Florence proves you don’t need meat to eat like royalty in Italy ✨🇮🇹 From vegan falafel and gluten-free pizza to farm-to-table bistros, the Renaissance city has a thriving plant-based scene. The combination of Florence’s deep culinary tradition and the growing creative vegan movement has produced some genuinely extraordinary restaurants — and the quality keeps improving year on year.
Florence rewards the curious plant-based traveller at every turn. Here’s my guide to the best vegan and plant-based restaurants in the city.
Best Vegan Restaurants in Florence
1. Santo Falafel — The Best Vegan Falafel in Firenze
Santo Falafel has built a devoted following in Florence with its exceptional Middle Eastern vegan food — freshly made falafel, house hummus, loaded wraps, and seasonal specials that showcase the very best of plant-based street food. With two Florence locations (Via Santa Monaca in the Oltrarno, and Borgo Allegri near Sant’Ambrogio market), Santo Falafel is perfectly positioned for a quick, brilliant lunch at any point in your day. “In Hummus we Believe” is their motto, and after one visit, you will too.
📍 Via Santa Monaca 7r, Florence 50124 (also: Borgo Allegri 68r) | 📸 @santo.falafel
2. Raw Vegan Firenze — Raw Bowls & Gluten-Free Pizza
Raw Vegan Firenze is one of Florence’s most versatile plant-based spots — a restaurant and café that offers both raw vegan bowls (cold-pressed, enzyme-rich, and genuinely delicious) and gluten-free vegan pizza. The combination is unusual but works brilliantly, catering to a wide range of dietary needs while maintaining high quality across both menus. A great option for travelling with mixed groups.
3. Giumella — Vegan Gastronomia & Lunch Boxes
Giumella on Via Lorenzo di Credi is a genuinely unique spot in Florence — a vegan gastronomia (Italian deli-restaurant hybrid) that produces beautiful plant-based Tuscan-inspired food to eat in or to take away as a lunch box. The lunch box concept is particularly clever and practical for tourists: a complete, freshly made plant-based meal that you can take to the Arno or eat in the shop. Open from 10:30am until 8pm.
📍 Via Lorenzo di Credi 12, Florence 50136 | 📸 @giumella_vegan
4. Ristorante Nirvana — Vegan Italian Classics Including Tiramisù
Ristorante Nirvana on Via Il Prato is a proper sit-down vegan Italian restaurant that takes traditional Italian cooking seriously and produces it beautifully in plant-based form. The seitan dishes, pasta, and — crucially — the vegan tiramisù are all excellent, and the kitchen has clearly put considerable thought into how to preserve the essence of Italian cuisine without animal products. Open for lunch and dinner, with booking recommended for evenings.
📍 Via Il Prato 4/B, Florence 50123 | ☎️ +39 346 638 1015 | 🌐 www.nirvanaristorante.it | 📸 @ristorantenirvana
5. L’OV Osteria Vegetariana — Gorgeous Vegetarian Osteria in Florence
L’OV Osteria Vegetariana is one of Florence’s most beloved and long-standing vegetarian restaurants — a gluten-free osteria that has recently moved to a new home near Ponte Rosso on Via Faentina. The menu is seasonal and entirely vegetarian (with extensive vegan options), and the cooking draws on the best Tuscan produce to create dishes that feel genuinely Italian and genuinely special. Book ahead — this one fills up.
📍 Via Faentina 2r (Ponte Rosso), Florence | 📸 @osteriavegetariana
6. ORA Firenze — Gourmet Vegan & Vegetarian in a Hip Atmosphere
ORA on Via San Zanobi is one of Florence’s most exciting plant-based restaurants — pioneering organic vegetarian and vegan cooking in a cool, characterful space in the San Lorenzo neighbourhood. The menu is creative and international, with a genuine commitment to biological and sustainable sourcing that underpins everything on the plate. The wine list is thoughtfully curated, and the atmosphere on a warm Florentine evening is absolutely magical.
📍 Via San Zanobi 126r, Florence 50129 | ☎️ +39 055 463 3414 | 🌐 www.orafirenze.it | 📸 @ora.firenze
7. Tanotto (Tripperia Vegana) — The Best Vegan Panino in All the Land
Tanotto is a genuine Florence institution — a Tripperia Vegana (vegan tripe shop, reimagined) where mushrooms are treated with the same respect and technique as meat in traditional Florentine street food. The lampredotto and trippa are made entirely from fungi that have been aged and prepared with remarkable skill, and the resulting panino is one of the most extraordinary plant-based sandwiches you will ever eat. This is the spot for a genuinely Florentine food experience, done entirely without animals.
📍 Via Pisana, Florence | 🌐 www.tripperiavegana.it | 📸 @tanotto_official
8. 5 & Cinque — Farm-to-Table Biological Vegan Bistro
5 & Cinque on Piazza della Passera in the beautiful Oltrarno neighbourhood is Florence’s most charming farm-to-table vegan bistro — a small, warm space that serves biological, seasonal vegetarian and vegan cooking with genuine elegance. The piazza setting is one of the most beautiful in Florence, and eating here on a warm evening with a glass of natural wine is one of those travel memories that stays with you. Open Wednesday to Sunday.
📍 Piazza della Passera 1, Florence 50125 | ☎️ +39 334 742 1258 | 📸 @5ecinquefirenze
9. La Brac — Bookshop Café with Beautiful Vegetarian Plates
La Brac on Via dei Vagellai is one of Florence’s most beloved and characterful restaurants — a bookshop and kitchen in one, combining a carefully curated selection of books with vegetarian and vegan cooking of genuine quality. The brunch here on weekend mornings is outstanding, the lunch menu changes daily, and the dinner service is elegant and creative. If you visit just one restaurant in Florence, La Brac’s combination of culture, food, and atmosphere makes it a genuinely special experience.
📍 Via dei Vagellai 18r, Florence | 📸 @labracfirenze
Tips for Vegan Travellers in Florence
Florence is a compact and highly walkable city, which makes it easy to combine several vegan spots in one day. The Oltrarno neighbourhood — south of the Arno — is particularly rich: Santo Falafel, 5 & Cinque, L’OV Osteria Vegetariana, and La Brac are all within easy walking distance. For something genuinely unique, Tanotto’s vegan tripperia experience is completely unlike anything else in Italy. La Brac and ORA are both worth booking ahead for dinner.
Have you eaten vegan in Florence? Let me know your favourite spots in the comments!