The Best Coffee Shops for a First Date in Austin

Plants fill the industrial room at Figure 8 Coffee Purveyors, an East Austin bakery cafe where a short handwritten menu usually lists espresso drinks, pour-overs, drip, and iced coffee. Linger or keep it quick, whichever you both prefer.

Shared seating comes from a community table made from an old conveyor belt.

Houndstooth Coffee leans on natural light, a minimalist look, and carefully made drinks.

Visit the cafe on East Martin Luther King Jr Boulevard, one of five around Austin, with others at North Lamar, Downtown, Rock Rose, and Laurel.

Graffiti covers the walls of the big warehouse room at Spokesman Coffee in South Austin's The Yard development. Beans are roasted in house, and nearly a dozen beers are on tap. Highland and Pflugerville have Spokesman locations too.

At Fleet Coffee, the Morning Ritual pairs espresso and doughnut-infused milk with a doughnut hole, and there is a coffee tonic too. The "Coffee And" menu pairs drinks with extras.

Long-running baristas own this tiny 364-square-foot stop-and-go cafe on Webberville Road in East Austin.

Baristas at Caffé Medici are happy to talk through flavor profiles in this cozy Clarksville neighborhood shop. Most of the beans are sustainably sourced single-origin.

Pick-up orders can be placed online for the West Lynn cafe.

Live music, game night, and trivia fill the week at Wright Bros. Brew & Brew, an East Austin coffee shop and bar. Brunch, bagels, beer, and cocktails join the locally roasted coffee.

Grab a drip or an espresso and watch the busy corner, one of the best people-watching spots around. The doors are open daily from 7am to 8pm, and you can order ahead online.

Flat whites, pour-overs, avocado toast, and Aussie sausage rolls are on the menu at Proud Mary Coffee, an Australian-born cafe in Zilker.

The cafe is open daily from 7am to 4pm, and the kitchen closes at 3pm. Order ahead online or get your drinks to go.

Weekends bring a line at Desnudo Coffee, a small family-run trailer at the Webberville Food Truck Park in East Austin.

We'd start with the brown sugar miso latte that helped the trailer take off, though the silky cold brew and the espresso are tempting alternatives. Order online.

Find Mercado Sin Nombre in an alley off East 5th Street, a corn-focused East Austin cafe that uses Mexican heirloom corn and Mexican coffee roasted in Austin.

The menu includes a blue masa biscuit and an atole cortado made with piloncillo and nixtamalized yellow corn. It is open Tuesday through Friday from 7am to 2pm, and Saturday and Sunday from 7am to 3pm.

Linger over a coffee at Klerje Coffee, an East Austin specialty coffee shop on a busy stretch of East Sixth Street that feels pleasantly removed from the commotion.

Menu sections borrow church and morning-ritual names: Morning Rituals holds the classics, Sabbaticals the riffs, Ceremonials the matcha, Witnesses the iced drinks, and Libations on Tap the cold brew and tea poured from draft. Premium pour-overs and signature drinks are the strength here, and the orange miso latte comes suggested.