Sneaky Pete's
73 Cowgate, Edinburgh EH1 1JW, UK
Hours: Site describes it as open and busy every night; no single published closing time
nightlife · edinburgh
Edinburgh Nightlife: The Best Clubs & Late Bars (2026)
Ten verified Edinburgh nightclubs and late bars, from Sneaky Pete's to Coco, plus honest notes on the Cowgate, George Street, Lothian Road and Grassmarket. Lulu now trades as Coco, and La Belle Angele is open from a new domain after the old one lapsed.
10
places
Edinburgh
Scotland
── nightlife · edinburgh
Edinburgh nightlife the clubs and late bars that are actually still open
Our best cocktail bars, best whisky bars and best rooftop bars guides cover where to go for a proper drink. This one's different: it's for when you want to dance, queue, and stay out past last orders. Ten venues, each checked against its own current site or a live listing rather than copied from an older 'best clubs' round-up, plus honest notes on the four strips worth knowing before you pick a direction: the Cowgate, George Street, Lothian Road and Grassmarket.
One caveat worth stating up front, because nightlife venues close and rebrand more often than any other category on this site. La Belle Angele's old web address now lands on a domain-resale page, which makes the place look shut when it is trading normally from a new one. Lulu on George Street is now Coco, same basement, same address. Both are the kind of change a 'best clubs in Edinburgh' round-up carries uncorrected for years, so check a venue's own current site before you build a night around it. If you want the wider city beyond nightlife, our things to do in Edinburgh hub is the place to start.
A quick steer if you don't want to read the whole list: Cabaret Voltaire and The Bongo Club are the pick for electronic and techno, though the Bongo is shut from mid-July to early September. Sneaky Pete's and The Liquid Room sit closer to a gig with a DJ set attached. Why Not and Coco are the bigger rooms, LED screens and a proper student-night crowd. CC Blooms and Planet cover Edinburgh's LGBTQ+ scene. And Biddy Mulligans is the answer if the queues everywhere else have worn you down and you just want a pub still pouring at midnight.
Sneaky Pete's
If you only do one club night on the Cowgate, make it Sneaky Pete's. It's a genuinely tiny room with an outsized reputation: DJ Mag's global 100-clubs list has had it on there, and the booking changes most nights instead of settling into one static club-night brand. The trade-off is exactly what makes it good: it fills fast, there's no VIP end to retreat to, and the strongest nights sell out early. Check its listings before you commit an evening to it.
The Bongo Club
The Bongo Club has been Edinburgh's proper underground room for nearly three decades: techno, drum and bass, jungle and house on one of Scotland's better sound systems, with regular nights like Alien Disko, Chromatic and Pulse rotating through Fridays and Saturdays. One thing to plan around: the building goes to Underbelly for the Fringe's seven-week run every summer, so the Bongo is shut from around mid-July until early September, which is wider than the festival dates themselves. It came back for this season on 4 September 2026. If you're here for the Fringe, this is the one room on the list you can't use.
The Bongo Club
66 Cowgate, Edinburgh EH1 1JX, UK
Hours: Open; reopened 4 September 2026 after its annual summer break. Underbelly takes over the lease for the Fringe's seven-week run each year, so it shuts from roughly mid-July to early September — wider than the festival dates, so check the listings before planning a Bongo night from late July onwards.
Cabaret Voltaire
Cabaret Voltaire is really two venues stacked on top of each other on Blair Street: an easy-going upstairs bar running DJ sets and acoustic sessions, and a vaulted nightclub downstairs doing electronic, drum and bass and techno most weekends. It also runs as a live-music and comedy room through the week, so a quiet Tuesday gig and a Saturday techno night are very different evenings in the same building. Worth checking what's actually on before you head down.
Cabaret Voltaire
36-38 Blair St, Edinburgh EH1 1QR, UK
The Liquid Room
The Liquid Room on Victoria Street has been running since 1997 and had a major refurbishment this summer, so the sound and lighting are newer than most of the Old Town competition. It's mostly a gig venue, but the standalone club nights (freshers' parties, indie nights, electronic sets) are worth watching for if you want a bigger room than Sneaky Pete's without losing the intimacy. Ticket prices aren't published upfront; they're set per event.
