Venice has exactly one fully vegan restaurant, which I realise is not what you were hoping to read. That changes how you plan the whole trip, and it makes this one of the harder cities on the site.
Go anyway. Venice is extraordinary and you would be mad to skip it over lunch. You just want to know where you are heading before you set off, because plenty of places here will hand you a side of vegetables and call it dinner.
Here is the shape of it. One vegan restaurant, one vegetarian bistro, a bacaro serving cicchetti, which are the Venetian small plates eaten standing at the bar, four kitchens with good plant-based cooking, and two gelaterias worth walking across a sestiere for. Sestiere is what Venice calls each of its six districts, and you will see the word everywhere.
Vegan Venice at a Glance
The shortlist, with what each one is, so you can plan around the gaps instead of discovering them at the door.
- The only fully vegan restaurant: La Tecia Vegana in Dorsoduro, and you need to book
- Most Venetian experience: H2NO, a bacaro serving vegan cicchetti
- Best full meal after La Tecia: Ital India in Cannaregio
- Best value sit down: Frary’s by the Frari
- Vegetarian, not vegan: Sullaluna, with dairy, egg and honey on the menu
- Best pizza: Pizzeria L’Angelo in San Marco
- Best sorbet: La Mela Verde in Castello
- Best known gelato: Gelatoteca SuSo near the Rialto
- Somewhere to sit for an hour: Super ZaZa in Santa Croce
Venice is expensive and the restaurants nearest the water are the worst value in the city. Everything on this list sits far enough off the main routes to be priced for people who live here.
Best Vegan Restaurants in Venice
- 1. La Tecia Vegana
- 2. Sullaluna
- 3. H2NO
- 4. Ital India
- 5. Frary’s
- 6. Pizzeria L’Angelo
- 7. Super ZaZa
- 8. La Mela Verde
- 9. Gelatoteca SuSo
1. La Tecia Vegana: The Only Fully Vegan Restaurant in Venice Vegan
La Tecia Vegana is the one place in Venice where the entire menu is yours. It sits in Dorsoduro about ten minutes on foot from the station, and the kitchen is organic.
The cooking is Italian with the occasional turn east. Order the aubergine lasagne or the seitan with polenta, and the ravioli if they are on. There is a lentil burger, a chickpea omelette, panzanella and a daily soup, and leave room for the tiramisu. The menu runs in several languages, so none of it is guesswork.
💡 Tip: Book, because they ask for reservations and they mean it. It is small and it fills every night. I would reserve before you fly if the trip is short, and go early in the trip so there is room to go twice.
📍 Calle dei Sechi, Dorsoduro 2104, 30123 Venezia | Dorsoduro | ☎️ +39 041 524 6244 | 🌐 lateciavegana.com | 📸 @lateciavegana
2. Sullaluna: A Vegetarian Bookshop Bistro on the Misericordia Vegetarian
Sullaluna is a bookshop with a bistro attached, on the Fondamenta de la Misericordia in Cannaregio, and the canalside tables are the reason to time your visit. It is a vegetarian kitchen, so order from the vegan dishes.
The vegan side is properly done, with falafel, hummus, puccia, crostini and salads, an emphasis on local produce and vegan wine on the list. Dairy, eggs and honey appear elsewhere on the menu, including in some of the cakes.
💡 Tip: Go in the late afternoon and take a table by the water, because the Misericordia is one of the few stretches in Venice where you can sit beside a canal without paying a premium for the privilege. Ask which cakes are vegan on the day, as the baking changes and honey turns up in unexpected places.
📍 Fondamenta de la Misericordia, Cannaregio 2535, 30121 Venezia | Cannaregio | ☎️ +39 041 722924 | 🌐 sullalunavenezia.it
3. H2NO: Vegan Cicchetti in a Proper Bacaro
H2NO calls itself an enobirroteca, which is a bar that takes both its wine and its beer seriously, and in practice it works as a bacaro. You stand at a counter lined with plates, you point at what you want, and it arrives with a glass of something. By early evening the place is full of people who have just finished work, nobody is sitting down, and the noise is considerable. That is the part of Venice most visitors never see, and vegans are very welcome.
