The Best Places to Drink in Ann Arbor
This college town is more than just tailgates and beer pong.
As far as places to drink go, half of Ann Arbor’s surface area is occupied by the sticky floors and littered lawns of frat houses. When you age out of Jell-O shots and Angry Orchard keg stands, ditch South University and explore Ann Arbor's world of home brewed stouts, non-boxed wine, and all the Department Of Labor-approved bars. Beyond campus borders is a drinking culture dominated by locals who take pride in double-fisting a negroni and a pool cue and letting both the Lions and a pitcher of IPA raise their blood pressure. But one thing unites us all: everyone likes to close out Rick’s and devour Joe’s on the back of a boober.
Bill’s Beer Garden
You know it’s finally spring when Bill’s opens their pearly gates. After storing Christmas trees for the nursery next door in the winter, the lot transforms back into Ann Arbor’s best neighborhood block party with rotating Michigan-based drafts, a sea of Canadian tuxedos, and dogs begging for scraps of assorted takeout under the table. If you aren’t one of the fortunate few who make it in during happy hour, you’ll be stuck waiting in line until the next turn at dusk. But that’s the fun of Bill’s: losing track of time and making friends with unlikely bunches.
Biercamp
Biercamp specializes in the two most important food groups of any college town: beer and brats. The shop had humble beginnings—it began as a cold cuts counter selling German sausages out of the downstairs unit of a house on S State St—but has since consumed the neighboring buildings and expanded their menu. Now, a perfect fall day in Ann Arbor can be spent devouring sandwiches, beer and cider, hot dogs, and milkshakes in a refined wood adirondack chair. If you have to prioritize one thing, let it be the Lamb Swiss Bastard: a sausage stuffed with melted swiss cheese on a toasted brioche hot dog bun.
The Grotto
Grotto’s big sell is their bungalow-like patio sprawled onto the corner of Ashley and Liberty, a tiny intersection with three of the busiest businesses in Ann Arbor. Head here to kick back with a Michigan IPA and watch Sunday night football among the flannels and foliage. Grotto’s patio is a good hang even in the winter, when it turns into a sauna thanks to outdoor lamps and the body heat from herds of sardined tailgaters. And even when there’s no sports game for distraction, Grotto is still open well into the night for a post-dinner or pre-cocktail pint.
Homes Campus Beer Garden
Though Homes is the brewery’s brand name, the “campus” alludes to a yard of shipping containers occupied by a main bar with their own draft beers, food trucks, Dozer Coffee, Campo Pizza, and an event room. A space made for groups with conflicting objectives, you can all split off to locate your respective vices and then congregate in the garden to enjoy the live music and warm weather. Homes has a larger restaurant and “brewpub” up the street, but the collective energy of the campus is hard to beat.
Mothfire Brewing Company
Started by an advantageous townie with too many hobbies, Mothfire is a local, independent brewery that’s infiltrated drink menus all across the state. Competing with Homes for best fruit-forward beers, they’re known for the LoLo Hazy IPA with notes of strawberry and mango. And because the tap-room is plopped in the middle of suburbia—with a breathtaking patio view of the local Costco—it has a calmer atmosphere where you’ll commonly see people doing work or stopping by on a lunch break. Carrozza’s pizza truck is always camped outside, but we’ve also seen lobster rolls, Thai, and BBQ.
8 Ball Saloon
8 Ball is an old-school, raunchy billiards bar that can only be accessed through the basement of The Blind Pig or an inconspicuous side door in the alley next to the building. Try not to get hit by a flying dart on the way in as you head to the back where the pool and pinball lives. Generously speaking, the bar is a little cramped. But the devoted gangs of competitive billiard players, beanie-wearing world-existentialists, and pit-stopped truckers make the space feel like your dad’s garage; charming chaos with a lot of promise and a high-chance of hearing some Journey rip through the speakers.
The Blind Pig
The Blind Pig remains staunchly committed to head-banging to dad rock, performatively nodding along to a passage of slam poetry, and laughing at wanna-be stand-up comedians. Even with a busy event calendar, the bar is still a great place to grab a casual drink before or after a game of pool at 8-Ball downstairs. Make sure to check The Blind Pig’s schedule before you make plans for your next date or out-of-towner visit, especially if that person might not be so into Moth Story Contests.
The Circ Bar
Circ is the top-floor installment of a renovated grain mill that has three bars underneath: The Rabbit Hole, King and White, and Tikki Bar. The climb up the metal fire escape to the front door might make you a little skeptical about what’s inside, but you’ll come to see it’s actually just your average dive bar with greasy bar snacks, Tequila Tuesdays, and Queen blasting on the speakers. During the week they have different events to entertain the few regulars who play pool there, but the weekends are what draw in the dancers and karaoke fiends. There’s also a back patio that’s Ann Arbor’s best kept secret in the summer: the atmosphere of Bill’s without the foot traffic of Liberty St.
Casa Dominick’s
Long before "shabby chic" made mason jars charming, Dom’s was serving sangria by the quart at their seasonal campus shack. Proximity to the law quad and Ross business school makes it a frequent haunt for professors and students alike—but never at the same time. A grungier equivalent to Bill’s, Dom’s has flickering string lights, sangria-stained wood, and rowdy cardgames. Patio tables are their main seating, so get ready to camp out at 5 PM or pass along your spot to the next of the ten birthday parties coming in that night.
