New Orleans, LA · Capacity: 16,867
Home of the NBA's New Orleans Pelicans, located adjacent to the Caesars Superdome. The 16,867-seat arena hosts NBA games, concerts, and events. Zion Williamson brings nightly highlight-reel dunks and celebrity courtside sightings.
The Smoothie King Center is the home of the Pelicans, sitting right beside the Superdome in New Orleans — which means a game here comes wrapped in the same French Quarter energy, brass bands and food that define the city.
It's a short walk from the Quarter and the CBD.
Below are the New Orleans stays, restaurants and bars fans use around the Smoothie King Center.
Hotels, bars, restaurants and things to do near Smoothie King Center in New Orleans — every pick web-researched and source-cited, closest to the arena first.
Trendy Warehouse District boutique hotel in a restored 1928 art deco building with a rooftop pool, craft cocktail bars, and live music programming. Walking distance to the Superdome and Smoothie King Center, the Ace is where visiting musicians, athletes, and creatives stay in New Orleans.
The Hampton Inn Garden District is one of the best-positioned hotels for Saints fans and Super Bowl visitors, offering reliable comfort at a reasonable price point just a short streetcar ride from the Caesars Superdome and the French Quarter's entertainment hub. The Garden District location means you're in one of the city's most beautiful neighborhoods, and the hotel fills with football fans during Saints home games and the increasingly frequent major events at the Superdome. The rooftop views offer a glimpse of the iconic arena's roof dome rising above the tree canopy.
Grand 1886 French Quarter hotel famous for its revolving Carousel Bar, a New Orleans institution. Saints fans and visiting sports crowds have sipped Sazeracs on the spinning bar for generations, making it an essential NOLA experience.
Grand 1893 hotel now part of the Waldorf Astoria collection, with the legendary Sazerac Bar (birthplace of the cocktail). The rooftop pool overlooks the French Quarter. Super Bowl teams, celebrities, and visiting NFL commentators make this their New Orleans headquarters.
A boutique hotel in the Warehouse/CBD district built inside a row of former 19th-century newspaper buildings. Essence’s own "where to stay" guide highlights it for keeping attendees near all the festival action.
A 1,193-room downtown high-rise directly next to the Caesars Superdome — the practical home base for Essence weekend. Recurring official and unofficial Essence events are hosted here, walkable to the Superdome.
Bywater wine garden with live jazz under string lights. Sandra Bullock, Anthony Mackie, Solange Knowles.
Sacred 60-seat jazz hall on St. Peter Street preserving traditional New Orleans jazz since 1961. No microphones, no cocktails, just intimate, world-class performances — Mick Jagger, Dave Grohl, and Sandra Bullock slip in regularly.
The Saint Bar & Lounge on Magazine Street is one of New Orleans' most beloved neighborhood bars, a place where Saints fans, locals, and nightlife enthusiasts gather postgame in a dim, comfortable space that runs well past midnight with DJ sets and a crowd that takes its WHO DAT culture seriously. The lack of pretension and the genuinely mixed crowd make it feel like a neighborhood secret even when it is full to capacity. Sports travelers who find their way to The Saint after a Saints win experience New Orleans nightlife at its most authentic.
Twelve Mile Limit in Mid-City is the sort of beloved neighborhood bar that New Orleans locals bring visiting sports fans to specifically to show them the city beyond Bourbon Street — genuine craft cocktails, a jukebox stocked with New Orleans music, and a crowd that includes Saints players' families from the nearby residential neighborhoods. The bar's unpretentious warmth is a perfect post-game antidote to the tourist-heavy French Quarter scene, and the cocktail prices are remarkably reasonable for the quality. If a Saints player's wife is your bartender's neighbor, you're in the right place.
The Sazerac Bar in the historic Roosevelt Hotel is one of America's most legendary cocktail destinations, serving the Sazerac cocktail — New Orleans' official cocktail — in a stunning Art Deco room that has hosted Louisiana governors, sports legends, and celebrities for over a century. Saints and Pelicans fans who dress up for a pregame dinner and cocktail at the Sazerac Bar elevate their entire sports travel experience to something approaching the transcendent. It is one of the only bars in American sports travel where the room itself competes with the game for your attention.
The Columns Hotel's Victorian porch bar on St. Charles Avenue is New Orleans' most atmospheric pre-game ritual for Saints fans and Jazz Fest visitors — a magnificent 1883 Victorian mansion where rocking chairs on the wraparound porch, cold Abita beers, and the passing streetcar create one of America's most civilized sports fan experiences. Visitors consistently describe the porch on a warm Sunday afternoon before a Saints game as capturing everything great about New Orleans in a single scene. The ornate interior bar hosts live jazz on weekend evenings.
James Beard Award-winning Cajun restaurant in the Warehouse District from chef Donald Link, celebrating Louisiana's rustic country cooking with wood-fired meats and Gulf seafood. A favorite of Saints and Pelicans players, Cochon is steps from the Superdome and Smoothie King Center.