The cicchetti change constantly, so there is no fixed menu to check in advance. What stays the same is the format: one or two bites on bread or polenta, eaten standing at the counter with a glass of something cold. Ask what is vegan on the day and they will put together a plate: grilled vegetables on polenta, artichoke hearts, bruschetta with tomato and basil, and the saor onions without the sardines.
💡 Tip: They run 10AM to 11PM from Monday to Saturday and close on Sundays. Arrive around 6PM, which is when Venetians turn up and the counter fills out. Order two or three cicchetti and an ombra, and stay standing at the counter, which is how a bacaro works.
📍 Rio Terà S. Leonardo 1815, 30121 Venezia | Cannaregio | ☎️ +39 041 934 6774 | 🌐 h2novenezia.it | 📸 @h2_NO
4. Ital India: The Most Reliable Full Meal in Cannaregio
Ital India is on the Fondamenta de le Capuzine in Cannaregio, and after La Tecia Vegana it is the most dependable full meal on this list. It is a vegan-friendly kitchen, though Indian menus carry more naturally plant based cooking than anything else you will find in Venice.
Order the chana masala and a dal with rice, and a vegetable curry to share, and ask for them without ghee or cream. The kitchen is used to the question and will tell you straight. Portions run large by Venetian standards and the prices sit well below what the restaurants near the water charge.
💡 Tip: Say vegano and then ask specifically about ghee, paneer and cream, because those three are what catch people out in an otherwise plant based Indian dish. It is a short walk from the Jewish Ghetto, so it fits neatly around an afternoon in that part of Cannaregio.
📍 Fondamenta de le Capuzine, Cannaregio 3102, 30121 Venezia | Cannaregio | ☎️ +39 041 524 3817 | 📸 @ital_india
5. Frary’s: Middle Eastern Mezze Beside the Basilica
Frary’s sits on a fondamenta, the Venetian word for a walkway running along a canal, a minute from the Basilica dei Frari. That is the enormous Gothic church where Titian is buried and where his Assumption hangs above the high altar, and it is one of the few sights in Venice worth queueing for. Frary’s has been serving Middle Eastern food beside it long enough to count as an institution. The label is vegan-friendly, and the plant based half of the menu is the larger half.
Falafel, hummus, vine leaves, spiced rice and a mezze spread that arrives looking like considerably more food than you ordered. There are vegan desserts as well. This is where to go for a proper sit down meal at a fair price.
💡 Tip: Order the mezze when there are two of you, because you get the whole range for less than two main courses would cost. Being a minute from the Frari, it works as lunch on either side of seeing the Titians, and it is one of the few places in San Polo where you are not paying for a view.
📍 Fondamenta Frari, San Polo 2558, 30125 Venezia | San Polo | ☎️ +39 041 720050 | 📸 @frarysvenezia
6. Pizzeria L’Angelo: Vegan Pizza in San Marco
Pizzeria L’Angelo is on Calle de la Mandola in San Marco, which is unpromising territory for value, and it turns out to be the exception. They do vegan pizza with vegan cheese, the staff know exactly what the word means, and it charges local prices in a part of the city that very rarely does.
The pizza is the reason to come, though the focaccia is worth adding if you are sharing. It is a small local place working from a short menu instead of a tourist operation with laminated photographs, and in this sestiere that is genuinely hard to find.
💡 Tip: Say senza formaggio if you want it with no cheese at all, or formaggio vegano if you want the substitute, because those two requests get confused constantly. Lunch is calmer than dinner, and this stretch of San Marco empties considerably once the day trippers start heading back.
📍 Calle de la Mandola, San Marco 3711, 30124 Venezia | San Marco | ☎️ +39 041 277 1126 | 📸 @pizzeria_l_angelo
7. Super ZaZa: A Comic Shop With a Bar Inside It
Super ZaZa in Santa Croce is a comic shop with a bar attached, which sounds like a gimmick and works far better than it should. The sign and the locals say Zazà.
Come for a drink and a snack and a browse, because the atmosphere is the point more than the food. This is a neighbourhood spot in the district most visitors only walk through on the way to the station, with drinks, snacks and shelves of fumetti, which is the Italian word for comics, to work through while you sit.
