21 Best Nightlife in Rhode Island, USA

On its own private beach, Ballard's has oceanfront tiki bars, VIP cabana rentals, and a barnlike restaurant with a dance floor and live music. It tends to be livelier by day, although you can also arrange for a private beach bonfire at night.

This place sets itself apart from the others by hosting June's Block Island Music Festival, a free roundup of soon-to-be-discovered bands from around the country. It has live music inside and out, a dog-friendly area, frozen cocktails, and a suntanned crowd. Disco Monday has been an island tradition for more than two decades.

Renowned blues and jazz performers are on the menu, along with folk, cabaret, and comedy acts. It's your turn to take the mike on Fridays for karaoke from 9 p.m. to midnight. Chan's also serves an extensive line-up of Chinese cuisine. Purchase show tickets and make dining reservations online in advance.

Club Soda is a lively hangout with a 12x8-foot outdoor TV. Shoot pool or tuck into some tasty pub grub. Live music, trivia, karaoke, musical Bingo, and outdoor movies keep the weeknight scene lively.

In a dimly lit space born as a bakery in the 1920s and converted to a social club at the tail end of World War II, this speakeasy is also a pizza joint and ice creamery. Pair your favorite boozy concoction with the POW (Pizza of the Week) and small-batch sorbet and ice-cream flavors like mint chocolate chip made with real mint. DJs spin music most nights, and the classic speakeasy vibe is a perfect match for live jazz on Sunday nights.

Named for the Fastnet Lighthouse off the coast of Cork, Ireland, this pub hosts Irish jam sessions on Sunday evening, when guest musicians, singers, and dancers familiar with traditional Irish repertoire are invited to participate. Soccer matches bring out raucous crowds that fill the interior as well as the courtyard out back. Irish beers and ciders are on draft, and the food menu includes bangers and beans along with the usual fish and chips and burgers.

Marina and skyline views, a waterfront deck, live tunes, beer buckets, frozen concoctions, and the city's best clam cakes and chowder make this indoor-outdoor bar and grill on the Fox Point waterfront an ideal place to unwind or catch a game. The name is a nod to a time when the docks below were the domain of fishermen, not pleasure boaters. 

You may recognize the Hot Club from the opening scenes of the movie Something About Mary. For more than 30 years, this place has been a favorite hangout for young professionals, university professors, and politicians. On summer afternoons until the wee hours of the morning, you'll find the hip set on the outdoor deck overlooking the Providence River. For cheap eats, try local favorites like the Saugy dog (hot dog) or a "stuffie" -- a stuffed quahog clam that's a Rhode Island seafood staple.

A tiny shack built over the water at Payne's Dock, Mahogany Shoals has a laid-back vibe and live music every night. The place has expanded, gracefully, with an outdoor bar and an upper-level deck. It remains the best spot on the island to enjoy a quiet drink, peer at beautiful yachts, and catch a breeze on even the hottest of nights.

Housed in a former bank building built in 1892, this café hosts live music, including touring blues acts and tribute bands, plus improv comedy nights. Wallflowers can watch the bands from the second floor, but the real action is on the dance floor in front of the stage.

The Ocean Mist has a beachfront deck where you can watch surfers on the point and catch some rays while enjoying a beer, a burger, or breakfast. Bands, including rock, throwback pop, and reggae acts, perform nightly in summer and on Thursdays and weekends the rest of the year. The music is free on Sunday Funday, but get there early, it's popular. Considered one of Rhode Island's best hangouts, "the Mist," as it's called by locals, is that cool beach bar that every coastal area has—or wishes it had.

An all-ages crowd heads here for eats, drinks, and live music seven days a week, including dueling pianos on Friday and Saturday nights at the Top of Pelham bar upstairs.

The Eddy specializes in classic cocktails like a Manhattan, gin and tonic (on draft), or Gibson; creative concoctions like the rum-based "Kingston negroni-doli" or the rye-Calvados-montenegro "High Horse"; draft and bottled beers; and a few interesting wines. Add charcuterie, cheese, sliders, seafood, and good bread, and you have a great night out.

This chic bar and restaurant, a popular locals hangout, offers specialty cocktails and elevated pub fare amid a smattering of Asian and Mexican-inspired apps and entrees. Next door, the Outer Element is a cute little beer garden where you can toss back a 'Gansett (what locals call Narragansett beer) and ditch Newport's preppy side.

The band Roomful of Blues was born at "The Knick," and national touring artists still gig at this club near the Westerly train station. The venue hosts R&B, jazz, and alt-country touring acts on its main stage and intimate Tap Room; local bands also perform, and there are occasional open-mike nights and dance lessons, too.

This 100-year-old, five-story theater (operated as Lupo's Heartbreak Hotel until the venue resumed its original name in late 2017), hosts nationally known musical acts: rock, blues, hip-hop, Americana, country, Latin, metal, funk—plus live comedy.

East Side gentrification has not touched this (kind of) riverfront bar on South Main Street. Studiedly unpretentious, the Wild Colonial occupies the brick-lined basement of an old warehouse building; strain your eyes, and you might get a glimpse of the Providence River across the parking lot. Food choices are limited to the likes of cheese plates and hummus, but the bartenders take pride in the beer list and in pouring the best Guinness drafts in the city. If you're looking for a place to duck in for a reasonably priced beer or cocktail on Waterfire nights (or any night, really), this is it.

This venerable beach bar hosts live entertainment six nights a week, late June–mid-September. Renovations following Superstorm Sandy included the addition of a function room that hosts weddings and other events. Children are welcome until 10 pm; after that patrons must be 21 or older.

Patrons here amuse themselves with darts, pinball, table tennis, and pool, to the sound of live bands or DJs on many summer nights. By day, order drinks and a big plate of nachos on Los Gatitos Deck overlooking the dunes at the southern end of Crescent Beach.