A few years ago, I spent a month traveling throughout the UK and visited some of the most vegan friendly cities there – according what I found on the internet at that time.
As an American, I was very excited because the UK (and western Europe for that matter) is way ahead in terms of plant-based offerings.
In this post I’ll be raking my top 5 cities in the UK for vegans in order!
Now we all know that London is that IT girl so I won’t be mentioning it in this post but be sure to check out my vegan food in London vlog for my recommendations.
This is all very subjective but the criteria for my ranking is based on mainly 3 factors; how easily is to find vegan food in the city center, diversity or variety of the food, and the amount of options to choose from.
With that said, here are the most vegan friendly cities in the UK according to this vegan foodie.
No. 5 Liverpool
I spent more days in Liverpool because I was there for a concert and I wanted to slow down a bit. I stayed in what is considered downtown or city center. You won’t have an issue finding vegan options here but the reason it’s at the bottom is because there wasn’t a lot of variety.
I had a lot of the same junk food, a lot of burgers. I could only find one vegan cafe and it was longer than a 20 minute walk so I had to take points off for that. I did find plenty of choices when it came to non-vegan places so if you’re traveling there with others, it’ll be easy to accommodate everyone.
No. 4 Bristol
I found that the options in Bristol were a bit more spread out so if you’re visiting in a short amount of time you may not be able to hit all the vegan gems this city has to offer. I was also there for a concert and stayed near the venue which wasn’t as close to the city center.
What surprised me about Bristol was the variety of vegan food, I had Asian food, Mexican, and some great breakfast options at non-vegan places. I loved every single meal I had too. I hope to go back to this city one especially since it’s so close to London.
No. 3 Brighton
Brighton is known as the vegan capital of the UK so putting at number three is a surprise even to myself. Honestly, it was higher in my list until I thought about the other two cities.
I had phenomenal vegan food in Brighton including one of the best meals of this entire trip however the vegan restaurants were quite spread out and I couldn’t make it to a lot of them. Not a lot of vegan breakfast options either. I do wished I had stayed there longer.
Watch: Exploring the Vegan Capitol of the UK
No. 2 Manchester
Let me start by saying that Manchester may have put a loves pell on me because I absolutely adored this city. I was in the city center and I found vegan options everywhere within walking distance – at cafes, at bars, and so many fully vegan restaurants.
Every single meal I had in Manchester was exceptional and loved the variety too. I had a vegan risotto that I still think about to this day. I can’t say enough great things about the vegan food scene in Manchester so it’s a must visit as a vegan.
Watch: Vegan Food in Manchester
No. 1 York
York is such a delightful and charming town that I would visit again even if I had to eat convenience store food haha. However as a vegan you won’t have issues here because there are options everywhere. I stayed at an Airbnb outside of the city center so this hurt my chances of trying a few more places I wanted but still had a lot of great food.
I had the best vegan English breakfast at a non-vegan brunch cafe that I got super lucky to get a table at during a busy weekend ( the vegan gods were watching out for me). That’s another meal I think about often. There was a lot of variety in terms of food and plenty of vegan baked goods which made York the number one city for this vegan.
Watch: Vegan Food & Solo Travel in York
Visiting the UK was a huge dream of mine and being able to do it so easily as a vegan was even better. If you’re thinking of visiting or visiting soon, you will have a great time!
I hope you found this list of vegan-friendly cities in the UK helpful and make sure to follow me on Instagram or YouTube where I post more vegan food content 🙂
Conscious Cuban 
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