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City Guide · Phoenix, AZ

The Best Places in Phoenix

25 essential Phoenix spots, desert trails to Roosevelt Row. This free City Pack from Whosly collects our favorite Phoenix spots — restaurants, bars, museums, parks, and things to do — each one mapped and ready to turn into a plan. Save the ones you love, then text a link and see who's in.

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Where locals go

Start where Phoenix locals go

The happy hours worth leaving work for and the spots off the tourist map. The 25 must-dos everyone knows come after.

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Phoenix Happy HourPlanner Pro

From $1.99 slices to $3 drafts: when the deals run and what they cost.

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10 spots locals swear by.

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The 25 must-do spots

The classics, for a first visit or anyone you're showing around.

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Restaurants

7

Pizzeria Bianco

🍽️ Restaurants·Downtown

Chris Bianco started making pizza in a corner of a local market in 1988; his Heritage Square room still draws lines for wood-fired pies. Get the Rosa: red onion, pistachios, rosemary and Parmigiano.

Tacos Chiwas

🍽️ Restaurants·Midtown

Chihuahua-style cooking at the family taquería of Nadia Holguin and Armando Hernandez, with handmade flour tortillas and gorditas; order the lengua. A James Beard nominee.

Little Miss BBQ

🍽️ Restaurants·University Park

Scott and Bekke Holmes's Central Texas barbecue, opened in 2014, with brisket and sides worth the morning line. The original University Drive location is the one to visit.

Bacanora

🍽️ Restaurants·Downtown

Chef René Andrade cooks Sonoran food over mesquite in this small, loud room on Grand Avenue, and took home the James Beard Best Chef: Southwest prize in 2024.

Gallo Blanco

🍽️ Restaurants·Midtown

A bright Garfield café for contemporary Mexican food, famous for breakfast: chilaquiles, huevos and its flapjacks. Daily happy hour from 3 to 6.

Lom Wong

🍽️ Restaurants·Downtown

Chef Yotaka 'Sunny' Martin and Alex Martin's downtown restaurant cooking the regional village food of Thailand, paired with natural wine. Sunny Martin later took home the James Beard prize as Best Chef: Southwest.

Fry Bread House

🍽️ Restaurants·Midtown

A Phoenix institution since 1992 serving Tohono O'odham fry bread with savory toppings like red chile beef, or sweet with honey and chocolate. It won a James Beard America's Classics award in 2012.

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Bars & nightlife

1

Bitter & Twisted

🍸 Bars·Downtown

The cocktail parlour that started Phoenix's craft-cocktail scene, in the 1920s Luhrs Building downtown, with a long, playful menu and good bar food.

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Museums & culture

9

Heard Museum

🏛️ Museums·Midtown

A museum devoted to American Indian art and culture since 1929, with standout galleries on the peoples of the Southwest and a big collection of Hopi katsina dolls. Free on First Friday evenings.

Musical Instrument Museum

🏛️ Museums·North Phoenix

A dazzling collection of thousands of instruments from nearly every country, with headsets that play the music as you walk past. Plan half a day; it's a perfect escape on a hot afternoon.

Phoenix Art Museum

🏛️ Museums·Midtown

The largest art museum in the Southwest, with a collection over 20,000 strong spanning Asia, Europe, Latin America and the American West, plus a fashion gallery. Admission is free on Wednesday evenings, 3 to 8.

Arizona Science Center

🏛️ Museums·Downtown

Four floors of hands-on exhibits downtown, with a planetarium and a giant-screen theater. Easy to spend a whole day with kids.

Taliesin West

🏛️ Museums·Scottsdale

The desert home, studio and school Frank Lloyd Wright built for his winters in the Scottsdale foothills, from local stone and sand. Guided tours show how the landscape shaped his work.

S'edav Va'aki Museum

🏛️ Museums·Southeast Phoenix

A Hohokam village site some 1,500 years old near the airport, renamed S'edav Va'aki, its O'odham name, in 2023. Walk the trail past the platform mound and the ancient ball court, then see the pottery and canal history inside.

Children's Museum of Phoenix

🏛️ Museums·Downtown

Hands-on play spread over three floors of a restored 1913 schoolhouse downtown, made for kids up to about 10, from a giant climbing structure to the noodle forest.

Heritage Square

🏛️ Museums·Downtown

A downtown block of restored 1890s homes, including the Victorian Rosson House, now a museum you can tour. Pizzeria Bianco sits on the same block in the old machine shop.

Hall of Flame Museum of Firefighting

🏛️ Museums·Papago Park

A big museum of firefighting history next to Papago Park, packed with dozens of restored fire engines, from hand-pulled pumpers to early motorized rigs.

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Parks & outdoors

5

Desert Botanical Garden

🌳 Parks·Papago Park

A 140-acre garden founded in 1939 with one of the world's biggest collections of desert plants, saguaros, agaves and seasonal wildflowers among them. Go early or at sunset in summer; the fall and winter evening events are lovely.

Camelback Mountain

🌳 Parks·Arcadia

The city's signature climb, a steep scramble up a mountain shaped like a kneeling camel, with views across the Valley from the top. Start at dawn, carry plenty of water and skip it in summer heat.

South Mountain Park and Preserve

🌳 Parks·South Mountain

One of the country's largest city parks, crossed by 50-plus miles of desert trail for hikers, cyclists and riders. For the classic view over the city, drive up to the Dobbins Lookout summit.

Papago Park

🌳 Parks·Papago Park

Red sandstone buttes a few minutes from downtown, with easy trails and the short climb to Hole-in-the-Rock, a natural window that frames the city. Beautiful at sunset.

Japanese Friendship Garden

🌳 Parks·Downtown

Rohoen, a three-and-a-half-acre stroll garden downtown, with a twelve-foot waterfall, ponds full of koi and a teahouse that hosts seasonal tea ceremonies.

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Things to do

3

Roosevelt Row

🎟️ Things to do·Downtown

Downtown's walkable arts district of murals, galleries, small shops and bars. Come on First Friday, when the streets fill with art, music and food trucks.

Phoenix Zoo

🎟️ Things to do·Papago Park

A big, leafy zoo in Papago Park, open since 1962, home to around 3,000 animals and a giraffe-feeding platform. Go early before the afternoon heat.

Wrigley Mansion

🎟️ Things to do·Arcadia

The 1930s hilltop mansion that William Wrigley Jr., of chewing-gum fame, built for his wife, now a restaurant and event space with sweeping views over the valley. Come for lunch or a drink on the terrace to see inside.

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