Gay Guide
Listing and event details can change quickly. Please verify with the venue directly before visiting. Lavender Atlas is not responsible for third-party accuracy.
About LGBTQ+ Orlando
Orlando's LGBTQ+ story is bound up with the night of 12 June 2016, when a gunman killed 49 people at Pulse, then the deadliest mass shooting in modern US history. The club building came down in March 2026 to make way for a permanent memorial on the site, due to be finished in fall 2027. The community's roots run much deeper than that night: the LGBT+ Center Orlando on Mills Avenue has served the city since 1978.
There is no single gay strip; the scene is spread across neighbourhoods east and north of downtown. In the Milk District, Southern Nights is the big multi-room club for drag and dancing, with District Dive alongside for darts and pool. Savoy on North Orange Avenue in Ivanhoe Village has drag shows, DJs and a weekend drag brunch, and Anthem, right on Orange Avenue downtown near Lake Eola, is a queer-owned club open seven nights a week.
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Out in College Park, Edgewater Drive has two easygoing neighbourhood bars, Hank's and BarCodes, with a local crowd. Club Orlando, the men's bathhouse just south of downtown, has a gym, steam room and an outdoor pool.
Some institutions have moved on. Parliament House, the resort on Orange Blossom Trail that anchored gay Orlando for decades, closed in 2020, and its owners plan a new venue downtown. Hamburger Mary's left Church Street in 2024 and reopened in 2026 at Old Town in Kissimmee, near the theme parks.
Come Out With Pride fills Lake Eola Park each October, with the parade finishing at the park and fireworks after dark. In early June, GayDays brings thousands to Walt Disney World, a tradition since 1991 that peaks with Red Shirt Day at Magic Kingdom.
Upcoming Events
A massive, high-tech nightclub in downtown Orlando featuring futuristic lighting and a diverse weekly lineup of events.
LGBTQ+ sports and dive bar in the Milk District, between Southern Nights and Southern Craft, with darts, pool tables and cheap drinks.
Gay bar near downtown Orlando with drag shows, DJs, happy hour and a weekend drag brunch.
Men's bathhouse south of downtown with a gym, steam room, sauna, private rooms and an outdoor pool for daytime lounging.
Multi-room LGBTQ+ nightclub in Orlando's Milk District, with several dance floors and regular drag shows.
Orlando longest-running LGBTQ+ neighborhood bar, a College Park institution.
Site of the Pulse nightclub, where 49 people were killed on 12 June 2016. The club building was demolished in March 2026 to make way for a permanent memorial with a reflecting pool on the footprint of the club, due to be finished in fall 2027, so the site is a construction zone until then.
Orlando's Pride, held each October in Lake Eola Park. The parade steps off from Washington Street and Orange Avenue in the late afternoon and finishes at the park, which hosts stages, community booths and fireworks from noon until 10pm.
The drag-show burger bar that spent 16 years on Church Street in downtown Orlando, reopened in 2026 at Old Town in Kissimmee with a 249-seat theatre space, bingo, trivia and a weekend Broadway brunch.
A gay bar in Orlando's College Park neighbourhood with a neighbourhood pub feel, pool tables, outdoor patio, and a loyal local following. BarCodes offers a more relaxed alternative to Orlando's louder club scene and is known for its friendly, inclusive atmosphere.
The LGBT+ Center Orlando, open since 1978 and one of the oldest LGBTQ+ centres in the US, offering free HIV and STI testing, counselling, youth and senior programmes and referrals from its base on Mills Avenue, with a second site in Kissimmee.