Your breath becomes visible the moment you push through the plastic curtain. The bar, the stool, and the glass they hand you are all made of ice. Thirty minutes, -7°C, one thermal parka — whether it’s July or January outside.
This guide covers how to book the Ice Pub Prague ticket, what the experience actually includes, and whether it’s worth the $14 price of entry — plus how the attached Karlovy Lázně nightclub fits into the ticket if you want to stay out after warming back up.
In a Hurry? The Three Ways to Book a Cold Prague Night
- The main ticket: Ice Pub Prague Entry Ticket with Nightclub Option — around $14, 30-minute Ice Pub slot plus optional entry to Karlovy Lázně club afterwards.
- Ice Pub as part of a bigger night out: Prague Pub Crawl with Unlimited Drinks and Cocktails — around $40, 4-6 hours, five venues with unlimited drinks.
- Hardcore version: Pub Crawl with 2-Hour Open Bar at Drunken Monkey — open bar for two hours, with absinthe, then three more bars.
- In a Hurry? The Three Ways to Book a Cold Prague Night
- What the Ice Pub Actually Is
- The Thermal Gear (You’ll Need It)
- The Drinks
- The Robotic Bar (the Other Half of the Room)
- The 30-Minute Time Slot
- The Three Best Tour Options for the Ice Pub
- 1. Ice Pub Prague Entry Ticket with Nightclub Option —
- 2. Prague Pub Crawl with Unlimited Drinks —
- 3. Pub Crawl with 2-Hour Open Bar at Drunken Monkey — around
- Karlovy Lázně — the Club Upstairs
- Getting There
- Opening Hours and the Best Time to Go
- Who This Works for — and Who Should Skip
- What I Wish I’d Known Before My First Visit
- Practical Details
- Other Prague Nights Worth Planning
What the Ice Pub Actually Is
The Ice Pub Prague is a small themed bar, held at a constant -7°C (19°F), where every surface is made from frozen water. The walls. The bar. The stools. The display shelves. The glass you drink from. Even some of the art — abstract ice sculptures mounted to the walls — is made from the same thing. You walk in through a refrigerated air-lock entrance, pick up thermal gear, and spend roughly 30 minutes inside before coming out and warming up.
The concept isn’t unique to Prague — ice bars exist in Stockholm, Amsterdam, Copenhagen, London, and a dozen other cities. What makes the Prague one notable is the price ($14 is the cheapest ice bar ticket in Europe, last time I checked) and the location (directly under the Charles Bridge archway, which is where roughly half the tourist traffic in Prague funnels through).
The Thermal Gear (You’ll Need It)
At the entry desk, they hand you a long thermal parka with a hood and a pair of gloves. Both are insulated. Both are necessary. In 30 minutes at -7°C your face will feel fine (the hood covers enough of it), your core will be warm inside the parka, but your hands will get cold within about 10 minutes if you don’t wear the gloves the whole time. Your feet will be fine — the parka is long enough to drop below your hips and the floor isn’t the coldest surface in the room.
What to wear underneath: whatever you had on already. In summer this means shorts and a t-shirt, and you’ll be fine — the parka does the work. If you’re visiting in winter you may already have a coat on; they’ll put the thermal over the top. Either way, bring gloves if you can (they give you gloves but they’re one-size, and one-size often doesn’t fit me).
The Drinks
Entry includes one vodka cocktail, served in a glass made of ice. The cocktail itself is nothing extraordinary — a sweet vodka-based mix, poured over a glass hollowed from a block of ice. You drink it fast, because the glass is slowly melting in your hand, and because at -7°C even a chilled cocktail feels bracingly cold. Most people take photos first, then realise they should drink it before it literally melts into their fingers.
If you want more than the one included drink, there’s a full bar. Prices are modest — another cocktail is around $5-7, vodka shots about $3. There’s also a novelty list: absinthe (this is Prague, after all), Becherovka (the Czech herbal liqueur), and a few house cocktails named after ski resorts.
The bartender I had on my second visit was a woman from Slovakia who’d been working there three years. She had opinions about which vodkas you could actually taste through the cold (the more expensive ones — the lower-shelf stuff all tastes the same once your tongue is numb). She suggested the Belvedere over the house pour. She was right.
