This may be controversial to some and we’re sure not everyone will agree with how we’ve categorised or termed some of the bars on our map but it’s only a map, they’ll get over it!
That being said, we thought it would still be helpful to give a brief description of how we’ve categorised the bars on our map.
Some of the category names we’ve used are pretty obvious and others may seem not entirely accurate but with the number of bars in Pattaya and the plethora of differences between them, this is our take on how to best group them.
Beer Bar
Beer Bars are your quintessential Pattaya bar! Mostly open air, fan cooled, open early in the day. Often with a pool table and girls serving cold beers.
In most of these bars the girls will sit and drink with you if you buy them a lady drink.
Mainly – Soi Buakhao, Tree Town, Soi Made in Thailand.
Beer Bar Complex
The Beer Bar Complex is mostly a collection of smaller Beer Bars or Box Bars under the same roof. The bars in the complexes are pretty packed together and sort of difficult to squeeze onto the map.
Cannabis Cafe / Bar
A pretty self-explanatory post-COVID edition to Pattaya, Cannabis Cafe and Bars are popping up all over the city now. How long they will last, we don’t know! But we’ll add them to the map either way.
All over Pattaya
Gentleman Club
Gentlemans Clubs are usually air-conditioned, behind-closed-doors establishments, where patrons can relax in a more comfortable environment. These clubs usually open earlier in the afternoon and close earlier in the evening compared to other late-night bars.
Prices are normally higher than the beer bars with some of these clubs including rooms upstairs for non-drinking activities.
Mostly – Soi Chaiyapoon (Soi Pothole), Soi Boomerang
Girly Bar
A Girly Bar is a sort of hybrid between a Beer Bar and a Gentlemans Club.
They’re normally open-air, fan-cooled bars with girls waiting to sit and drink with you. However, the number of girls is usually pretty high for the size of the bar and the energy level is much greater with loud music and the girls having fun among themselves. These bars often have rooms upstairs similar to the Gentalmans Club for similar non-drinking activities.
Mostly – Soi 6
Gogo Bar
You can’t think of bars in Thailand without thinking of Gogo Bars, and Pattaya has one of the highest concentrations of Gogo Bars in the whole country.
Easily the most expensive bars to drink in, typically with a stage, some poles and a good number of girls in various states of undress dancing to a mix of western hip hop or Thai club tunes.
Mostly – Walking Street, LK Metro
Indian Clubs
Post-COVID tourists from India have accounted for the 3rd biggest group of holidaymakers visiting Pattaya, with the TAT projecting that some 600,000 Indian tourists will visit Pattaya in 2023.
It’s unsurprising then that Pattaya now has some of the largest and flashiest clubs dedicated to Indian partygoers.
Mostly – Walking Street
Music Bar
Another self-explanatory category. The music bars in Pattaya are not quite the same as you’d find in Bangkok as most music bars tend to have bands playing covers of Western classics or Thai/ Essan hits. So if you’re looking for original music it’s not impossible to find but hard, but if original music is your thing some bars have weekly jam nights where patrons are welcome to get up on stage and take part.
Night Club
Night Clubs are more Western-style late-night establishments with DJs and a dance floor. They will still have the Thai-style table service with club staff taking orders and bringing your drinks to your table but the music will be of a more western persuasion. There are also many Thai Night Clubs in Pattaya but we’ve categorised them separately as the experience between the two types can be very different.
Mostly – Walking Street, Soi Buahkao
Pub
Not to be confused with the Thai Style Pub. We consider a Pub to be a bar that is focused on serving food, not to the extent that it would be considered a restaurant as there is still a large focus on selling drinks in a Pub and we don’t list restaurants (Yet) on the map.
Pubs will quite often have live sports on the TV and in this regard, there is some cross-over between a Pub and a Sports Bar, although with Pub it’s pretty unlikely that the staff are available to Bar fine.
Sports Bar
Again pretty self-explanatory however not all sports bars are created equal! For this map, we class a sports bar as a sport-orientated bar that shows live sports WITH commentary. For sport-themed bars that have sports on the TV but music playing at the same time, we’ve put them into the Themed Bar group.
Themed Bar
Themed bars are a miscellaneous collection of bars that don’t really fit easily into another category and don’t have enough similar establishments to warrant having their own category.
Hooters is a good example of a Themed Bar as the chain is known for its American food, relaxed drinking atmosphere, and eclectic music with sports shown on multiple TVs. It also has a policy of no staff leaving with customers, all of which pretty much limits Hotters from being listed in any of our other categories.
These categories are likely to change over time as we continue to add new locations to the map.
If you own or run a bar in Pattaya and you feel we’ve incorrectly categorised your establishment or if we’ve missed you off our map, please drop us an email with the relevant information so we can make the necessary changes.