Where to Find the Best Breakfast in Melbourne's CBD
Make time to visit these CBD cafes and never turn up to work hungry again.
Where to Find the Best Breakfast in Melbourne's CBD
Make time to visit these CBD cafes and never turn up to work hungry again.
While Melbourne's obsession with weekend breakfasts is ingrained in its identity, the first meal of the day is sometimes overlooked during the week in favour of hitting the snooze button and a couple of extra minutes in a warm bed. We're all about those zzzs, but it's no excuse for skipping brekkie — especially if you work or study in the city, where excellent breakfast options abound. Melbourne CBD is home to numerous cafes that open early during the week, ready to serve great food and even better coffee to start your day right.
So, for the sake of nutrition, productivity and your taste buds, we've put together a list of the best breakfast spots in Melbourne's CBD. From fluffy ricotta hotcakes to lobster benedicts, fresh baguettes with French butter to Reuben sandwiches, specialty pastries to moreish morning buns, perfectly brewed tea to two-tone cold-foam coffees, take a moment to sit down, read the news (or scroll on TikTok, no judgment here) and digest before you get locked into the daily grind.
Recommended reads:
The Best Breakfast in Melbourne
The Best Cafes in Melbourne
The Best Coffee Shops in Melbourne's CBD
The Best Bottomless Brunches in Melbourne
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Located at the Southern Cross end of Little Bourke Street, Higher Ground is from the team behind quintessential Melbourne cafes Top Paddock and The Kettle Black — and boy is it a beauty, a huge, high-ceilinged 160-seat venue set in a heritage-listed powerhouse.
Higher Ground serves the type of superb cafe fare that its siblings are known for, with an all-day menu including an avocado pretzel, the always-popular chilli scrambled eggs, served with smoked yoghurt and flatbread, and more unexpected dishes such as an udon carbonara and a fried chicken croffle. Of course, the famous Top Paddock ricotta hotcakes have been a menu mainstay at Higher Ground, too.
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Rustica is far more than your usual bakery. Yes, these folks bash out some damn fine bread, but its breakfast and lunch game is just as strong. Enjoy sourdough bread in its purest form with a slice of fruit, white or seeded toast with condiments, or dive into the more complex creations.
Go light with oat porridge or almond granola, middle of the road with chilli scrambled eggs or mushrooms with pesto and feta, or go all in with lobster and prawn benedict or maple butter croissant French Toast, but don’t blame us if you can’t concentrate at your 9am meeting.
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For those in demanding jobs, it can be difficult to get your brain moving in the morning. If you think surrounding yourself with suspended bookshelves and pillars filled with pot plants will get things going, head down Flinders Lane to Journal.
Simplicity is key at this long-standing Melbourne cafe, which serves a menu centred on classic breakfast items like pastries, fried eggs and well-crafted toasties. If its closer to lunchtime and you want something healthy and satisfying, Journal’s tuna Nicoise salad with potatoes and a soft poached egg really does the trick. There’s Italian coffee, fresh juices and even a handful of cocktails to match. Plus, you can pick up wifi from the nearby City Library.
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Long-running Hardware Street cafe Hardware Societe became so popular that it expanded to a second venue in the CBD. The newer 255-square-metre sibling site off Flinders Lane promises a grander space and shorter queues.
Here, a well-rounded menu of creative brunch fare boasts something to tickle just about everyone’s morning craving. Give the confit duck Benedict a try, tuck into hearty baked eggs with a fresh baguette, or start your day strong with the fried brioche with seasonal compote. Bon appétit.
Image: Peter Tarasiuk.
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A playful space featuring navy accents and dreamy pink terrazzo, nestled within the 80 Collins precinct, Maverick is a vibrant modern cafe from the minds behind Richmond’s Mayday Coffee & Food. Here, you can settle in over specialty coffee by Axil and pastries from Richmond’s Penny for Pound, or a taste of the kitchen’s creative seasonal breakfast fare.
