My friends back in Iowa would attest to my affinity for coffee shops. I was pleased to discover no shortage of them in Kyiv. This may be the biggest density of coffee shops (and sushi restaurants) I’ve ever encountered. My type of place.

I go to four different fairly prominent chains. If anyone can recommend others, please comment below.

Here’s my rating:

4. Кофе Хауз / Kofe KHauz / Coffee House

These are everywhere. Coffee House is overpriced, with horrible, soggy sandwiches, but they’re open 24/7 and I have yet to have any problems with their open wireless networks.

3. Double Coffee

Double Coffee seems like the high end shop. The food and drinks are pricey, but very good. Service is sometimes slow. In my experience, they either have a locked wireless network whose password doesn’t work, or no internet access at all. Based strictly on ambiance, though, this one takes the cake — clean, dark, mysterious, sexy. You can also order sushi.

2. Шоколадница / Shokoladnytsa / Chocolatarium

Nice, clean, good internet, good sandwiches. Given their title, I expected better desserts.

1. Coffee Life

My personal favorite of the chains I’ve visited. Hip ambiance. Several rooms. Reliable Internet. Their selection of food is rather limited, but service is quick and the servers are polite.

I should mention that the judging strictly by taste, the coffee/pastries/meals available at either of two private French bakeries are vastly superior to anything else I’ve encountered, coffee shop wise. Буланжері is located on Olesya Gonchara st and Yaroslaviv Val, the other, Реприза, or, Cafe Patisserie, is on Velyka Zhytomyrs’ka. Between the two, I’m partial to Реприза where you order then sit down, and the food is brought to you. In Буланжері, you wait in line to order food, then in another line to order your beverage.

(CORRECTION: Реприза is a chain.)

Other chains I know of, but have yet to visit:
Kafka
Coffee Time
Kofium
Repriza
Chaikoff
Volkons’ky Keizer

There are also these coffee cars all over the place:

While on the subject of coffee, I can’t resist sharing this French animation:

Perhaps “cafe” is French for methamphetamine.