Pub quiz nights in Glasgow: where to play

Why Glasgow is a good city for a pub quiz

Glasgow has one of the deepest pub quiz scenes in the UK. Ask around and most regulars will have a favourite night, a favourite host, and strong opinions about which bar gives out the best prizes. If you're new to the city, visiting for a weekend, or just bored of the same Tuesday routine, tracking down a proper quiz is one of the easiest ways to have a good, cheap night out and actually talk to people rather than just drink at them. Below are a handful of nights we could actually verify are running, with a note on what we found and where we found it.

A quick note before you head out

Quiz nights are one of the most changeable things in pub culture. Hosts move on, venues drop the quiz when a new manager comes in, and nights get shuffled to a different day without much notice. We've checked each of the following against the venue's own site, a listings page, or a recent event post, but none of that guarantees it'll still be on by the time you read this. Call the pub, check their Facebook or Instagram, or look at their website before you commit an evening to it. Plans change, especially in hospitality.

City centre

Sloans, Argyll Arcade

Sloans is one of the oldest surviving pubs in Glasgow, tucked just off Argyll Arcade in the heart of the city centre, and its Thursday night quiz has become a proper fixture. It's run by Quiz Hard, starts at 7pm and runs to around 9pm, and is free to enter with prizes including venue tickets and a cash voucher. The setting alone is worth the trip: a building with genuine history, ornate ceilings, and none of the generic sports-bar feel you get elsewhere. See Sloans' own Quiz Hard page for details, which confirms it's still a free, weekly Thursday fixture.

A note on The Admiral, Waterloo Street

Worth flagging rather than quietly dropping: the old Admiral ran a Tuesday Tea Time Quiz billed as one of the city's longest running unbroken quiz nights, going back to March 2006. It closed for good in March 2023 when its building on Waterloo Street was earmarked for redevelopment (STV News's report on the closure). A pub called The Admiral Woods has since opened nearby on the same street, but we couldn't confirm, from its own website, its Facebook page, or anywhere else, that it's run by the same team or that it continues any kind of quiz night, so we're not including it as a verified listing here. If you know otherwise, a quick check with the venue directly before you go is the safest way to confirm.

If your own local doesn't run a quiz at all, it might be worth mentioning quizquiz.co to whoever runs the place. It costs the venue nothing to try and it's an easy way to get a quiet Tuesday busier. And if nobody near you fancies stepping up, there's nothing stopping you from building your own quiz and running it round a friend's kitchen table instead. All you need is a decent set of questions and someone willing to keep score.

The Butterfly and the Pig, Bath Street

This is one of Glasgow's more distinctive bars, all mismatched furniture and quirky décor, and it runs a Monday night quiz from 7:30pm that's popular enough that it's worth getting there early for a table. Entry is free, and the prize recently changed from a rolling bar tab to a £50 voucher for the winning team, so ignore any older mention of cash or a bar tab. Food's available until 9pm if you want to make an evening of it before the questions start. The pub's own site confirms pub quizzes are part of its regular lineup, but the exact day, time, and current prize come from the quiz host's own social media posts rather than the site itself, so treat those specifics as slightly less firm than the venue-page-confirmed entries above.

Source: The Butterfly and the Pig

West End

The Sparkle Horse, Dowanhill Street

Sitting at the crossroads of Byres Road and Dumbarton Road, The Sparkle Horse has built a reputation among West End regulars as one of the trickier quizzes in the city, not a beginner's night by any means. It runs every Monday from around 7:30pm, confirmed directly on the pub's own events page, with a bar tab for first place and a bottle of wine further down the table. It's the kind of unpretentious neighbourhood bar where the quiz has clearly been running long enough to build its own in-jokes and regulars, and there's a loose connection to the local music scene that gives it a bit of extra character.

Further out

Lock 27, Crow Road

For something with a different setting, Lock 27 sits right by the Forth and Clyde Canal on Crow Road and runs a Tuesday night quiz from 7:30pm. It's free to enter, hosted by the Sir James quiz company, and the canal-side location makes it a nice change of scene if you're used to city centre bars. You can see it listed on the Sir James Pub Quiz venue page and it's been confirmed as a going concern via the venue's own social posts.

Make your own quiz night happen

Four venues is a decent start, but Glasgow has quiz nights on most days of the week if you go looking, and plenty of pubs that don't run one yet but probably would if a regular asked. If you fancy hosting rather than just playing, our guide on how to run a great pub quiz covers everything from round structure to keeping the energy up when the room goes quiet on a hard question. Between finding a night out and starting your own, there's really no excuse to have a quiet week.