The best live music venues in Austin.

The Continental Club

The room the rest of the city measures itself against. The Continental Club first opened in 1955 as what its own history calls a swanky private supper club, and in the decades since it has become the South Congress home of roots, rockabilly, country, swing, rock, and blues, with music every night of the week under the neon sign that has become a landmark, and vintage cars and hot rods often parked out front. The Austin original is the one on this page; the club opened a Houston sibling in 2000. The same operators later built C-Boy’s a few blocks south, which tells you the model travels.

Music nightly; tickets and calendar on the site. 1315 South Congress Avenue, with the Continental Gallery next door at 1313.

Antone’s Nightclub

Austin’s Home of the Blues since 1975, in its own words, and the room whose history the site tells through the names that played it, from Muddy Waters, B.B. King, and Jimmy Reed to the Fabulous Thunderbirds and Stevie Ray Vaughan, whose Triple Threat Revue used the club as a clubhouse when it was just beginning. The current calendar is the proof that it is not a museum: a September 2026 week runs from touring indie and soul acts through a sold-out Sunday show and a two-seating Jazz Room tribute night to the standing Blue Monday blues bill that recurs every Monday on the listing. Each show prints doors, start time, and an age policy, the venue publishes private-event booking, and the fiftieth-anniversary program has its own section of the site.

Full calendar with tickets on the site; each show lists doors, start time, and age policy. Downtown, back on Fifth Street east of Congress Avenue.

Broken Spoke

The dance hall, established 1964 and described by founder James M. White as the last of the true Texas dancehalls, a line the site prints as his. It is a working honky-tonk rather than a preserved one: Alvin Crow, a Texas Country Music Hall of Famer, plays dates through the fall, dance lessons run for the two-step curious, and the building carries a Texas historical marker. The site’s own thank-you note records that a City of Austin heritage grant funded a new electrical system, roof, paint, and patio roof across 2024 and 2025, which is how a 1964 dance hall is still standing on South Lamar in 2026, and the note is signed by Ginny White-Peacock.

3201 South Lamar Boulevard. Calendar, dance lessons, and a tourist-trap store on the site; Texas Historical Marker on the building.

The Hole in the Wall

The club across from campus, open since 1974 and open, by its own banner, from 3 pm to 2 am every single day. The history the venue publishes is specific: it credits Nanci Griffith as the first person to play music there, the reason the front-window stage was built at all, and names Spoon, The Gourds, Shakey Graves, Timbuk 3, Bob Schneider, Fastball, Black Joe Lewis, and Gary Clark Jr. among the acts that came through the front stage before wider acclaim, with touring acts like Old 97s and Jonathan Richman on the larger middle stage in recent years. Doug Sahm, the site says, called the place a spot to get down to the nitty gritty. It has now outlasted fifty years of the Drag changing around it.

In Courtney Goforth’s words: “Hole in the Wall has survived Austin’s ever-changing landscape for over 50 years. We’ve continued to be the go-to club for generations of beginner bands, touring acts, and music legends to throw back a few, have a laugh with the locals, and, as one of our most revered regulars, Doug Sahm, once said, “get down to the nitty gritty.””

Open 3 pm to 2 am daily. Shows and booking through the site; two stages.

The Saxon Pub

The listening room. The Saxon Pub opened in 1990 and, by its own count, has hosted well over thirty thousand performances, enough that a documentary about it, Nothing Stays the Same, streams on Amazon Prime. The calendar is the argument: a standing Monday residency for Bob Schneider’s Lonelyland, The Resentments on Sunday evenings, the weekly Tunesmiths Tuesdays songwriter showcase, free weekday happy-hour shows with tips appreciated, and ticketed sets priced from ten dollars, all printed on the site. The pub describes itself as a home for music, for people who play it and people who like to listen, and keeps the room 21 and up.

Cover charges printed per show, from $10, with free weekday happy-hour sets. 21 and up. South Lamar.