New Orleans' most iconic restaurant, a turquoise Victorian mansion in the Garden District serving legendary Creole cuisine since 1893. The turtle soup, bread pudding soufflé, and 25-cent martini lunch are bucket-list items. Where Emeril and Paul Prudhomme learned to cook.
A tiny Uptown po-boy shop that has been hand-frying shrimp and stuffing French bread since 1918—no frills, no fuss, just perfection. Saints fans make the pilgrimage before Superdome tailgates for the roast beef po-boy dressed, which is as essential to game day as a Who Dat chant.
Dooky Chase's is one of America's most historically significant restaurants, a Creole dining landmark that has fed civil rights leaders, presidents, and Saints fans since 1941, serving legendary dishes including the signature shrimp Clemenceau and fried chicken that has appeared in multiple presidential memoirs. Chef Leah Chase's legacy defines New Orleans Creole cooking, and dining here before a Saints game or Pelicans playoff night is to participate in a living piece of American culinary and civil rights history. The restaurant's art collection alone, showcasing African American artists, is worth the visit.
Jacques-Imo's in the Uptown neighborhood is the kind of raucous, joyful Creole restaurant that defines the New Orleans dining experience — dark, loud, and packed with the energy of a city that treats eating as a sport in itself. Saints fans from across Louisiana make the pilgrimage here before and after Caesars Superdome games, drawn by the shrimp and alligator sausage cheesecake and the legendary fried chicken. The communal tables and refrigerator-car dining room are as entertaining as anything on the field.
Parkway Bakery & Tavern in Mid-City is New Orleans' most celebrated po'boy shop — a 1911 institution where Saints and Pelicans fans load up on roast beef dressed po'boys and cold Abita before games at the Caesars Superdome. The lively covered patio on Hagan Street fills with fans in black and gold, and the roast beef gravy that drips through the French bread is one of American sports food culture's greatest pre-game rituals. President Obama stopped here; winning Saints fans feel equally presidential after their first Parkway po'boy.
Audubon Park's 1.8-mile loop along the Mississippi River levee is a beloved New Orleans morning ritual where Saints and Pelicans fans gear up before heading downtown for game day. The majestic live oaks draped in Spanish moss create a surreal backdrop for a sports-travel morning run. Following the loop with a beignet at a nearby café is the quintessential New Orleans sports-weekend morning.
Bourbon Street and the French Quarter transform into one of the world's great pregame environments on Saints game days, with Saints jerseys mixing into the year-round carnival atmosphere of America's most celebrated party street. The festive outdoor culture of New Orleans means fans don't need a specific sports bar — the whole neighborhood is a continuous sports celebration. Experiencing a New Orleans Saints weekend without walking Bourbon Street is to miss a core part of the cultural experience.
Go behind the scenes at the iconic Caesars Superdome, home of the New Orleans Saints and host of seven Super Bowls. The tour covers the suites, locker room area, and field level of the 73,000-seat venue that stands as a symbol of the city's resilience and football passion.
New Orleans City Park houses an enormous network of sports facilities including golf courses, tennis courts, and the Pepsi Tennis Center, set within 1,300 acres of spectacular live-oak canopy. Sports travelers who arrive a day early can get a round in at one of the South's most atmospheric public golf courses before the main event. The park's Storyland and Botanical Garden make it a full-family destination on days without scheduled games.
A self-guided walk through the French Quarter on a Saints or Pelicans game day is one of American sports travel's most immersive experiences, where century-old architecture, jazz pouring from open doorways, and jersey-clad fans mingling with Mardi Gras revelers create an atmosphere unlike anything else on the sports calendar. The 13-block walk from Jackson Square to the Superdome or Smoothie King Center passes historic bars, Creole restaurants, and street performers who treat every day like a festival. Visitors who walk the Quarter before their first New Orleans game understand immediately why this city's sports culture is incomparable.
Frenchmen Street in the Marigny neighborhood is the real New Orleans music scene — three blocks of live jazz, brass band, funk, and soul spilling out of every doorway seven nights a week, making it the perfect post-game destination after a Saints win at the Superdome. Visiting sports fans who discover Frenchmen Street consistently call it the highlight of their New Orleans trip, and the outdoor art market and food carts add to the sensory overload. The DBA, The Spotted Cat, and Apple Barrel are the essential stops on the crawl, but don't plan to leave quickly — this street has kept people until sunrise for decades.
Smoothie King Center in New Orleans is tracked across 0 events and seats 16,867 fans. Here's how fans build a trip around it:
Structured facts on this page (capacity, opening year, architect, ownership) are compiled from public reference databases and verified against venue coordinates.
Lil Wayne, Anthony Mackie have been spotted at Smoothie King Center.
Smoothie King Center has a capacity of 16,867 people.
Smoothie King Center opened in 1999.
New Orleans Pelicans plays home games at Smoothie King Center in New Orleans.
Check our events page for upcoming events at Smoothie King Center.
