Coffee in Uzbekistan: A Tea Country's New Habit
Coffee in Uzbekistan in 2026: imports up, Tashkent roasters with flat-white prices, what to expect in Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva, and how to order.
In the first six months of 2025, Uzbekistan imported 431 tonnes of coffee from 36 countries, worth $3.9 million, according to national statistics committee figures reported by Upl.uz. That's 133 tonnes more than the same half of 2024, and more than the country bought in the whole of 2021, when the committee counted about 333 tonnes for the year. Italy was the biggest supplier in 2025, at 125 tonnes; in 2021 it had been Russia.
The line doesn't only go up. January and February 2026 came in at 136.2 tonnes, down 32.4% on the same two months of 2025, as UzDaily reported in April 2026. Two winter months prove little. The multi-year direction is clear, though, and for a traveller it translates into something practical: coffee in Uzbekistan is now easy in Tashkent, findable in the old towns, and still mostly powder everywhere else.
What the numbers look like on the street
Tea remains the default. Nobody in a chaikhana on a raised tapchan is going to bring you a cappuccino, and in a village home a request for coffee can leave your host searching the cupboard for a jar that isn't there.
The coffee boom is urban and young. It shows up as roasters with Instagram accounts, laptop tables, oat milk and flat whites priced like a plate of plov. That price gap is the easiest way to understand coffee's place here. A neighbourhood plov lunch runs a few dollars; a specialty flat white in central Tashkent costs about the same, sometimes more. Coffee is the treat, tea is the utility. (For the full restaurant picture, our Tashkent eating guide goes district by district.)
Tashkent's specialty coffee cluster
If you only have an hour, go to Taras Shevchenko Street in the Mirabad area. Tim's Coffee & Roastery sits at number 40 and roasts its own beans, with brew methods beyond espresso (French press, Chemex, siphon) according to its own listings. Mad Lads Coffee Roasters is a few doors down at 36A, takeaway only. Socials, another café that comes up repeatedly in local listings, is on the same street. That's two sit-down cafés and a takeaway roaster within a short walk, which is rare in a city built on Soviet-scale blocks.
Beyond that stretch, the cafés are scattered. The table below uses prices published in a Tashkent café roundup by travel blogger Megan Starr on 23 September 2026. We've listed only places that also show up on map and review platforms. Treat the numbers as a snapshot (last checked: September 2026).
| Café | Address | Flat white | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tim's Coffee & Roastery | Shevchenko 40 | 35,000 som | 8:00–22:00 |
| Master Coffee | Mirabad 27/7 | 35,000 som | 8:00–20:00 (later at weekends) |
| Cafe Dosan (Korean-run) | Yakub Kolas 6 | 36,000 som | 7:00–23:00 |
| Zira Cafe & Bakery | Ukchi 3 | 40,000 som | 9:00–22:00 |
| The Coffee Belt | Oybek 12 | 40,000 som | 7:30–22:00 |
| Rassvet | Chimkent 17 | 45,000 som | 8:00–20:00 |
At the Central Bank rate of 11,825 som to the dollar on 26 September 2026, that range works out to roughly $3–3.80 a cup. Cafe Dosan also serves barley drinks and matcha, and Zira's two floors make it the easier pick for a slow brunch. Zira has no wifi, according to the same roundup, which is either a flaw or the point. If a table with wifi and a socket matters more than the beans, Tashkent cafes that work for a laptop are a separate list.
Now the caveat, and it's a big one. Tashkent cafés open and close fast. On Wanderlog's roaster list for the city, Columbina Coffee Boutique (once a standard recommendation in older guides) shows as temporarily closed, and Black Bear Kofi on Shevchenko Street as permanently closed. Georgian roaster Shavi is at Bukhara Street 26. Before crossing the city for a particular cup, check the place on Yandex Maps or 2GIS the same morning.
The chains, for when you just need a coffee
Safia is the one you'll see everywhere. It started as a confectionery brand and has turned into a cake-and-coffee chain with dozens of branches, the large majority in Tashkent, plus single outlets in cities including Bukhara, Fergana and Andijan, according to its business-directory listing (branch counts vary by source; last checked: September 2026). Expect a long pastry counter, reliable espresso, full breakfasts and long opening hours.
Bon! is the other name. It's a European-style boulangerie and café, with its first branch on Chekhov Street and several more in malls and on Babur Street. The croissants are the draw.
Our take? Use the chains for breakfast and a quiet table, and save your first proper cup for an independent roaster. The chains are consistent. They aren't the reason anyone writes about coffee in Tashkent.
Coffee in Samarkand, Bukhara and Khiva
Outside the capital the pattern flips. Hotel breakfasts usually come with instant coffee, and roadside cafés sell 3-in-1 sachets (coffee, powdered creamer and sugar in one packet) stirred into hot water. Specialty coffee exists, but in small, countable pockets near the monuments.
Samarkand
Smash Coffee, at Registan Street 9, is the name reviewers keep returning to: a tiny bar with a couple of outside tables, a serious machine and an espresso-with-pomegranate-juice drink you won't see in Tashkent. It's on the Registan's own street, handy before the ticket queue. We haven't confirmed it against a dated 2026 listing, so check it's still open on Yandex Maps or 2GIS first.
Bukhara
Café Wishbone, a German-run coffee shop, trades inside the 16th-century Tim Abdullakhan trading dome, one of the few places anywhere where you drink an Italian-style cappuccino under a brick cupola. Cafe Mazza, in the first trading dome, has listed 9:00–21:00 hours. Neither is confirmed against a dated 2026 listing, so check they're still open before you go. Our Bukhara eating guide puts old-town espresso at 20,000–35,000 som.
Khiva
Thinner still. Aim Coffee near the east gate (9:00–22:00) is the name that comes up in Megan Starr's September 2026 Khiva guide; it publishes no prices. The rest of our Khiva food notes cover what else opens early.
One genuinely useful fact about all three: most restaurants don't open until late morning, while the better cafés start between 8:00 and 9:00. If you're up early for the light on the tiles, a café is often your only sit-down breakfast outside the hotel. The Uzbek breakfast guide covers the bazaar alternative.
How to order
In Tashkent specialty cafés, English menu words work: americano, cappuccino, latte, flat white. Everywhere else, a few words in Uzbek or Russian help. The Uzbek word is qahva, though kofe is what you'll hear.
- Bitta kofe, iltimos (Uzbek): one coffee, please.
- Sutli / s molokom (Russian): with milk.
- Shakarsiz / bez sakhara: without sugar. Worth saying, since sweet is the default in many places.
- Olib ketish uchun / s soboy: to take away.
- Naturalniy kofe?: “real coffee?” Ask this before ordering outside the big cities, because the honest answer is often a sachet.
More survival words are in our Uzbek phrasebook.
If you can't go a day without it
Buy a bag of beans from a Tashkent roaster before you head west, and pack a small plastic pour-over cone or a few drip-bag filters. Guesthouses almost always have a kettle, because they all make tea. Ask for ground beans (most roasters will grind to order) and you've solved the Nukus morning, the desert-road fortress day and the homestay breakfast in one purchase.