The best wine bars in Birmingham

The best wine bar in Birmingham is Loki Wine in the Great Western Arcade, a shop with a tasting room that opens at 10am and keeps more wines open by the glass than most restaurants list by the bottle. Behind it come a self-pour bar on Colmore Row, a natural wine shop on York Road in Kings Heath and a Victorian eye hospital turned hotel on Church Street with a cellar to match. Birmingham's wine bars are mostly shops that let you drink in, which is the right way round: you taste, then you buy.

Loki Wine, Great Western Arcade

Loki Wine is an independent merchant with three shops, with 104 wines by the glass across the three and more than 600 bottles from over 20 countries on the shelves. It calls itself Birmingham's most awarded wine shop, and nobody has argued. The city centre branch is at 36 Great Western Arcade, with a lounge upstairs and tasting downstairs. It opens 10am to 9pm Monday to Wednesday and until 11pm Thursday to Saturday; it is closed on Sundays. Go at lunchtime, try three things you have never heard of, and leave with the one you liked.

Loki Wine & Deli, Greenfield Crescent, Edgbaston

The Edgbaston Loki at 10 Greenfield Crescent is the neighbourhood version: wine on tasting, beer on draught and a deli counter. It opens at noon from Tuesday to Sunday, until 11pm Thursday to Saturday and 9pm on Sundays, which makes it the answer when the arcade is shut. Both shops run tasting dinners, cheese and wine nights and proper WSET courses if you want to learn what you are tasting.

Vagabond, Colmore Row

Vagabond at 92-98 Colmore Row is a chain that earns its place. You pour your own from the machines, scanning them with the app or a linked bank card, and every wine comes as a splash, a half or a full glass, so you can try ten without committing to one. There are more than 100 to work through, plus wine flights and a charcuterie board. The room has a real tree, a fox mural, teal banquettes and a vault downstairs for tastings. It is a short walk from New Street, which makes it the after-work stop for half of the Colmore Business District.

Grace + James, York Road, Kings Heath

Sophie and Henry Poultney's Grace + James at 23 York Road is a wine shop, bar and deli in one, in B14. There are more than 100 wines to buy, and the ones open to drink in change daily, leaning organic, biodynamic and natural. Small plates and charcuterie come from the counter, there is a weekly G&T you can take home in a refillable bottle, and on a sunny day the tables on the pavement are the best seats on York Road. It opens 10am every day except Sunday, when it opens at 11am.

Hotel du Vin, Church Street

Hotel du Vin is in a restored Victorian eye hospital from 1884 on Church Street, between the Colmore district and the Quarter. The point here is the cellar: a hotel group named after wine keeps a long list, and the bar and the Bubble Lounge draw on it. Order Champagne in the Bubble Lounge and pretend you are staying the night. It is cashless, so bring a card.

1000 Trades, Frederick Street

1000 Trades at 16 Frederick Street is a Jewellery Quarter bar for craft beer and natural wine, with food from rotating kitchen residencies, so what you eat depends on the week. It opens from 11am Monday to Friday and noon at weekends, until midnight Thursday to Saturday. Ask what is new on the natural list; it moves.

Passing Fancies, The Goodsyard

Passing Fancies is best known for cocktails, but at its new home on Station Way in the Goodsyard the ground floor, Passing, is given over to beer, wine and food. If one of you wants a Negroni and the other wants a glass of something orange, this is the compromise.

A wine crawl

• Start: Loki in the Great Western Arcade, for a tasting flight.
• Then: five minutes to Vagabond on Colmore Row, for splashes from the machines.
• Then: up Church Street past Hotel du Vin to Frederick Street, for natural wine at 1000 Trades.
• Weekend: take the train to Kings Heath for a long afternoon at Grace + James.

Know before you go

The arcade Loki is shut on Sundays and the Edgbaston one on Mondays, so check which you are heading to. Several of these are shops first, which means you can buy the bottle you liked on the way out, usually for less than a restaurant would charge to open it. Hotel du Vin takes cards only.