The Robotic Bar (the Other Half of the Room)
Half the venue is the ice pub proper. The other half is the Robotic Bar — a separate space where two mechanical arms, mounted overhead, mix cocktails by following orders from a touchscreen menu. You order from your stool. The robots pour, shake, stir, and fill your glass. A human server brings it to you because the robots don’t walk.
It’s a gimmick. A fun one, but a gimmick. The robots take longer to make a cocktail than a person would, and the drinks aren’t better. But watching them work for the first time is genuinely entertaining, and if you have kids with you (the Robotic Bar has a lower minimum age than the Ice Pub itself) it’s a way to extend the stop. Non-alcoholic options are available from the same robots.
The 30-Minute Time Slot
Your ticket gives you 30 minutes inside the Ice Pub. When you check in they give you a starting time. After 30 minutes, staff will politely indicate the exit and your next visitors will come through. In practice, most people find 30 minutes is just right. The cold is a novelty for about 10 minutes, impressive for another 10, and starting to actually bother your face and hands by minute 25. I’ve never wished I had more time. I have wished, on one January visit, that I had more gloves.
The time slot runs from the top of the hour or the half hour, and you can arrive any time during the opening window. The door staff are genuinely flexible — if your slot is 8:30 and you show up at 8:38, they’ll let you in and you’ll finish at 9:00 with the rest of your cohort. If you show up 20 minutes early they’ll have you wait until your time.
The Three Best Tour Options for the Ice Pub
There’s really only one Ice Pub tour — the standard entry ticket. The other two options here are pub crawls that can either stand alone or pair with the Ice Pub for a longer night. Ranked by review volume.
1. Ice Pub Prague Entry Ticket with Nightclub Option — $14
This is the ticket to book. It gets you the thermal gear, the 30-minute slot, and one drink. The “nightclub option” part refers to the fact that the same ticket includes entry to Karlovy Lázně, the five-floor club upstairs — which, in the evening, is one of the biggest dance venues in central Europe. Our full review covers which of the five floors are worth staying for (the retro 90s floor and the rooftop are the two I’d pick). $14 is the cheapest ice bar ticket in Europe by a wide margin.
2. Prague Pub Crawl with Unlimited Drinks — $40
The Prague pub crawl that’s been running longest. Four to six hours, five venues (the exact list rotates, but the final stop is almost always Karlovy Lázně, same complex as the Ice Pub). Unlimited drinks means you’re mostly drinking Pilsner and standard cocktails — nothing fancy, but the price works out to a fraction of what paying per-drink would cost. Our review explains how this differs from the Drunken Monkey version, and which suits different kinds of groups better.
3. Pub Crawl with 2-Hour Open Bar at Drunken Monkey — around $40
Similar idea, different structure. Instead of spreading unlimited drinks across five venues, this one starts with a two-hour open bar at the Drunken Monkey (absinthe included — important to know before you drink it), then moves through three more bars. Smaller groups, younger crowd on average, and the two-hour stationary start means you don’t have to pace yourself across venue moves. Our full review covers which version suits which type of night out.
Karlovy Lázně — the Club Upstairs
The Ice Pub shares a building with Karlovy Lázně, a five-floor nightclub that bills itself as the largest music club in central Europe. Your Ice Pub ticket includes entry after 9pm. Each of the five floors plays a different genre: house on one floor, 80s and 90s on another, Czech pop, R&B, and a rooftop bar that closes when it rains. The rooftop is the one most worth finding — the others are standard club floors, well-run but nothing you couldn’t find in any European capital.
The crowd skews young and international — Karlovy Lázně is where stag parties end up most Fridays, which some visitors find fun and some find tiresome. If you’re looking for a local-leaning Prague night out, the smaller clubs in Žižkov or Vinohrady are better bets, or a guided pub crawl that hits the pubs locals actually drink at. If you want a big energetic crowd and don’t mind the tourism volume, this is as central as it gets.
Getting There
The Ice Pub is at Novotného lávka 5, in Staré Město (Old Town), on the ground floor of the building directly attached to Charles Bridge. If you’re standing on the Old Town side of Charles Bridge, facing the river, it’s in the building immediately to your left. The entrance is on the south side of the building, through the short passageway that leads from the riverside walk down toward the bridge.
