Dance clubs, live music, rooftop bars, speakeasies, LGBTQ+ venues, listening bars and late-night dives in New Orleans.
Dance clubs, live music, rooftop bars, speakeasies, LGBTQ+ nightlife, listening bars and late-night dives across New Orleans, with where to go and what is worth the late night.
Republic NOLA in the Warehouse District is a converted brick warehouse with wooden beams, two stocked bars and a 5,000 square foot main room that runs touring electronic and hip-hop bookings.
Tip: Most weekends sell tickets via the venue calendar; the stage doubles as a concert room earlier in the evening before the DJ takes over.
The Metropolitan in the Warehouse District is the two-story EDM and top-40 club with eleven bar stations, sixteen VIP sections and a Saturday-only schedule running until 04:00.
Tip: Saturdays only. Cover runs $20 to $30, cocktails $10 to $15. Reserve a VIP section in advance if you want a guaranteed table on a busy holiday weekend.
The Rabbit Hole on Oretha Castle Haley runs DJ sets and live shows under custom murals and a Void Acoustics rig, with weekend parties built around resident hip-hop and house selectors.
Tip: Tickets via the venue calendar; the main room runs late on Friday and Saturday with rotating themed nights and a cover charge at the door.
Preservation Hall on St Peter Street has run traditional New Orleans jazz nightly since 1961, with the Preservation Hall Jazz Band leading short, no-frills sets in a candlelit room.
Tip: Three sets a night, around 17:00, 20:00 and 21:00. Tickets via the box office sell out; the $50 reserved seats save you from standing-room.
Snug Harbor on Frenchmen is the sit-down jazz room of the Marigny, with two sets a night in a renovated 1800s storefront and Ellis Marsalis Trio holding a long Friday residency.
Tip: Two nightly sets at 19:30 and 21:30. Book a music room ticket online; the bistro side seats walk-ins for Creole dinner before the show.
The Spotted Cat on Frenchmen Street is the standing-room jazz, blues and gypsy-swing room that runs three sets a day, no cover at the door and a single-bill stage at the front window.
Tip: No cover but a one-drink minimum per set. The afternoon set around 14:00 is the easier walk-in; the 22:00 set fills the room standing.
d.b.a. on Frenchmen Street pairs a 60-tap craft beer and bourbon programme with a back-room stage that runs the Treme Brass Band, Walter Wolfman Washington and weekly brass residencies.
Tip: Cover usually $10 to $20 paid at the door for the back room. Saturdays open at 14:00; the Glen David Andrews and Treme Brass Band sets are the headliners.
Tipitina's at Napoleon and Tchoupitoulas has anchored Uptown live music since 1977, named for the Professor Longhair song and now musician-owned by Galactic. The Free Friday series runs all year.
Tip: Free Friday concerts every week with local headliners. Buy ticketed shows in advance via the venue site; show floor is general admission.
Maple Leaf Bar on Oak Street has hosted the Rebirth Brass Band's Tuesday-night residency for over thirty years, a packed back room that ends with a second-line through the bar.
Tip: Get in line by 22:00 for the Rebirth Tuesday; cash at the door. The pressed-tin ceiling and pat o'briens dim glow keep the heat in.
Chickie Wah Wah on Canal Street is the intimate Mid-City music bar that books Jon Cleary, Meschiya Lake and Tom McDermott as locals, with Blue Oak BBQ serving smoked plates from the kitchen.
Tip: Shows nightly from 17:00. Reserve a table via the venue site for the early set if you want dinner alongside; the late set is general admission.
The Howlin' Wolf on South Peters runs the Warehouse District concert hall plus The Den, a smaller back room. Capacity over 600 with a pro-grade sound system and full lighting rig.
Tip: Buy main-hall tickets in advance; The Den is the walk-in option for local funk and Sunday brass nights with no cover.
BMC at the corner of Decatur and Esplanade is the upstairs balcony jazz room that runs live music every night, half a block from the Frenchmen Street strip but technically still inside the Quarter.