Early mornings are made all the more palatable with the likes of smoked salmon with soft eggs and beetroot relish, a hot dog with provolone cheese and American mustard, or chilli eggs with mushroom XO. Or, treat that sweet tooth to ricotta hotcakes, topped with crispy bacon, butter and pure maple.
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Code Black Coffee knows how to cafe. Each of its many outposts serves some of the city’s best breakfasts and cups of joe — the team is conquering the city, one cup of coffee and eggs benny at a time, and it shows no signs of slowing down. That was made especially clear when it opened its seventh outpost on Flinders Lane in mid-2024. Here, the team is pumping out the types of dishes that have seen Code Black assume a rightful claim to being one of the very best places for breakfast in Melbourne.
On the menu, you might find dishes like baked eggs with truffled white beans, smoked ham hock and parmigiano; house-made soda bread topped with seasonal mushrooms and whipped buffalo ricotta; and bacon and egg gnocchi with Springs peas and crispy pancetta. Code Black’s more unusual bevs include a dirty strawberry choc coffee, a Morning Bar Punch with espresso, pineapple, coconut water and Earl Grey and dill foam, and a watermelon, apple and coconut milk drink with espresso cream.
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The hanging foliage and whitewashed brick walls of Manchester Press are a sight for sore eyes on an early morning visit. This cavernous laneway cafe usually sings with a hum of happy people plunked on retro school chairs, enjoying their specialty coffees by Ona and bites from the bagel-focused menu.
The food offering is centred around open and closed bagels, of both the sweet and savoury variety. Try crafty combinations like bacon, maple and banana on a blueberry bagel, or grilled eggplant and harissa on a sesame bagel — or take those taste buds on a trip to the Big Apple by way of a classic New York lox bagel. There was no way this longstanding and always buzzy cafe was not going to make it on the list of the best breakfast spots in Melbourne’s CBD. If bagels aren’t your calling, there are also plenty of salads, acai bowls, toasties and seasonal dishes available.
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Tucked down a CBD lane in a stunning heritage-listed building on Wills Street (just off LaTrobe) in a pocket of the city that’s usually reserved for business only, everything about Operator25 is unassuming. And from the minute you step in, you can tell there is no messing around here: from the crisp interior design and outstanding coffee, to the polished brunch and lunch menu that’s one of the best in the Hoddle Grid.
You can drop by for simple eggs your own way or a few slices of toast with condiments, but be sure to explore the bigger bites when you have time to treat yourself to a proper Melbourne CBD breakfast. The corn fritters with pesto and kaffir lime yoghurt, the Singapore chilli crab omelette, the yuzu smashed avo with halloumi, and the spicy mala baked eggs with a fried Chinese bun are the kind of dishes that convince an out-of-towner that Melbourne really does make the best breakfast.
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It spent almost 100 years of its life as a dry venue, but the beer’s flowing freely now at The Victoria Hotel, as it enters its next phase as Mister Munro. The historic Little Collins Street pub has been reimagined as a dapper dining room and bar, named in a nod to former Victorian Premier and temperance advocate, James Munro.
It’s also now also serving some solid brekkie options in the CBD. You can come in for your classic bircher muesli, buttermilk pancakes, or a mushroom and cheese omelette, but we’re here to share the secret of its daily breakfast buffet. For only $32, you can keep filling up your plate with as many breakfast goodies as you like until you’re stuffed.
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If your weekday mornings are spent somewhere a little more corporate, Liminal might be the perfect multi-functional space for you to fuel up at before popping off to work. Located in the foyer of Collins Street’s T&G Building, this daytime diner has become a favourite for the hungry AM crowd.
Admire stretches of marble and lounge on comfy contemporary couches while you enjoy a wide range of brekkie staples. Menu highlights include the avocado on toast with whipped feta, radish and dukkah; the breakfast roll with bacon, scrambled egg, and HP sauce on a milk bun; and mushroom ricotta toast with charred corn. The venue also serves as a wine store, event space and marketplace. Tick, tick, tick.
