The claim
Tucked into Winecellar Entry, one of the narrow lanes of old Belfast, White's Tavern calls itself the city's oldest tavern and claims a licence of 1630. The historic tavern has since been joined by a beer hall, a garden and a shop, and it hosts regular live music. The early licence has not been independently documented, but the tavern is a Belfast institution.
What the records show
The tavern says Belfast's first tavern licence was granted on this site in 1630, and no licence record has been traced; the planning record calls it local tradition. What that record does document is the rest: the building standing now is largely the work of the wine merchant Valentine Jones, who rebuilt about 1790, and is known historically as Washington House. By the middle of the nineteenth century Neil & White ran it as a wine and spirit warehouse, with part of it used as the Oyster Rooms by the fishmonger John Walker, and the premises moved from wholesale trade to a public house only in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. The name White's Tavern dates from 1962. It was restored in the 1980s, held by Beannchor and the Merchant Hotel Group, and bought by the Clover Group in 2019, which restored the bar counter to its original height and added the Oyster Room, the beer hall, the store and the garden. The statutory register has now been searched as well, and it holds nothing for the house: within three hundred metres of Winecellar Entry the Northern Ireland register of historic buildings lists forty-six entries, including the Northern Whig round the corner on Bridge Street and the eighteenth-century Northern Bank on Waring Street, and there is no entry for the tavern, for Winecellar Entry or for 14-18 High Street. So the dating on this page is the planning record's and not a designation's, which is worth a reader knowing.
What to look for inside
- Claims Belfast's first tavern licence (1630)
- In Winecellar Entry, one of Belfast's historic entries
Visiting
White's Tavern is in Belfast, Northern Ireland, at 2-4 Winecellar Entry and 14-18 High Street, Belfast BT1 1QN. We do not list opening times, because they change; the pub’s own site is the place to check before you set out.
Sources
- www.whitestavernbelfast.com/
- boozingabroad.com/oldest-and-best-belfast-pubs-ireland/
- rebelatlas.com/destinations/europe/ireland/where-is-irelands-oldest-pub-10-historic-pubs-with-a-claim-to-the-title/
- www.planbelfast.com/project/whites-tavern
- services2.arcgis.com/BdBkthNLO9mzGAMO/arcgis/rest/services/Listed_Buildings_Centroid/FeatureServer/0/query?where=1%3D1&geometry=-5.93074%2C54.59873%2C-5.92610%2C54.60143&geometryType=esriGeometryEnvelope&inSR=4326&spatialRel=esriSpatialRelIntersects&outFields=HB_Ref_No%2CAddress%2CCurrentGra&returnGeometry=false&f=html
- ratings.food.gov.uk/business/59353
- whitestavernbelfast.com/tavern/
Know something we don’t?Suggest a correctionLast checked Sept 2026
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