💡 Tip: Treat this as a stop instead of a destination, somewhere to sit for an hour between other things. Santa Croce is the quietest of the six districts, and the walk over from San Polo is one of the nicer ones in the city, particularly in the hour before sunset.
📍 Santa Croce 270, 30135 Venezia | Santa Croce | ☎️ +39 041 299 0986 | 📸 @zazafumetteria
8. La Mela Verde: The Sorbet Worth Crossing Castello For
La Mela Verde is on the Fondamenta de l’Osmarin in Castello, and the sorbets are why people cross the city for it. It is an artisan gelateria, so the dairy free flavours sit in the same cabinet as everything else and you need to ask which is which.
Order the vegan sorbets: chocolate, fig and watermelon are the ones people rave about, and the staff will let you taste before you choose. There is a public bench on the walkway outside, a rare free seat in a city where almost every chair belongs to a café.
💡 Tip: Ask which flavours are senza latte, meaning without milk, and check the cone as well as the gelato, because the cone is where dairy tends to hide. It is open 11AM to 10PM and closed on Wednesdays, and it is five minutes from San Zaccaria, so it slots in easily on the walk back from the Arsenale or San Marco.
📍 Fondamenta de l’Osmarin, Castello 4977, 30122 Venezia | Castello | ☎️ +39 349 195 7924 | 📸 @la_mela_verde_venezia
9. Gelatoteca SuSo: The Famous One, and It Earns It
SuSo is in the Sotoportego de la Bissa, a couple of minutes from the Rialto, and it is the gelato everybody has heard of. The queue is long and it moves quickly. Order the vegan Pistacchiotto, their signature pistachio made with plant protein and coconut oil, which is as rich as the dairy version.
They are clear about which tubs are dairy free and the staff will tell you without being asked twice. It is an artisan gelateria, so the usual questions apply to the cone and to anything you have put on top.
💡 Tip: Go late. SuSo stays open into the evening and the queue after 9PM is a fraction of what it is at 4PM. Standing near the Rialto at night with a gelato is one of the better free things you can do in this city, and the bridge is almost bearable at that hour.
📍 Sotoportego de la Bissa, San Marco 5453, 30124 Venezia | San Marco | ☎️ +39 041 241 2275 | 🌐 suso.gelatoteca.it
Cicchetti: How Venice Actually Eats
Cicchetti are the small plates Venice runs on, served in bàcari, the old wine bars tucked down side calli away from the squares. The word comes from a Latin root meaning a small quantity, and that is exactly the scale of them. One or two bites on a slice of bread or polenta, eaten standing at the counter.
The custom matters as much as the food. You go straight to the counter instead of waiting to be seated, you order two or three things, and you drink an ombra alongside, which is a small glass of wine. The name comes from the shaded stalls that once shifted around the base of the campanile in San Marco to keep the wine out of the sun.
Most of the famous cicchetti are seafood, which is where this gets difficult. Baccalà mantecato, sarde in saor, fried squid. The vegetable ones exist if you look for them: artichoke hearts, bruschetta with tomato and basil, olives, and grilled vegetables on polenta. Saor itself, the sweet and sour onions with raisins and pine nuts, is vegan before anyone lays a sardine on top of it.
That last point is the useful one to carry around. Ask a bacaro for the saor without the fish, or simply for the vegetable cicchetti, and most will assemble something for you, because the components are already sitting behind the counter. H2NO does this as a matter of course.
💡 Tip: The phrase to learn is senza pesce e senza carne, without fish and without meat, and then senza formaggio if you need it dairy free as well. Cicchetti are priced in small change next to a sit down meal, so a bacaro crawl is comfortably the cheapest way to eat well in this city.
Venice Is a City on Water, and That Changes How You Plan
There are no cars in Venice. Nothing arrives by road, so every crate of vegetables and every keg of beer comes in by boat and then travels the last stretch on a trolley pushed over bridges. That is a large part of why eating here costs what it does, and why the places furthest from the water tend to give you the most food for your money.