Tip: Two sets most nights, no cover. Climb to the wraparound balcony for the breeze and the second-line view down Esplanade.
The AllWays Lounge on St Claude books burlesque, drag, comedy, theatre and queer cabaret in a Marigny shotgun room that holds about 80 and runs free Sunday swing-dance lessons.
Tip: Cover usually $10 to $15 at the door; Sunday 20:00 swing-dance lessons are free with no cover. Calendar updates weekly on the venue site.
Hot Tin atop the Pontchartrain Hotel is the 14th-floor 1940s-artist-themed cocktail room with a 270-degree view of Downtown and the Mississippi, sky-blue ceilings and a small terrace.
Tip: 21+ only, no reservations. Sunday to Thursday closes at midnight; Friday and Saturday push to 02:00. Cocktails around $18.
Above the Grid atop the NOPSI Hotel pairs an open-air pool deck with cocktail service, weekend live music and a clear sightline of the CBD skyline from a heated wraparound terrace.
Tip: Day pool access via ResortPass; bar service runs into the evening with DJs on weekends. The pool closes earlier than the bar.
The Pool Club on the 13th floor of Virgin Hotels New Orleans pairs a wraparound pool deck with cabana seating, resident DJs and a skyline view across the CBD into the Quarter.
Tip: Bar open later than the pool on Thursday to Saturday. Day pool access for non-guests via the hotel's day-pass option.
French 75 at Arnaud's has poured the city's defining gin-and-champagne cocktail since 1918, a wood-panelled side room behind the dining hall with a small bar and antique military prints.
Tip: Walk in for the bar; reservations for the dining room only. Order the French 75 with a side of soufflé potatoes.
Jewel of the South, by Chris Hannah and partner John Stubbs, runs the renovated 1830s Creole cottage as a World's 50 Best cocktail room with a stocked back garden and a small dining menu.
Tip: Reserve via Resy; the garden tables sit two and four. The Brandy Crusta is the order, served at the front bar.
Cure on Freret Street, opened by Neal Bodenheimer in 2009, took the James Beard Outstanding Bar award in 2018. The room sits inside a restored 1905 firehouse with a copper-clad back bar.
Tip: Walk in for the bar, Resy for a back-room seat. The seasonal menu changes quarterly; the bartenders will riff if you give them a flavour to chase.
Cane & Table on Decatur runs a rum-forward tropical cocktail menu inside a worn 1830s shopfront, with a courtyard out back and a small late-evening kitchen of Caribbean small plates.
Tip: Open 17:00 to 22:00 nightly. Sunday dinner is the easier walk-in; weekend nights book the back courtyard via Resy.
The Carousel Bar in the Hotel Monteleone opened in 1949 as the city's first rotating bar. The merry-go-round counter turns once every fifteen minutes around a single barback well.
Tip: Stools at the carousel itself rarely free up; arrive at 16:00 if you want one. The Vieux Carre cocktail was invented here in 1937.
Café Lafitte in Exile at Bourbon and Dumaine has run continuously since 1933, the bar that opened after Café Lafitte was evicted from 941 Bourbon, claimed as America's oldest gay bar.
Tip: Open 24 hours. The Sunday Napoleon House drag brunch carries on across the bar; Tea Dance Sunday afternoons are the institutional draw.
Bourbon Pub & Parade at Bourbon and St Ann is the corner gay bar with the open-balcony downstairs pub and the upstairs Parade dance floor, drag and DJ shows running through Southern Decadence.
Tip: Downstairs open 12:00 onwards; the Parade dance floor opens at 21:00 weekends. Cover for some weekend nights, none for the pub.
Oz on Bourbon Street, opened in 1993 across from Bourbon Pub, runs the big-floor gay dance club with dancers on the platforms, a drag cast and a long balcony over the street.
Tip: Open seven nights, 12:00 to 04:00 Thursday to Sunday. Drag shows nightly; weekend cover charged at the door.