The Liquid Room
9C Victoria St, Edinburgh EH1 2HE, UK
La Belle Angele
The original La Belle Angele opened in 1992 and spent a decade as the room where Edinburgh's underground music scene actually happened, hosting Oasis, Radiohead and The Libertines and club nights like Manga and Ultragroove. Then on the evening of 7 December 2002 a fire started in Hastie's Close and became the Cowgate fire, which took eight storeys of the Old Town with it, La Belle Angele included. It took twelve years to come back. The rebuilt venue opened on the same site in 2014, built from the ground up around the sound system, and it now runs as both a live venue and a club until 3am. The rebuild put the sound system first, and that is the reason to pick it over the places on either side of it.
La Belle Angele
11 Hastie's Cl, Edinburgh EH1 1HJ, UK
Hours: Daily 19:00-03:00
Why Not Nightclub
Why Not, in the basement of the old bank building at 14 George Street, is open Wednesday to Saturday, 22:30 to 03:00, and doesn't pretend to be anything other than a big night out: a main room, an outdoor beer garden, a vault, and what the venue calls Scotland's only full LED room. Wednesday is the cheap-drinks student night; Friday and Saturday get considerably busier and the door policy tightens up accordingly.
Why Not Nightclub
14 George St, Edinburgh EH2 2PF, UK
Hours: Wed-Sat 22:30-03:00
Coco
The basement at 125b George Street used to trade as Lulu. It's now Coco, and if you're working off an older list that still says Lulu, that's the tell it hasn't been rechecked recently. Coco won SLTN's Late-Night Venue of the Year in 2025, stays open till 3am, and charges no entry fee, running a bingo-with-lip-syncs night (Boozy Ball) and a music quiz (Beat the Tune) alongside the usual DJs.
Coco
125b George St, Edinburgh EH2 4JN, UK
Price: No entry fee Hours: Open until 3am
Biddy Mulligans
Grassmarket's pubs stay open later than the postcard photos of the square suggest, and Biddy Mulligans is the one that runs latest with any real energy: an Irish bar open 8am to 1am with live music most nights and the big rugby, GAA and football fixtures on screen. It's not a club, but if the Cowgate queues five minutes away have put you off, it's a solid last stop that doesn't shut at 11.
Biddy Mulligans
94-96 Grassmarket, Edinburgh EH1 2JR, UK
Hours: Open 8am-1am daily
CC Blooms
CC Blooms on Greenside Place has been Edinburgh's LGBTQ+ anchor since 1994: free entry to the upstairs bar and restaurant, open until 3am seven nights a week, with a basement nightclub running drag shows and DJ sets most weekends (a cover charge can apply on specific ticketed basement nights). It's the one on this list I'd send a friend to first for a night in what's usually called Edinburgh's Pink Triangle.
CC Blooms
23-24 Greenside Pl, Edinburgh EH1 3AA, UK
Price: Free entry upstairs; cover charge may apply for specific ticketed basement nights Hours: Open 7 nights a week until 3am
Planet
Planet, a few minutes from CC Blooms on Baxter's Place, bills itself as Edinburgh's longest-running gay bar: free entry, open until 3am on Friday and Saturday (1am the rest of the week), with karaoke and the weekly Showtime Fridays drag night. It's smaller and less club-like than CC Blooms, which is exactly the appeal if you want to actually talk as well as dance.
Planet
6 Baxter's Pl, Edinburgh EH1 3AF, UK
Price: Free entry Hours: Fri-Sat 13:00-03:00; Sun-Thu 15:00-01:00
── cowgate · old town
The Cowgate: Edinburgh's actual club strip
If Edinburgh has one street built for a night out rather than a nice drink, it's the Cowgate, the sunken road running under South Bridge between the Grassmarket and Holyrood. Sneaky Pete's and The Bongo Club sit almost opposite each other, with Cabaret Voltaire a couple of minutes round the corner on Blair Street. The area's had a rough patch: the fire that started in Hastie's Close on 7 December 2002 destroyed much of the street's east end, including La Belle Angele, and the strip was rebuilt over the following decade. La Belle Angele itself came back on the same site in 2014 and is on this list. Worth knowing if you go looking for it online: its old web domain has lapsed into a domain-resale page, so the venue reads as shut on a quick search when it isn't. Use la-belleangele.com.
It gets loud, it gets studenty, and it's one of the steepest, most closed-in streets in the Old Town after dark. Walk it, don't drive it, and expect queues outside the bigger rooms from around 23:00 on a Friday or Saturday.
