurants in London 2026

Gymkhana opened in a Mayfair colonial-club-style room in 2013 and the trajectory has been one-way: Michelin star in 2014, two stars in the 2024 guide, Best UK Restaurant on the World's 50 Best in 2023. The menu is built around game — kid-goat methi keema with bone marrow on naan is the signature; the lamb-chops sukka, the suckling pig vindaloo, and the partridge biryani are the test orders depending on the season. The bar downstairs serves a shorter menu of the greatest hits on a walk-in basis and has the best Old-Fashioned-with-an-Indian-twist programme in central London. Service is JKS-precise. The room seats ninety.

Chet Sharma spent four years at Mugaritz in San Sebastián and was a sous chef at Restaurant Story in Bermondsey before opening BiBi on North Audley Street at the end of 2021. The Michelin star arrived in the 2022 guide — the fastest star awarded to a London Indian restaurant in fifteen years. The format is a fifteen-course tasting menu in a forty-seat room, with the open kitchen visible from the counter seats. The dahi puri opener — yogurt foam, tamarind, sev, a single bite — is the signature. The vegetable register is the strongest in London Indian fine dining: the cauliflower with curry-leaf cream and the smoked aubergine with black-lime yoghurt are the test mid-courses.

Trishna opened in Marylebone in 2008 — the Sethi family's first London restaurant and the project that started the JKS empire — and earned its Michelin star in the 2012 guide. The brown crab from the Konkan coast (brown-meat shell, white-meat shell, garlic, butter, chilli) has been on the menu since opening and remains the test dish. The hariyali bream and the Goan pork sausage pao are the alternative orders. The room is smaller and quieter than Gymkhana — fifty seats — and the Sunday-lunch set menu (£42 for three courses) is the best value in the JKS group.

Veeraswamy is approaching a centenary in 2026: opened by Edward Palmer (great-grandson of an English general and an Indian princess) in 1926, run by the Mathrani-Panjabi family since 1997, and awarded its Michelin star in the 2017 guide. The first-floor dining room overlooks Regent Street through tall windows and is one of the prettier rooms in the category. The Hyderabadi haleem and the Patiala-style raan (slow-cooked lamb shank) are the menu fixtures; the Goan pork vindaloo is the test order. The wine list is the most thoughtful in London Indian, with serious Riesling and Champagne by the glass. Service is the most formal in the category and the regulars include royalty.

Jamavar opened in late 2016 on Mount Street as the Leela hotel group's London flagship; Rohit Ghai ran the opening kitchen and earned the Michelin star in the 2017 guide. The current kitchen, under Surinder Mohan, has held the star for nine consecutive years. The menu draws on the royal traditions of Rajasthan, Awadh, and Kerala: the dum biryani is sealed with dough in the traditional way and brought to the table covered; the malai stone bass is the alternative signature; the goat raan is the slow-cooker showpiece. The room is candle-low, banquette-comfortable, and seats sixty over two floors. Service is the most polished in the category outside the Sethi houses.

Benares opened on Berkeley Square in 2003 under Atul Kochhar — the first Indian chef to receive a Michelin star outside India — and has held its star continuously since 2007. Sameer Taneja took over the kitchen in 2019 and has kept the star while modernising the menu materially. The lobster tikka with curry-leaf chutney is the signature; the venison seekh and the malai chicken are the alternative orders. The chef's tasting at £95 is one of the better-priced one-star tasting menus in Mayfair. The dining room is on the first floor of Berkeley Square House and the bar is one of the better pre-dinner Mayfair stops.

Quilon opened in 1999 inside the Taj's St James's Court Hotel near Buckingham Palace, earned its Michelin star in the 2008 guide, and has held that star every guide year since — the longest-running Michelin-starred Indian restaurant in the UK. Sriram Aylur runs the kitchen and has done so for the duration. The Malabar seer fish curry is the test dish; the Mangalorean chicken stew and the masala dosa with potato-shallot filling are the alternative signatures. The room is hotel-formal but the dining floor is calm and unfussed. The dosa programme is genuinely the best in London — better than any of the high-street South-Indian rooms in Tooting or Wembley.

Amaya opened in Belgravia in 2004 as the first restaurant to do Indian small plates centred on the three live grills — tandoor, sigri (charcoal grill), and tawa (flat iron) — and earned its Michelin star in the 2006 guide. It has held that star for two decades. The chargrilled lamb chops are the signature; the rock oysters with coconut chilli and the masala kingfish are the alternative test orders. The room is the best-looking Indian dining room in London — open kitchen, atrium ceiling, candle-low lighting — and is the bureau's most-booked Indian date-dinner room. The cocktail bar at the entrance is correct for a pre-dinner Negroni Bianco.

Rohit Ghai opened the kitchens at both Gymkhana (2013) and Jamavar (2016) before opening Kutir in a converted Chelsea townhouse in 2018. The Bib Gourmand arrived in 2020. The format is closer to a private dining house than a restaurant — three small dining rooms over two floors, a courtyard for summer lunch, and a menu that draws on the same hunt-club traditions Ghai built at Gymkhana. The venison shami kebab and the rabbit pulao are the signature game dishes; the dhokla with green-chilli chutney is the test snack. Manthan, his Mayfair sequel, holds a Michelin star — but Kutir is the more interesting room.

Brigadiers opened in the Bloomberg Arcade in late 2018 — JKS's first restaurant in the City — and has been the bureau's most-booked City Indian since. The format is Indian Army mess: low-slung leather booths, a snooker table, two whisky-flight rooms, and a 250-bottle whisky list selected for slow drinking with smoky food. The kitchen is built around the open tandoor and a wood-fire grill: the rib of beef vindaloo (Sunday-special, advance order), the smoked lamb chops, and the masala paneer skewers are the test orders. The lunch crowd is City suits; the Friday-night crowd is the same City suits, with the snooker table in use.