July 6, 2026
Miami's Money Machines: 12 Local Restaurants on America's Top 100 Independents (2025)
Every year, Restaurant Business ranks the 100 highest-grossing independent restaurants in America—single concepts with no more than five locations, measured by their gross food and beverage sales. It's a list that rewards a very specific kind of restaurant: the big room, the special-occasion table, the see-and-be-seen destination that turns dinner into an event. And in 2025, Miami didn't just show up. It ran the table.
The number one independent restaurant in the entire country is in Miami Beach. Twelve of the top 100 are right here in Miami-Dade—more than almost any other metro on the list. These are not the neighborhood gems we usually send you to; the average check at some of them runs north of $200 a head. But if you've ever wondered which Miami rooms are printing money, this is the map. Consider it the definitive guide to where to blow the budget—and why these particular dining rooms are the ones raking it in.
A quick note on the numbers below: sales figures are gross 2024 food and beverage revenue as reported to Restaurant Business, and "average check" is per person. We've listed each spot by its national rank.
No. 1 in America — MILA
Let this sink in: the single highest-grossing independent restaurant in the United States sits on a Lincoln Road rooftop in Miami Beach. MILA pulled in more than $51 million in 2024 on an average check of $188, edging out every steakhouse in Vegas and every institution in New York. Its "Mediterrasian" menu—part Mediterranean, part Japanese—comes wrapped in a lush open-air room, a marquee sushi and robata program, and a cocktail-and-mezcal bar that keeps the energy going late. It's the flagship of Miami's big-money dining moment, and now it has the receipts to prove it.
No. 3 — Joe's Stone Crab
The oldest name on this list is also one of its biggest earners. Joe's has been serving stone crab claws in South Beach since 1913, and at nearly $48 million a year it proves that a Miami classic can out-gross almost any trendy newcomer. No reservations, famously long waits, tuxedoed servers, and a mustard sauce people fly in for—Joe's is less a restaurant than a Miami institution that happens to move an astonishing amount of seafood.
No. 13 — Makoto
Tucked inside Bal Harbour Shops, Makoto is chef Stephen Starr's polished take on Japanese dining—robata grill, sushi bar, and a garden patio that draws a well-heeled Bal Harbour crowd. At roughly $28.7 million a year, it's proof that a mall address (a very luxurious mall) is no obstacle to landing among the country's top-grossing independents.
No. 21 — Rusty Pelican
If MILA is the sceney rooftop, Rusty Pelican is the postcard. Perched on the Rickenbacker Causeway with the downtown skyline framed across the water, it's the waterfront seafood-and-steak spot that generations of Miamians have booked for anniversaries, graduations, and Sunday brunch. That reliable special-occasion traffic added up to about $24 million in 2024—the view sells itself.
No. 26 — Komodo
David Grutman's three-story Southeast Asian giant in Brickell blurs the line between restaurant and nightclub, and the sales reflect it: around $23 million a year on a $120 average check. Dim sum, whole crispy fish, and Peking duck give way to a DJ and a late-night crowd as the evening rolls on. Komodo helped write the playbook that half this list now follows.
No. 27 — Casadonna
One of the newest arrivals here and already a heavyweight: Casadonna, another Groot Hospitality production, opened in a restored waterfront building in the Edgewater/Omni stretch and immediately started pulling in about $23 million a year. The formula is coastal Italian in a grand, columned room right on Biscayne Bay—glamour, water views, and a menu built for a long, wine-soaked dinner.
No. 29 — MAYAMI
Here's the wildest number on the whole list: MAYAMI, the Wynwood Mexican spot known for mezcal and live cabaret-style performances, posts the highest average check of any Miami restaurant here—$286 a person. It serves far fewer covers than the giants above it and still clears $22 million, which tells you exactly what kind of night people are having. This is dinner-as-spectacle, priced accordingly.
No. 38 — Delilah Miami
The h.wood Group's supper club brought its Old Hollywood glamour to Brickell—red banquettes, 1920s styling, and live entertainment between courses. At $20 million a year on a $160 check, Delilah sells the fantasy of dinner and a show in equal measure. Come for the burger everyone talks about; stay because the room won't let you leave.
No. 45 — Pastis MIA
When Keith McNally and Stephen Starr brought the beloved New York bistro to Wynwood, it landed instantly. Pastis serves steak frites, plateaux of shellfish, and Parisian café energy from morning to midnight, and its all-day traffic added up to about $18 million in 2024. Of the sceney spots on this list, it's the one you can actually walk into for a croque monsieur at lunch.
No. 52 — Gekko
Bad Bunny and David Grutman's Brickell steak-and-sushi temple runs on pure star power—wagyu crispy rice, lobster dumplings, red lighting, and a crowd that treats midnight as prime time. Around $17 million a year on a $128 check makes it one of Miami's most bankable "it" tables, and a fixture of the celebrity-restaurant boom.
No. 64 — Papi Steak
Papi Steak turned the wagyu tomahawk into theater—the $1,000 "Beef Case," the servers parading raw cuts through the room, the whole Miami Beach spectacle. It serves relatively few covers at a steep $201 average check and still cracks $15 million, which is exactly the point: this is a steakhouse built for a blowout, not a Tuesday.
No. 83 — Bayshore Club
Rounding out the Miami contingent is the most down-to-earth name on it. Bayshore Club took over the storied waterfront spot on Coconut Grove's marina and turned it into a breezy seafood-and-raw-bar destination. Its $51 average check is by far the gentlest here—proof you don't need a $200 tab to move serious volume, just a great dock, cold oysters, and a sunset over the bay.
The bigger picture
Look at the pattern and it's unmistakable: waterfront views, celebrity partners, supper-club theater, and marquee sushi-and-steak rooms. This is the machinery of big-money Miami dining, and no other city placed a number one and eleven more like this one did. These aren't the spots we'd send you to for an everyday great meal—that's what the rest of Worth Eating Miami is for—but when the occasion calls for a splurge, or you just want to eat where the whole city seems to be spending, now you know exactly which twelve rooms the country is watching.
Source: Restaurant Business, Top 100 Independents 2025 (gross 2024 food and beverage sales).