What is the difference between ''coffee shops'' and ''cafés'' in America?
Recently, I was talking to my friend about my plans for the next day and suddenly I didn't know which form I should use.
In Poland we use the latter version and school teachers use this word as well (they teach British English pronunciation).
I say ''coffee shops'' but at the same time I always feel like I'm talking about an entirely different place.
The way I currently see it:
* café - a smaller, quiet place; designed for meetings/working; sitting places can be located both indoors and outdoors; sometimes you can also buy beer/something to eat there.
* coffee house - a place where you can buy coffee products, you can also sit down and drink but this place is much more crowded, employees let you select coffee beans before you order your coffee, mostly indoors, usually located in shopping centers, 10/15+ people/3minutes in the afternoon.
I also came across this sentence: ''... a gritty little coffee shop and cafe in Hartsville, South Carolina.'' so it doesn't really help...

Question

Answer

In America we use them interchangably most of the time. We really only use Café to sound fancier. So your friends will understand you whatever one you want to use. If you still help just think of coffee shops as bigger, more corprate places that are usually in malls, like Starbucks or Carribou Coffee. A cafe is smaller and usually not part of a big corprate chain and in smaller, less busy places. While some coffee shops offer some food, café are the ones that offer more varity as well as other drinks. If some used coffee shop and café in same sentence it they probably meant that it was a coffee shop that also sold food, tea, and other things.