The Phoenix on Elysian Fields opened in 1983 as the leather, bear and Levi command bar of the Marigny, with the upstairs Eagle running its own dress-coded fetish nights Wednesday to Sunday.
Tip: Open 24 hours, no cover. Upstairs Eagle closed Mondays. The Levi-Leather Lords of Leather host regular fetish nights.
Bacchanal Wine in Bywater runs an outdoor backyard with nightly live jazz, a wine and cheese deli inside the cottage and Mediterranean small plates plated from the kitchen upstairs.
Tip: Music seven days a week. Pick a bottle from the shop, take it to the back patio. Weekend brunch sets start around 12:00.
Three Muses on Frenchmen pairs a small-plates kitchen with a low-volume music room, where Linnzi Zaorski and the Sam Doores rotate through the corner stage from early evening.
Tip: Reserve a table via the venue site; the bar walks in. Music starts around 19:00 with no cover, the room enforces quiet listening.
Compère Lapin's bar, inside the Old No. 77 Hotel, is Nina Compton's Caribbean-French cocktail room, with an exposed brick warehouse wall, mosaic floor and a long zinc-topped bar.
Tip: Walk in for the bar, Resy for tables. Order the goat curry with sweet potato gnocchi; the dirty rice arancini are the house snack.
Lafitte's Blacksmith Shop at Bourbon and St Philip is the candlelit 1772 cottage commonly cited as the oldest standing structure used as a bar in the United States, with no electric lighting.
Tip: Open until 03:00 most nights. Order the purple Voodoo Daiquiri; cash and card both work but the line in the back is faster.
Erin Rose on Conti, half a block off Bourbon, is the locals' Irish pub with frozen Irish coffees out front and Killer PoBoys serving sandwiches from the back kitchen until late.
Tip: Open 21 hours a day. The frozen Irish coffee is the order; cash bar runs faster than card on Saturday nights.
Molly's at the Market on Decatur is the journalist and bartender pub at the river end of the Quarter, open 10:00 to 03:00 with a frozen Irish coffee built almost as well as Erin Rose's.
Tip: The bar runs until 03:00 every night. Order the frozen Irish coffee at the counter; the front window seats people-watch the Decatur foot traffic.
Saturn Bar on St Claude in Bywater is the cluttered velvet-painting dive with a tin ceiling, cheap beer and a back room that runs DJs, brass and the long-standing Mod Dance Party Saturdays.
Tip: Cash bar, no card minimum. Saturday's Mod Dance Party runs from 22:00; the front bar opens at 16:00 weekdays.
Pal's Lounge in Mid-City is the pin-up themed neighbourhood dive on Rendon, around since 2002 in a building that's been a bar since the 1920s, with a jukebox and an open back patio.
Tip: Open 15:00 to 03:00 every day. Play the jukebox; the back patio is dog friendly and runs popup pizza most weekends.
Twelve Mile Limit on Telemachus runs a Mid-City corner dive where the cocktails come out at proper craft level, the back room hosts trivia and karaoke, and the kitchen rotates pop-ups.
Tip: Trivia Tuesdays from 20:00; food pop-ups posted on Instagram. Cash and card; the Telemachus side patio is the quieter seat.
Kajun's Pub on St Claude runs karaoke open to close every day of the week, a state-of-the-art light and sound rig, and a back patio that bleeds into the Marigny dive-bar circuit.
Tip: Karaoke from open until close. Friday and Saturday run to 03:00; cash bar, no cover, 21+ after 20:00.
Vaughan's Lounge sits on a Bywater residential corner, a 60-year neighbourhood dive that ran Kermit Ruffins' Thursday residency for two decades and still books brass and funk Thursdays.
Tip: Side-door buzzer entry. Thursday brass sets start around 20:30 with a second set near 23:00; free red beans and rice on Thursday nights.
Peak food season in New Orleans is year-round.
Local dining hours: lunch around 12:30, dinner from 19:30.
service is typically included; small extra is welcome but not expected.
Ask the next local you meet what they would order. New Orleans rewards trust.