Image: Carmen Zammit.
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Chicken and waffles might sound indulgent as a breakfast dish, but sometimes it’s necessary. Bowery to Williamsburg’s take on the southern classic will sort you out, whether you’re a little dusty, had a large morning workout or simply feel like treating yourself.
An illuminated subway sign welcomes diners into the laneway eatery, paying homage to the subway stations of New York. And similarly, menu options like bagels (both filled or with your choice of schmear), lox and potato latkes and loaded deli sandwiches will instantly transport you to a New York deli, as will the bottomless filter coffee. The only hard part is making a choice from the enticing menu — will you go for shakshuka baked eggs with Italian sausage, a Reuben sandwich with pickles, a Philly cheese steak on a toasted long roll or a Southern fried chicken burger with chipotle dressing.
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Located in a section of the State Library that had been closed for more than 15 years, Guild Cafe opened in 2018 as part of the historic venue’s extensive refurbishment. Run by the minds behind Almond Milk Co, the cafe resides just inside the Library’s Russell Street entrance.
It offers a short but sweet menu with pastries, granola, vegan ramen and brekkie rolls. With communal tables, large windows, ample light, and an all-day filter coffee pass, this is the perfect nook for a light, easy breakfast in Melbourne’s city centre. Moreover, the spot is one of Melbourne’s most laptop-friendly cafes, so feel free to work and eat here throughout the day.
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The bottom part of Flinders Lane is often overshadowed by its significantly more impressive top end. However, tucked down there is The Grain Store, a spacious breakfast spot offering homey, substantial brunch dishes starring fresh ingredients.
The vibe at The Grain Store is exactly what it sounds like, and the space itself is reminiscent of a farmhouse. Behind the barn doors, you’ll find the likes of a brunch board with avocado and feta toast, halloumi and potato hash and a fresh OJ, a morning brioche filled with scrambled eggs, ham and parmesan, beef cheek benedict with jalapeno hollandaise and French toast with orange whipped cream.
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Since opening in 2010, Brown Bagels has been hitting the sweet spot between newfangled experimental and bare-bones tradition. Brown’s sweet and savoury bagels — such as strawberry and Nutella, banana and honey and salmon and cream cheese — are comforting and familiar. But as you go into the more lunch-like bagels, things get a little more experimental, such as a beef bulgogi or spicy pork bagel.
Find this hidden gem, one of Melbourne’s best bagel joints, tucked down Equitable Place — an alleyway in the city that fills with office workers searching for a great lunch or breakfast in the CBD.
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We’ve excluded coffee shops that only serve a few token pastries and takeaway rolls from this list, but Vacation is a more than worthy exception. And we say that because it goes beyond just one or two small breakfast offerings, and there is a decent amount of space to dine in.
Coffee is, of course, why most people visit, but the cafe also has a tight menu of muesli, toast and sandwiches. Whenever we visit, we gun straight for the morning brioche bun that’s packed with harissa, grilled haloumi, tomatoes, and a fried egg. The egg and bacon butty is also a winner.
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Ok, we lied! We have included one pastry-only offering because it is just too good to miss. While this city is in no way short of banging bakeries, every now and then, a new one emerges that really captures the attention of Melburnians. Bloomwood Bakery, a buzzing CBD space, did just that, with its irresistible pastries and specialty drinks.
Signature pastries, which attract hordes of visitors each day, make for a perfect brekkie when you have a little less time, but still want something to fill the tum. You might go for a maple cinnamon scroll, or a passionfruit and coconut jelly flower, or go savoury with the famed corn and cheese croissant or a thick slice of pepperoni and hot honey focaccia pizza. Take a choc chip pretzel cookie to go so you have something to look forward to in the afternoon. To drink, there are renowned two-toned drinks, such as strawberry, banana or coconut iced matchas, and plenty of seasonal specials such as a Thai tea with salted coconut cream or citrus cream brew.
Top image: Hardware Societe by Peter Tarasiuk.
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