Metro-wise, the closest stop is Staroměstská on Line A (green) — about a 4-minute walk from the station through the Old Town to the river. Trams 17 and 18 also stop at Staroměstská. If you’re coming from the Malá Strana side (the castle side, where Prague Castle sits), cross Charles Bridge on foot — it’s 5 minutes across.
Opening Hours and the Best Time to Go
The Ice Pub is open every day from noon to 5am. Yes, 5am. In practice, the 30-minute slots that book up first are the ones between 8pm and 11pm — that’s when the pre-club crowd is arriving. Daytime slots (1pm, 2pm, 3pm) almost always have availability on the day.
If you want the combined Ice Pub + Karlovy Lázně experience, arrive at the Ice Pub between 9pm and 10pm — you’ll emerge around 10pm or 10:30pm, Karlovy Lázně will be hitting its stride, and you can use the ticket to walk straight in without queueing.
Who This Works for — and Who Should Skip
The Ice Pub is a tourist attraction. It’s a themed venue, it’s priced for tourists, and it’s located exactly where the highest tourist footfall in Prague passes. That’s neither good nor bad — it just means you should know what you’re buying. If you want a moody local-feel Prague drinking experience, the Ice Pub is not that.
This works for: first-time visitors to Prague who’ve done the daytime sights and want a novelty night-out moment. Groups that want a 30-minute shared experience before a bigger night. Anyone with kids in the 12-16 range (the Ice Pub is family-friendly with no minimum age, though the Robotic Bar is the part they’ll remember). People who want to be able to say they’ve been to an ice bar.
Skip if: you’re a cold-weather complainer (if you’re already dreading the Prague winter, 30 minutes at -7°C will be its own special punishment). You want authentic local Prague drinking culture — try Lokál or U Medvídků instead. You’re travelling solo and not a joiner — the Ice Pub is intensely communal by layout, and it’s awkward to sip an ice vodka cocktail alone while surrounded by stag parties.
What I Wish I’d Known Before My First Visit
Three things the booking page doesn’t tell you.
Your phone screen gets weird. Most touchscreens misbehave when the glass drops below zero — mine went unresponsive after 10 minutes. If you want to take photos, do it in the first 15 minutes. After that, either put the phone inside the parka against your body to warm it, or wait until you get outside.
The thermal jacket smells a bit. They’re shared, rotated through hundreds of visitors, and lightly cleaned between uses. Not offensive, but noticeable. Wear a scarf you can pull over the collar if you’re sensitive.
The ice glass melts faster than you think. It’ll be a puddle of water in your hand within 15 minutes. Drink accordingly. If you want to keep the empty glass as a souvenir, just be prepared for it to vanish on the walk home.
Practical Details
Admission. $14 adult (roughly 330 CZK), $10 child (5-14). Under-5s free. The ticket includes thermal gear rental, 30 minutes inside, one vodka cocktail, and Karlovy Lázně entry after 9pm.
Accessibility. The Ice Pub itself is ground-floor and step-free from the passageway entrance. The Karlovy Lázně club upstairs has lifts to each floor. The narrow entry airlock can be tight for powered wheelchairs — call ahead if this matters.
Drinks age. 18+ for the vodka cocktail. Under-18s get a non-alcoholic drink instead (I’ve not tasted it — presumably non-terrible, given this venue has been operating for years).
How long to plan for. 30 minutes inside. Another 15 minutes at the Robotic Bar if you stay. Plus the Karlovy Lázně club upstairs, which could be an hour or all night depending on how committed you are.
Other Prague Nights Worth Planning
If you like the idea of novelty Prague night experiences, the medieval dinner shows run the same kind of “theatrical theme, food included” format but with sword-fighting and roast pork instead of ice sculpture and vodka. For a more cultured evening, classical concert tickets get you into chapels and mirror halls for Vivaldi and Mozart performances — quieter and also shorter than you’d expect. And the underground walking tours go down into the medieval cellars below the Old Town, which is its own kind of “strange place where Prague keeps its weirdness.”
For daytime Prague after a late Ice Pub night, the Astronomical Clock tower climb takes about an hour and is a short walk from here, and a Vltava river cruise is the easiest thing to do if you’re hungover — you sit, you drift, the castle passes by.
Disclosure: This site earns a commission on bookings made through the links above, at no extra cost to you. We only recommend tours we’ve researched and would book ourselves.