Explore Manhattan’s Times Square, from neighborhood favorites to unique curated events. Start with the best-known things to do, then check out "What's happening" for upcoming limited events in Times Square.
These special events are sourced from the web and social media, then carefully curated based on cool and unique events you might enjoy doing in Times Square.
We update this page on a daily basis, so be sure to bookmark us and return for fresh events.
The New Year's Eve Ball is the draw at One Times Square, and you can now see it close up inside the building that carries it above the crowds each December. The Ball Experience combines that encounter and a photo with Times Travel, an interactive account of the neighborhood and its New Year celebrations, and the open-air Skywalk. It's a chance to connect the object everyone watches on television with the place and traditions surrounding it.
Aladdin brings its sets, costumes and stage effects to the New Amsterdam Theatre on 42nd Street, close to One Times Square. You get two kinds of theatrical craft here: the production onstage and the restored decoration surrounding it. The theater opened in 1903, later housed the Ziegfeld Follies, and became a home for Disney productions after its restoration. The Lion King and Mary Poppins preceded Aladdin here.
The performers share the story with the people working offstage at the Museum of Broadway, farther north on 45th Street. You can examine costumes close up and explore The Making of a Broadway Show, which follows the work that goes into a production. I like the connection with a theater visit: the museum gives the designers and other production professionals a place alongside the people you see taking a bow.
Ric Burns and Jeff Goldblum supply the filmmaking and narration at the beginning of RiseNY, also on 45th Street. You start in a recreation of the original City Hall subway station with their short documentary, then move through seven interactive history galleries. Co-curated with museums, the galleries use artifacts and memorabilia to tell New York stories. This part is about browsing and looking closely before the attraction changes gears.
Your team's discoveries move the story forward at The Escape Game NYC (Times Square), farther north on Broadway. Each game runs through multiple connected rooms: you investigate clues, compare findings and solve puzzles that open the next space. The expanding setting is part of the appeal, with another room to explore as the game progresses. These are 60-minute activities built around a shared story and the team's work within it.
Les Paul played weekly at The Iridium until 2009, and his connection to the electric guitar and recording still helps explain the club's musical identity. You can hear jazz, blues, rock and songwriters in its downstairs, 180-capacity room, just north of the escape game. The programming also reaches into folk, indie pop, R&B and world music, so the particular artist matters when choosing a night here.
Find upcoming street fairs, performances and other unique events in Times Square.
8 things worth doing in the next 7 days · Friday, October 16th – Thursday, October 22nd
| Event | Date | Where | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
 Flying Ivories Dueling Pianos | Fri, Oct 16 | Haswell Green's, Hell's KitchenTimes Square · Manhattan | Fridays & Saturdays 10pm$50/person food & drink minimum |
 Live Music | Fri, Oct 16 | The Long Room, TheaterTimes Square · Manhattan | Not posted yetPrice not listed |
| Event | Date | Where | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
 Bottomless Piano Brunch | Sat, Oct 17 | Haswell Green's, Times SquareTimes Square · Manhattan | Saturdays 1pmPrice not listed |
 Eighth Avenue Fall Fair | Sat, Oct 17 | 8th Avenue from 42nd to 52nd StTheater District · Manhattan | 10am-6pm |
| Flying Ivories Dueling Pianos | Sat, Oct 17 | Haswell Green's, Hell's KitchenTimes Square · Manhattan | Fridays & Saturdays 10pm$50/person food & drink minimum |
| Live Music | Sat, Oct 17 | The Long Room, TheaterTimes Square · Manhattan | Not posted yetPrice not listed |
| Event | Date | Where | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
| Live Music | Sun, Oct 18 | The Long Room, TheaterTimes Square · Manhattan | Not posted yetPrice not listed |
| Event | Date | Where | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
 Live Band Karaoke | Mon, Oct 19 | Haswell Green's, Hell's KitchenTimes Square · Manhattan | Mondays 9:30pmPrice not listed |
No events listed for Tuesday, October 20 yet.
| Event | Date | Where | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
 Alan Buko Request Show | Wed, Oct 21 | Haswell Green's, Hell's KitchenTimes Square · Manhattan | Wednesdays 9pmPrice not listed |
| Event | Date | Where | Hours |
|---|---|---|---|
 Curious, Comic & Sublime: Music and Dance of the 18th Century (with Harpsichord, Cello, and Violin) | Thu, Oct 22 | 239 West 49th Street, off of 8th Ave, Midtown, Manhattan, 10019Times Square · Manhattan | 1:15pm |
 The Big Woozy Band & Kelsey Pierce | Thu, Oct 22 | Haswell Green's, Times SquareTimes Square · Manhattan | Thursdays 10pmPrice not listed |
A price sits under the hours when an event is not free. Tap an event for its details, the time and place, and the organizer's link.