Mohawk

The Red River room with a creed. Mohawk was handmade in downtown Austin in 2006 as a live music venue, event space, and bar, and states its mission as fostering and preserving a community of friends, artists, and industry people across all music tastes and walks of life. Its stated rule since opening has been All Are Welcome, which the site applies to genres, fans, and staff alike, and it describes production, security, and service as three tiers of a staff that works together to keep guests and artists treated with respect. The venue page prints the specifics behind the creed: two stages, one indoor and one outdoor, three bars across the indoor room, the patio, and the roof deck, and live music most days from 8 pm to 2 am at 912 Red River.

912 Red River Street. Two stages, indoor and outdoor; shows and events calendar on the site; private events and buyouts bookable.

C-Boy’s Heart & Soul

The juke joint. C-Boy’s opened on New Year’s Eve 2014, built by the people behind the Continental Club a few blocks north, and named for L.C. “C-Boy” Parks, who ran the Rome Inn and whom the site calls its namesake and mentor. The program is classic soul, R&B, and blues onstage seven nights a week, with what the site calls a little chicken-something country on Sundays, a spacious patio with vintage shuffleboard, and an upstairs cocktail lounge, the Jade Room, styled after fifties-era Japanese GI bars. It looks like it has been on South Congress for sixty years, which is the point.

Live music seven nights a week; calendar and tickets on the site. South Congress Avenue.

Elephant Room

The jazz basement, and the most transparent room on this page about what a night costs. The Elephant Room has run live jazz seven nights a week, 365 days a year, in a basement on Congress since 1991, and its site prints the cover for every night: five dollars Mondays and Sundays, seven midweek, ten on Friday and Saturday, and no cover before 8 pm. Seating is first come, first served, with no reservations, and the room is 21 and up. It calls itself an old-school basement jazz bar, and nothing about the description is marketing.

Covers printed: $5 to $10 by night, none before 8 pm. Open from 5 pm most nights; 21 and up; no reservations.

Sam’s Town Point

The venue people find by accident, in its own telling, camouflaged in a wooded neighborhood at the south pole of Austin’s music map. Penny Grossman and her family have run Sam’s Town Point as a working-class neighborhood joint since 1981, and over the last several years a community of musicians led by Ramsay Midwood has, by the site’s account, turned the sprawling property into a homey event space. The calendar runs two shows most nights, among them a Steel Monday, a Tuesday Bob Wills night with the Super Swing Revue, and a Sunday cocktail-steel set, and the site is candid to the point of comedy about the room’s lack of gloss.

Two shows most nights; calendar and tickets on the site. Far south Austin, beyond Slaughter and Manchaca.

Sahara Lounge

The East Austin room with the most global calendar in town. Sahara Lounge runs live music, diverse bands, and DJ dance parties five nights a week, Wednesday through Sunday, and its signature is Africa Night, a standing showcase of African and diaspora music that the site documents back years. The practical facts are unusually reader-friendly: free parking, a Mediterranean food truck on the patio Friday and Saturday evenings, a two-dollar cover discount for veterans, and a family policy that admits minors with a parent or guardian. It calls itself an Austin classic, and the description of the community vibe is borne out by the calendar.

1413 Webberville Road. Wednesday through Sunday; free parking; minors welcome with a parent. Booking and show calendar on the site.

Monks Jazz Club

The listening room with a city designation behind it. Monks began as a pop-up listening room and, in its own account, has evolved into a state-of-the-art audio and video recording studio and event space whose curated concert series books improvisational jazz groups and musicians from the region. After four years on the East Side it relocated to the St. Elmo Arts District, where it says it is one of the first venues to use the City of Austin’s new Performance Venue designation, which allows music spaces to operate in different parts of the city. It has recently launched its first bar program, open Tuesday through Sunday, publishes a booking address for bands, and runs a Patreon and a livestream, which is the modern jazz club’s economics stated plainly.

Tickets and calendar on the site; music and a drink Tuesday through Sunday. St. Elmo Arts District.

