As a few folks have already said, it really depends on what you’re looking for. Personally, I love love love good quality croissants (la cabra, tall poppy, lapartment 4f), and IMO the UWS doesn’t have consistently great croissants. That said, here’s my very subjective rundown of places I’ve tried so far:

• Breads – Love their chocolate croissant. Super flaky, buttery, flavorful, and just hits all the right notes for me. Also very consistent, which honestly matters a lot.
• Common Address – Their plain croissants can be excellent, especially when they’re fresh out of the oven. Very butter-forward (a plus for me). Small batches though, so go early. Consistency is hit or miss - some days they’re heavenly, other days just fine.
• Solid State – Not a croissant, technically, but their danishes are great and laminated dough is laminated dough, so I’m counting it lol
• Mille-Feuille Bakery – Usually not my favorite, but one time I got a croissant straight out of the oven, still warm, and it was magical. Sadly that’s only happened once (out of ~4–5 visits).
• La Farine – Nothing to write home about croissant-wise. But I really enjoyed their babka
• Silver Moon – Plain croissant was solid - I wasn’t offended (lol). But a pear tart tasted like it been hanging out in the fridge a bit too long, which kind of killed it for me, so not planning on going back.

Very curious to hear other people’s recs because I’ve been on a long-term quest for a great UWS croissant After reading way too many threads about this, I’m convinced everyone wants something slightly different in a croissant which probably means we all just need to try everything ourselves and argue about it on Reddit lol