The Flying Ivories play dueling pianos with a set list you control.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 2 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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You can hear a changing roster of musicians on Fridays and Saturdays, plus traditional Irish music with fiddle and banjo on Sundays.
🚇 42 St-Bryant Pk (B D F M) · 3 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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Eighth Avenue hosts a fall street fair.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 4 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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You can sing along to songs performed live at Haswell Green’s weekly piano brunch.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 2 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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Sing karaoke with a live rock band backing you at Haswell Green's.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 2 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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Your song requests shape Alan Buko's weekly music show.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 2 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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The Big Woozy Band and singer-songwriter Kelsey Pierce share a Thursday music bill at Haswell Green's.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 2 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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The New York Baroque Dance Company performs comic theatrical dances from an 18th-century collection, accompanied by live music.
🚇 50 St (1 C E) · 2 min walk
🍴 Eat nearby · 4 places, closest 2 min walk
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A 25-screen cinema near Times Square.
4.1★ from 12,245 Google reviews
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A 1,900-seat house staging plays, concerts and ballet.
4.8★ from 12,237 Google reviews
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Dating to 1903, this theatre has been used for both stage productions and film, and remains in operation.
4.7★ from 11,388 Google reviews
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The arcade is the reason to come with children: racing games, shooters, air hockey and basketball alongside newer machines, played off a Power Card.
4.3★ from 10,935 Google reviews
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A 1927 Broadway house on West 44th Street, built by the Chanin Brothers and designed by Herbert Krapp in a "modern Spanish" style with a terra-cotta base and arched windows.
4.7★ from 8,512 Google reviews
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A Broadway house that has staged large-scale musicals and dance productions since opening in 1973.
4.8★ from 7,424 Google reviews
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A Broadway theatre dating to 1927, seating around 1,445.
4.7★ from 6,914 Google reviews
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Fifty bowling lanes plus an arcade with a mix of classics and newer machines, billiards tables, and a grill and bar area.
4.3★ from 5,401 Google reviews
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A multi-screen cinema showing current releases.
4.4★ from 5,112 Google reviews
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It runs in four parts, in order.
4.5★ from 3,877 Google reviews
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4.4★ from 3,871 Google reviews
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A midtown music hall where you sit down to a meal while the show runs — full menus of appetisers, entrees and homemade desserts are served at every event.
4.5★ from 2,965 Google reviews
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A concert hall designated a National Historic Site, programming theater, dance, comedy and music from around the world.
4.5★ from 2,721 Google reviews
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A Broadway house on West 52nd Street, renamed in 2005 for August Wilson — the first Broadway theatre named after a Black playwright — after two renovations in the 1980s and 90s when it was the Virginia Theatre.
4.6★ from 2,688 Google reviews
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A mid-sized music room booking both well-known and smaller acts.
4.5★ from 2,202 Google reviews
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An immersive museum about Broadway on West 45th Street, in the theater district.
4.8★ from 1,866 Google reviews
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60-minute escape rooms where solving one room opens another partway through, so the space keeps expanding.
5★ from 1,531 Google reviews
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A landmark building at Times Square, designed by architect Cyrus L.
4.7★ from 1,191 Google reviews
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This is a working Broadway house on 44th Street, so a visit means seeing whatever show is running rather than touring the building.
4.6★ from 1,011 Google reviews
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A small jazz room downstairs, with a history tied to guitarist Les Paul.
4.6★ from 954 Google reviews
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Sightseeing tours of the city by bus, on foot, or a combination of bus and boat, led by a guide.
4.8★ from 886 Google reviews
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A small comedy club whose lineups mix newer comics with established ones, and occasionally a well-known name drops in.
4.2★ from 723 Google reviews
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An Episcopal church on West 46th Street, a block off Times Square, that has kept its doors open daily for welcome and worship since 1870.
4.8★ from 337 Google reviews
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A Hell's Kitchen piano bar and restaurant serving dinner and drinks with live entertainment Tuesday through Saturday, including a monthly all-request sing-along night and a ticketed supper club series.
4.4★ from 184 Google reviews
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A former Broadway and movie theater at 215–217 West 42nd Street, built in 1920 to designs by Eugene De Rosa for the brothers Edgar and Archibald Selwyn.
4.5★ from 159 Google reviews
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An indoor pickleball club on the 8th floor at 1501 Broadway with seven courts, plus a bar, restaurant and pro shop.
4.9★ from 114 Google reviews
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5★ from 91 Google reviews
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Live drag performances staged in a dinner-theater format.
4.2★ from 75 Google reviews
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A hip-hop and commercial dance studio in Times Square teaching kids, teenagers and adults.
4.8★ from 63 Google reviews
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4.8★ from 54 Google reviews
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Two works are experienced from public space: one changes the billboards each month, while the other rises from a pedestrian island.
You can have lunch or dinner on 45th Street or eat with singing waitstaff farther up Broadway.
You can put a message on candy itself or customize a chocolate gift with your choice of wrapper or mix-ins.
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