── george street · new town
George Street: dressed-up, and later than it looks
George Street reads as pure New Town respectability by day: Georgian townhouses, high-end shops, restaurants that take a booking. But a couple of basements underneath it run until 3am. Why Not, in the old bank building at number 14, and Coco (the venue that used to be Lulu) at 125b are both a five-minute walk from St Andrew Square, which makes either an easy add-on after dinner rather than a destination you'd cross town for on its own.
Expect a smarter door policy than the Cowgate. This isn't a trainers-and-a-hoodie street after 22:00 on a Friday.
── lothian road · west end
Lothian Road: quieter for clubbing than it used to be
Lothian Road, running from the West End past the Usher Hall (see our best live music guide for what's actually on there) down to Tollcross, reads today as theatre-and-casino territory more than a clubbing strip. It's where I'd send you for a big gig or a late show, not for the venues on this list. There's no dedicated nightclub on the road itself worth recommending, so if that's specifically what you're after, the Cowgate and George Street are the better bet.
── grassmarket · old town
Grassmarket: the pubs that don't shut at 11
The Grassmarket, at the foot of Victoria Street below the Castle, is mostly a pub crawl rather than a club strip, but a few of them run properly late, Biddy Mulligans among them, open 8am to 1am with live music most nights. It's a solid last stop if the Cowgate queues five minutes away have put you off. For the square's daytime pubs, shops and history, our Old Town guide covers it properly; this guide only tracks the late end of it.
── broughton street · the pink triangle
The Pink Triangle: Edinburgh's LGBTQ+ nightlife
Around Broughton Street and Calton, Edinburgh's LGBTQ+ nightlife has its own small, well-established strip usually called the Pink Triangle. CC Blooms has been the anchor since 1994: free entry, open till 3am every night, drag downstairs most weekends. Planet, a few minutes away on Baxter's Place, is quieter and bills itself as the city's longest-running gay bar. Neither charges to get in, which is more than you can say for most of George Street.
── safety · getting home
Getting home safely from a night out
Edinburgh's late-night streets are busy rather than isolated. Cowgate, George Street and Grassmarket are all well-trafficked until well past 2am on a weekend, which cuts both ways: safer in numbers, but also the point in the night when the drunkest crowds are out. The usual advice applies: stick with whoever you came with, keep your phone charged, and agree a meeting point before the night gets loud enough that texting is pointless.
For getting home, Lothian Buses runs a NightBus network across the city from midnight to 4:30am, covering most routes out to the suburbs from the centre. Taxis and ride-hailing apps both work fine in Edinburgh late at night; the ranks outside Waverley Station and along Lothian Road tend to be more reliable than trying to hail one on the Cowgate itself on a Friday or Saturday.
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── frequently asked
Frequently asked questions.
What time do nightclubs in Edinburgh close?
Most of the ones on this list run to around 3am. Coco and CC Blooms both confirm a 3am close on their own sites, and Why Not is open 22:30-03:00 Wednesday to Saturday. The Bongo Club's regular nights also run into the small hours, outside the mid-July to early-September window when the building goes to Underbelly for the Fringe.
What happened to Lulu nightclub on George Street?
It's rebranded as Coco. The old luluedinburgh.co.uk domain now redirects through to cocoedinburgh.co.uk, and Coco (same address, 125b George Street) won SLTN's Late-Night Venue of the Year in 2025. If a list still calls it Lulu, that's a sign it hasn't been rechecked recently.
Is The Bongo Club open during the Edinburgh Fringe?
Not during the Fringe. The building is leased to Underbelly for the festival's seven-week run each summer, so the Cowgate club shuts from about mid-July until early September — a wider window than the festival dates themselves, which catches people out in late July and the first days of the month. It came back for this season on 4 September 2026, and outside that stretch it runs its usual rotation of club nights.
Which Edinburgh nightclubs have free entry?
Coco (125b George Street) confirms no entry fee, and both Pink Triangle venues, CC Blooms and Planet, offer free entry to their main bars. CC Blooms' basement nightclub can carry a cover charge on specific ticketed nights.
How do you get home safely after a night out in Edinburgh?
Lothian Buses runs a NightBus network across the city from midnight to 4:30am, covering most routes out to the suburbs. Taxi ranks outside Waverley Station and along Lothian Road are more reliable than trying to hail one on the Cowgate itself at 2am.
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