The 50 best restaurants in America

A great meal at an outstanding restaurant can be a life-changing experience. But with new places popping up every day, it can be difficult to decide which spots are worth your time - and hard-earned cash.

We combined six noteworthy lists compiled by food critics, experts, and diners to come up with a definitive ranking of the best restaurants in the country.

We gave each restaurant a numerical rating based on how many lists the restaurant appeared on and how high it appeared on lists that were ranked. Restaurants that appeared on multiple lists ranked higher on our list, while restaurants that ranked on only one of these lists ended up closer to the bottom. For restaurants that tied, we broke down the rankings based on reviews, price, and our own editorial discretion. Read the complete breakdown of the methodology here.

The lists we used were The Daily Meal's 101 Best Restaurants in America 2017, OpenTable's 100 Hottest Restaurants in America, The World's 50 Best Restaurants, the James Beard Foundation's 2017 Restaurant and Chef Award Semifinalists, Eater's The National 38, and the Michelin Guide.

Read on to check out the best places to eat across America:

Talia Avakian and Emmie Martin contributed reporting to an earlier version of this article.