The best bagel shops in Shanghai

Spread the Bagel

Possibly Shanghai’s most well-known bagel spot, Spread the Bagel serves up artisanal, New York-style bagels. The wide range of bagels and spreads here include Cinnarella (cinnamon raisin), Wholly Molly (whole wheat) and Snow Flake (sea salt) along with more traditional flavours like the everything bagel and sesame.

Boom Boom Bagels

Boom Boom Bagels has a few simple options for bagels but its spreads are where it really shines, with choices like house ricotta and maple-nut cream cheese. Boom Boom's signature bagels mix and match flavours to create some stand-out bagelwiches like The Hindquarter, a bagel topped with house-smoked pulled pork, pickles and fennel.

Its popular Anfu location offers seating at high, bar-style tables and can get packed when the weekend morning crowd descends.

Big Bagel

These bagels are indeed big bagels. Big Bagel has a very traditional selection of bagels to choose from, including plain, sea salt, sesame and parmesan. For lunch, there's a pastrami bagelwich for 58RMB that’s a fun play on New York cuisine.

Starting out with a shop in Suzhou, Big Bagel has slowly built up momentum, and made the move to Shanghai two years ago, with a shop on Yongkang Lu complete with rustic, wood-panelled walls, tasteful tiling and chalkboards menus.

Secret Bagel

So, what’s the secret? These bagels use a recipe handed down to owner Tian Tao by a 78-year-old Jewish baker, who’d been making bagels his whole life, survived the Holocaust and spoke only Yiddish, teaching Tao through a combination of pointing and Google Translate.

Secret Bagel offers a few classic options alongside whackier flavours – sesame or sea salt bagels can be paired with smoked salmon or roast beef. Alternatively, live a little with an Oreo or chocolate-flavoured bagel. And yes, for all the on-trend kids out there, there are rainbow bagels here.