Nightcap
This swanky cocktail speakeasy has a bar rail that stretches the length of the room, commonly filled with paired-off couples playing footsie under the stools. Made for date nights, Nightcap’s only seating is two-person booths or bar seats, so pick your poison. They nail the classics—martinis, negronis, and manhattans—but you owe it to yourself to experiment with one of their specialty drinks. The Blueberry Gimlet will have you rethinking if you should’ve combined cinnamon and blueberries a long time ago.
Babs’ Underground
When the restaurant bar hits last-call and you want to continue the night without elbowing through crowds of students on South U, go to Babs. The queue for pool starts upstairs, while the downstairs booths are reserved for silencing your phones and sipping cosmopolitans. The crowd used to be a mix of 30-somethings and industry workers, but after students got word of a magical place with no lines and good drinks, they set out to colonize uncharted territory. Now, the bar’s time is split by students Thursday-Saturday, industry workers for discounted drinks on Sunday, and locals during the week.
MASH Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor’s true watering hole, Mash can be a mix of everyone from college students pregaming Rick’s, twenty-somethings on a casual first date, or groups of those thirty and up pretending they don’t have a 9pm bedtime. It’s considered a cocktail bar, but we recommend going for the well drinks and live music—unless you like Sprite and Ice in your French 75. The dimly lit booths and cavernous arches make for a hip first date spot if you’re okay with shouting over the band playing a questionable cover of “I’ll be Watching You” by The Police.
The Hidden King Cafe & Bar
Only open 5-11 Thursday through Saturday, Hidden King is a bar filled with townies on a first name basis with the bartenders and their parents. Students haven’t infiltrated Hidden King, and they won’t unless they want to feel the wrath of the essential oil moms and cyclist dads of Ann Arbor. The lounge is half-coffee shop half-cocktail bar, so even though they have a large selection of liquors and beers, the coffee-based drinks like the Irish coffee and espresso martini are the winners. It’s nothing fancy—canned beers, tattered chess boards, and battery operated candles—but it’s the epitome of Ann Arbor: unassuming, cozy, and local.
The Rabbit Hole
If you’re unsure of what your vibe is for the night, wander over to 1st St and let The Rabbit Hole figure it out for you. Perfectly versatile, you can crush well drinks and get disgustingly hot on the dance floor, or sip an unnecessarily complex cocktail and gossip in one of the leather booths. What sets it apart from other “alternative” cocktail bars—drinks with ironic names, lights so low you can’t see your date, and bartenders who look like they hate mainstream music and wear sunglasses inside—is the setting: a renovated grain mill with brick lined walls. Play it safe with a G&T, or experiment with the Omakase, a dealer’s choice cocktail where the bartender takes the liberty of choosing your drink.
The Last Word
Even in a small midwestern town, you can still find speakeasies with ambiguous entrances, deceptively large spaces, and hostesses with an enviable wardrobe. Last Word is first and foremost a bar, but they also have a hearty, American-based food menu as well, giving it a varied demographic of diners, drinkers, singles, groups, and people ages 21-50. It’s a safe choice for first dates—you can grab drinks and stay for dinner depending on how well it’s going. And even though it’s always packed, no one rushes you out. It’s easy to spend hours nursing a single cocktail and burning the midnight oil with your friends, significant others, and out of towners.
Scorekeepers Sports Grill and Pub
Even when you're old enough to get into Rick's, no one ever ages out of the Dirty Shirley pitchers and green tea shots at Skeeps. When the frats aren’t throwing, Skeeps is always the next best option for dancing to Ke$ha, Britney, and Taylor, though that means shoulder to shoulder traffic in and around the bar. When your shoes are sufficiently scuffed and your vodka-cran pitcher has run dry, head across the street for a slice at NYPD.
Rick’s American Cafe
Thursday and Saturday Rick’s nights are a sacred weekly ritual for Umich seniors. The quintessential college bar, Rick’s is the Skeeps for upperclassmen: facey, good music, and $3 shots. Doors open at 7pm, but busy nights mean lines could start as soon as 5. To get ahead of the queue, Rick’s regulars start on the patio of Gar-Bar across the street where they can keep tabs on the line in real time
Good Time Charley’s
Inverse to its South University counterparts, Charley's peak time is before or during football games. Every seat has a vantage point of at least two TVs, making it the best spot for camping out gamedays. It’s impossible to recommend just one of the 27 alarmingly colored fishbowl cocktails, and you should order a basket of cheesecurds to balance out whatever miscellaneous alcohol is in them. If greasy bar food isn’t your calling, Charley’s has a walk-up burrito stand called BTB Burrito next door.
Garage Bar
Gar-Bar is the newest child in the family of college bars on South University. The bar is open until 2am, but is exclusively active from 5-8 p.m while people wait for the Rick’s line to grow. However, similar to its neighbor Charley’s, away gamedays mean hoards of tailgaters camping out at the bar for hours on end. Make a day out of it by grabbing a bar stool during the game, then heading upstairs for a slice of Ann Arbor’s famous Pizza House deep dish.