The White Horse

The East Austin honky-tonk, open every day from 3 pm to 2 am and 21 and up always, in its own capital letters. The dancing is a published program rather than a garnish: donation-based Texas two-step lessons on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday at 7 pm with instructor Beth Coffey of Dancin’ Austin, no reservations taken for them, a cover after 7:30 pm, and a live music calendar of its own. There is a taco window, and separate published addresses for band booking and for private rentals. For a visitor who wants the dance-hall experience without driving to South Lamar, this is the East Side answer.

Open daily 3 pm to 2 am; 21 and up. Two-step lessons Thursday through Saturday at 7 pm, donation based, with a cover after 7:30. Booking and private-event inquiries by the emails published on the site.

Donn’s Depot

Established 1978, and the room where live music, cocktails, and dancing are the whole sign. Donn’s Depot publishes a music schedule with standing weeknight acts and the price on each: a Monday show by the Christine Albert Band at 8:30 with no cover, ten-dollar Friday and Saturday nights, two-step lessons at 7:30 before the Wednesday band, and a Tuesday residency listed as a weekly repeat years into the future, which is the kind of calendar a neighborhood institution keeps. The site publishes its musicians and its history, and the venue can be booked for private events.

Open Monday to Friday from 2 pm and Saturday from 6 pm, closed Sunday; music schedule with no-cover and $10 nights published. 1600 West Fifth Street.

Carousel Lounge

The one-ring circus. The Carousel Lounge opened in 1963 after founders Cecil and Myrtle Meier, a couple who grew up dancing at the SPJST Hall in Taylor, had drinks at the Carousel Lounge in New Orleans’ Hotel Monteleone and decided to build their own; Cecil delivered bread for Butter Krust from 4 am and then worked the bar, Myrtle tended it in the evenings, and the elephant and lion-tamer murals and the actual carousel behind the bar are still the backdrop. The site claims it has hosted live music continuously for longer than any club in Austin, and whatever the exact accounting, it says local acts play most nights with plenty of room to scoot around the dance floor. Its published hours run Wednesday to Saturday from 3:30 pm, so read the calendar before a Monday drive.

1110 East 52nd Street. Open Wednesday to Saturday from 3:30 pm; calendar and reservations on the site.

Sagebrush

The south honky-tonk with a backyard. Sagebrush runs live music and two-step dancing on what it calls the oldest oak dance floor in town, with a big local draft list, and the property is an acre with a backyard that hosts vendor markets and vintage western wear alongside the shows. The published calendar backs the description up: ten-dollar nights that pair a two-step lesson at 7 with a band after, local and touring country through the fall, and the kind of themed bar night the site lists with a straight face, National Drink Beer Day among them. It publishes a booking address and rents for private parties. Founding year is not published, so this page does not print one.

5500 South Congress Avenue. Two-step lessons several nights a week ahead of the band; events calendar, rentals, and a booking email published on the site.

Cheer Up Charlies

The queer venue on Red River. Cheer Up Charlies describes itself in two words, vegan and queer, and lists what it pours in the same plain style: Wunder-Pilz kombucha on tap, fresh-squeezed juice cocktails, and local brew, alongside creative events and, in its own phrase, rad friends. It runs Thursday through Sunday from 4 pm to 2 am, publishes a booking address, and keeps a full past-shows archive, which is more program transparency than most rooms twice its size offer. On a street built for rock clubs, it is the room where the crowd is the show as much as the band.

900 Red River Street. Thursday through Sunday, 4 pm to 2 am. Booking by the email on the site.

The Concourse Project

The electronic room, ranked as what it is. The Concourse Project calls itself a modern indoor and outdoor music venue by the south terminal of the airport, a modular warehouse turned destination venue tailored toward world class production and talent, with most shows inside a main event hall it puts at more than 18,000 square feet. The calendar bears it out: a September and October run of touring DJs and producers ticketed from thirty dollars, with headline nights listed as high as a hundred and fifty, split between that hall, a second space called The Hangar, and outdoor shows, and an age policy of 18-plus or 21-plus printed per event. It also stages the Seismic Dance Event festival. It is not a band room and does not pretend to be; for dance music in Austin at scale, it is the independent option.

Ticket prices and age policy printed per event; a main hall plus The Hangar and outdoor shows. Southeast Austin, by the airport’s south terminal.