Nobu Restaurant — Restaurant in Barcelona

Dining at Nobu Barcelona was an exercise in unmet expectations, and what should have been an exceptional culinary evening turned out to be a resounding disappointment. For a restaurant of this stature and price point, the glaring lack of substance behind its style is impossible to overlook.

Let’s start with the basics: the price-quality ratio is abysmal. For a bill that totaled €500 for two people, one would reasonably expect impeccable food, service, and ambiance. Instead, we were met with mediocrity at every turn. The sushi—arguably the cornerstone of Nobu’s reputation—was shockingly subpar. The fish lacked the delicate freshness and finesse one expects from such an establishment. If you’re paying a premium, the least you deserve is excellence on the plate.

Then there’s the timing. It’s frankly absurd that the kitchen closes at 23:00—an insult to Spanish dining culture, where late meals are the norm. The early closure feels out of touch and restrictive, as if the restaurant prioritizes its schedule over its guests. Adding insult to injury, the rooftop terrace, which should have provided a stunning setting for a pre-dinner drink or a post-meal wind-down, was closed to smokers by 20:00. Instead, guests were forced to trek downstairs—hardly the seamless luxury experience Nobu purports to offer.

The service was equally underwhelming, particularly with the handling of drinks. When ordering a premium whisky like Yamazaki 12, it is standard practice to pour it at the table to showcase the quality of the bottle. Instead, it arrived pre-poured, cheapening the experience and leaving us questioning whether we even received what we paid for. The mishandling continued with the wine. Our bottle was whisked away from the table, only for our glasses to be left empty for long stretches of time—a cardinal sin in fine dining.

Finally, the abruptness with which we were ushered out at precisely midnight was nothing short of offensive. After such a costly meal, one expects to linger and savor the atmosphere, not to be hurriedly shown the door in a manner that bordered on hostility.

Nobu Barcelona is a masterclass in style over substance—a shiny façade that utterly fails to deliver on the basics of hospitality. For €500, one could enjoy far better food, service, and ambiance elsewhere in the city. Save your time, money, and expectations, and look to one of Barcelona’s many authentic dining establishments that understand the art of genuine...

the service was absolutely terrible. we haven't said anything about it, we just let it glide because we didn't want to ruin our night with bad vibes but it kept on being worse and worse. miscommunication about drinks, not being solved at all by the staff. quality of the cocktails was bad, taste and temperature were off. time between dishes was very very long. tables around us were dirty for over 15 minutes, if not way more, it was a mess. on top of that, we were sat next to a corner where there constantly was a stack of dirty dishes that would just lie there for over 20 minutes until it got changed to new dirty dishes?? see picture attached. It was disappointing. Also: the order and timing of the dishes was off: we got toro tartare stand alone, 30 minutes later we got oysters, since no one asked us for new drinks, we ordered wine to go with the oysters while the oysters came and and this wine took more than 10 minutes to get to us, and it came after the black cod. which left us eating oysters after the warm black miso cod since we wanted wine with the oysters. another 45 minutes (or longer?) later we got vegetable tempura and the waiter asked if "we still wanted our cauliflower" ?! so he apparently forgot to order it. again it arrived very late. when the dessert came, it took a very long time. no one asked us about our empty glasses at any point during the night btw which had been empty for a very long time. I asked about the dessert and the waiter said "its already ordered" ehm, ok... all in all a very weird experience with clearly bad management and highly unequipped staff that clearly doesn't care about their customers. we had 4 waiters in total and all of them were unprofessional. since this was also a birthday, we felt even more uncomfortable by the experience. So all in all a very disappointing experience for a restaurant like this - and this is not our first time at a Nobu. Nobu London and Ibiza are worlds apart in terms of service from Nobu Barcelona. Never...

I'm not the kind of person who writes bad reviews, but this was supposed to be a special meal in a special city, and we were treated worse than we would have been at a fast food restaurant. We were seated at a table that was obviously in a place where the sun was glaring into our eyes; the restaurant was not busy, and there were plenty of other places to seat us. We asked for the blinds to be lowered. After 20 minutes, they finally were. Then a few minutes later, they were raised again. I couldn't see anything or look at the person I was eating with; the sun gave me a migraine that lasted the rest of the night. We asked repeatedly for the staff to lower the blind closest to our table; they repeatedly said they would and then did not. All the interactions were so strange and discourteous; I felt like I was being treated like I wasn't a real person.

Besides this, it took them ages to even hand us a menu, and the food was very mediocre. I used to live in Japan; the food was like the quality of a discount conveyor belt sushi restaurant (for 4x the price). The wagyu beef was seared so that it just tasted like charcoal (wagyu should be left alone so that you can enjoy the meat itself). We ate 100 euros worth of food, left still hungry, and filled up on granola bars leftover from our plane ride. Really frustrating and...