Honolulu Nightlife

The best rendezvous for a bucketload of heady Hawaiian ambiance is found near Kahanamoku Lagoon. This award winning, open air bar plays live music and have a great variety of tropical cocktails for you to enjoy. The Mai Tai Bar offers a late night happy hour everyday so be sure to stick around for the entire night.

This stylish, low-lit lounge bar inside the Waterfront Plaza may look like a chintzy drinking hole, but it’s actually one of Honolulu’s hippest nighttime venues. Stuffed with next generation karaoke machines and dozens of games consoles for the latest video games, this bar is frequented by gamers and singers of all ages. While they may come for the machinery, they stick around until 2am for the excellent handmade cocktails. Over 21s only.

Found along a row of Waikiki’s most popular bars, this hip gay club keeps it popping every weekend. While the cover fee is a little steep, the pumping music, excellent sound system, and cool laser lighting keep the dance floor packed. Keep an eye on the club’s scheduled events: its known for its risqué and wildly entertaining drag shows.

One of Waikiki beaches most popular grills, Tiki's Grill & Bar is as much loved for its retro island décor—fishing nets, lava rock walls, carved wooden tikis (human faces) and a 'volcano' that erupts when light shines through it at night—as it is for its tasty American and Pacific Rim fare. This chilled out bar has an extensive drinks list, including loads of cocktails. Try the Ocean Potion, drunk straight out of a coconut!

The popularity of karaoke bars in Honolulu can’t be understated, and Wang Chung’s is one of the best. Dark, cosy, and populated with locals and travelers alike, this gay friendly bar offers delicious Chinese food, funky Asian décor, and—what you never knew you needed—misfortune cookies. Find it all on the lobby level of the Stay Hotel.

From jazz to electronic dance music, hip hop to heavy metal, this club in the heart of Chinatown pulls in large dance crowds. Its celendar is packed with visiting bands and DJs.

A popular venue for jazz music, at Jazz Minds Art & Café prominent local artists come and jam six nights a week. There’s plenty of room for R & B, surf rock, and funk too. While the décor is questionable (exposed brickwork and a rug-covered, Cuban heel of a stage doesn’t get any interior designers taking notes), the friendly atmosphere, swinging musicians, and cool range of cocktails certainly keep the venue packed.

At the heart of hip and happening Chinatown, this erstwhile tattoo parlour is now a chilled venue for live jazz and blues. You’ll find this cosy, slightly grungy venue with its cramped dance floor hidden on the second floor above Hank’s Café Honolulu. While you'll need to pay a cover charge to enter, it's always worth the small fee to hear the Dragon's excellent selection of live acts. Seating is limited, so arrive early unless you want to stand all night.

Known as ‘The Pride of the Pacific,’ when the Hawaii Theatre opened its doors in 1922 it was the most elegant theatre and cinema in Honolulu, staging spectacular plays, variety shows, musicals, and silent films. Over the years, it fell into disrepair, but a spirited community effort saved it from the wrecking ball in 1986. Listed on both State and National Registers of Historic Places, the theatre today is a state-of-the-art, multi-purpose performance centre.

This is Honolulu's primary special-event venue, within which can be found a multi-purpose arena, exhibition hall, galleria, and concert hall that accommodates a stunning range of events. The venue’s most notable construction is the Waikiki Shell, a beautiful outdoor amphitheatre that hosts shows and dance presentations. Go in the evening, when the moon and stars shining overhead add an incomparable and dramatic mood to the scene. The Shell seats 2,400 people, with room for an additional 6,000 on the lawn.