After several long months of ice, snow, and temperatures that make going outside feel like a punishment, nothing hits quite like summer in Montreal.
And Montrealers certainly don’t take any of it for granted. The Bixi bikes come out, the festivals stack up weekend after weekend, and the second the temperature creeps above 15 degrees, every restaurant patio, rooftop bar, and sidewalk seat in the city fills up almost instantly.
We squeeze every last drop out of our terrasses before October reminds us where we live. But with so many to choose from, settling on the perfect spot could be a little daunting.
That’s the problem Terrasse Season is trying to fix. The free, bilingual website launched ahead of the 2026 patio season as a searchable directory of more than 200 terrasses, patios, and rooftops spread across 24 different Montreal neighbourhoods.
Jesse Bergman, the Montreal local who built the site, says existing options were never quite up to the task.
“There are some great ‘best terraces’ lists out there but they only mention a few select spots, and none of them can tell you what’s open for the season, near where you are, whether it’s covered when the forecast looks uncertain,” he told MTL Blog. “Google Maps isn’t that helpful either unless a place happens to have ‘terrace’ in its name.”
Bergman, 36, launched the site last month after deciding he wanted to explore the city beyond the same two or three spots he kept returning to every summer.
The tool is built around an interactive map with every listing pinned to its address, but the filters are what make it genuinely useful. You can sort by neighbourhood, terrasse type (rooftop, sidewalk, backyard, courtyard, balcony, garden, or plaza), dog-friendly, covered, and heated, with a sort-by-distance option for when you’re already outside and just want whatever’s closest.
The two most useful filters are probably the simplest. “Open right now” cuts the full directory down to only the places currently open based on live hours pulled from Google Places. “Open this season” shows which spots are confirmed open for the year.
“People often want to know if a spot has their terrace available before going,” Bergman said, noting the feature was especially popular during the April and May window when some spots are ready and others aren’t yet.
The site launched with 182 listings and has since grown to 205 through community submissions, with restaurant owners and locals both pitching in spots. Features like covered seating, heated spaces, and dog-friendly policies are only listed when confirmed by a source.
Bergman hopes to eventually have every patio in the city on the map. “We have a ‘submit a terrace’ page where several people have already submitted spots, including restaurant owners as well as locals who want to support their favorite neighborhood spot,” he explained. “Every submission is reviewed for accuracy and then added to the site.”
The response so far has been encouraging, with the site crossing 3,000 unique visitors organically and no marketing budget behind it.
“I also got an email last week from someone saying they discovered two new spots in their neighbourhood that they probably wouldn’t have known about otherwise. It’s awesome to hear that people are enjoying something you created.”
A mobile app is in the works for next year, which would add push notifications when a terrasse opens for the season. For now, the site works on any phone and requires no account.
Terrasse Season is free and available in English and French at terrasseseason.com.