You get around on foot or by vaporetto, the water buses run by ACTV. Single tickets are expensive enough that a travel pass pays for itself if you cross the water more than twice a day. Distances look tiny on a map and take far longer than you expect, because every canal has to be crossed at a bridge and every bridge has steps.
Addresses will confuse you at first. Venice numbers its buildings by sestiere, and the numbers run in one long sequence across the whole district instead of along a street. Cannaregio 2535 is a building number, not a house number on a road, which is why the addresses in this guide look the way they do. Search a venue by name in your maps app, because the number on its own will not find it.
The words on the signs help once you know them. A calle is a lane, a fondamenta is a walkway along a canal, a campo is a square, a rio terà is a filled-in canal that now works as a street, and a sotoportego is a covered passage running under a building. Every address on this list uses at least one of them.
💡 Tip: Download an offline map before you arrive. Venice is the one city where your phone will genuinely give up on you, because the calli are too narrow and too repetitive for GPS to place you accurately. Note the nearest campo or church to wherever you are eating and navigate to that instead, then look for the sign.
Vegan Venice: What to Know Before You Go
Plan around La Tecia Vegana instead of hoping to stumble on somewhere. It is the only fully vegan kitchen in Venice, it is small, and it takes bookings. Fix that meal first and build the rest of the trip around it.
The Italian you need is short. Sono vegano or sono vegana means I am vegan. Senza formaggio is without cheese, senza burro without butter, senza uova without eggs, senza pesce without fish. Italians are direct about ingredients and nobody treats the question as awkward.
Avoid anywhere with a photographic menu, a person outside inviting you in, or a table with a view of San Marco. Those three signs reliably mark the worst food at the highest prices in Venice. Walk five minutes inland from any famous square and both improve sharply.
Supermarkets help more than you would expect. Coop and Conad have branches inside the city, both stock plant milk and decent bread, and picnic supplies from a supermarket beat a bad tourist lunch by a wide margin.
If Venice is one stop on a longer Italian trip, Naples is a very different proposition, with a pizza tradition that is vegan by accident more often than by design.
When to Visit Venice
April to June and September to October are the windows worth aiming for. The weather is warm without being punishing, the light is at its best, and the crowds thin enough that you can walk the Rialto without queueing to cross it.
Summer is hot, extremely busy and smells like a lagoon in August. Winter is quiet and atmospheric and I like it a great deal, though acqua alta, the seasonal high water, is most common from October through January and can close streets for a few hours at a time.
Carnival falls in February and fills the city completely. Book months ahead if those are your dates, and expect restaurants including La Tecia Vegana to be full every night of it.
Vegan Venice FAQ
Is Venice good for vegans?
It is harder than most Italian cities, and very doable once you plan. There is one fully vegan restaurant, La Tecia Vegana, plus a vegetarian bistro, Sullaluna, vegan cicchetti at H2NO and good vegan gelato at SuSo.
What is the only fully vegan restaurant in Venice?
La Tecia Vegana in Dorsoduro, about ten minutes on foot from Santa Lucia station. Order the aubergine lasagne and the tiramisu, and book before you travel.
Can you eat cicchetti as a vegan in Venice?
Yes. Artichoke hearts, bruschetta, olives and grilled vegetables on polenta are standard, and saor, sweet and sour onions with raisins and pine nuts, is vegan before the sardine goes on. H2NO in Cannaregio serves vegan cicchetti every day.
Where can I get vegan gelato in Venice?
Gelatoteca SuSo near the Rialto, for the vegan Pistacchiotto, and La Mela Verde in Castello for chocolate, fig and watermelon sorbets.
Which part of Venice is best for vegan food?
Cannaregio. Sullaluna, Ital India and H2NO are all there, and it is where Venetians live. Dorsoduro has La Tecia Vegana.
Is vegan food expensive in Venice?
Venice is expensive everywhere, and the closer to the water the higher the price. A bacaro crawl of cicchetti and an ombra, a small glass of wine, is the cheapest way to eat well.
How many days do you need in Venice?
Two or three covers the main sights, a day on the outer islands and enough meals to get through this list. The whole city can be crossed on foot in under an hour.