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A scheduled window when a bar runs discounted prices on drinks, food, or both. Usually weekday afternoons, but anything goes — some places run morning, late-night, or all-day happy hours.

A second happy hour that runs later in the evening — typically 9pm–close. Aimed at the after-dinner crowd and industry workers getting off shift.

A weekly slot (often Sunday or Monday) where bars offer deeper discounts to other restaurant and bar workers. Some venues open it up to anyone, others ask for a pay stub.

Exactly what it sounds like — happy-hour pricing runs the entire day the bar is open. Common on slow days like Tuesday.

Generic term for whatever the bar is discounting today. We list each specific deal on the venue card so you can see what 'specials' actually means before you walk over.

The deal applies only if you sit at the bar — not at a table or on the patio. Worth knowing before you ask the host for a booth.

Half the regular menu price. Usually applied to a specific category — appetizers, oysters, pizzas — rather than the whole menu.

Buy one drink, get a second one free (or half-off). Common on bottled beer and well drinks during slower hours.

Beer poured straight from a keg through a tap, instead of from a bottle or can. 'Drafts' is shorthand for the bar's tap list, which is what most happy-hour beer deals discount.

16 oz of beer (in the US). Most 'pint specials' are full pours of draft beer at a discount.

The bar chose a subset of its tap list (usually the cheaper or house-brewed beers) and ran the discount on those. Ask the bartender which beers are 'in' on the deal.

US-made macro beers — Miller Lite, Budweiser, Coors, etc. Often the cheapest tier of bottled beer at a bar.

Beer brewed outside the US — Modelo, Stella, Heineken, Tecate. Usually a buck or two more than domestics.

Miller High Life — 'The Champagne of Beers.' Cheap, light American lager that bars love discounting because it's already cheap and it photographs well in a coupe glass.

Retro Midwest lager from Minnesota, sold for nostalgia as much as flavor. A common cheap-beer deal in Chicago dive bars.

Mexican pale lager, frequently part of a 'beer + shot' combo or a margarita-and-Tecate happy hour at taco-leaning bars.

Chicago's hometown cheap beer. Originally brewed in Wisconsin, but adopted by Wrigley Field and every dive bar in town as the local default.

Beers brewed in Belgium or in the Belgian style — usually higher-ABV, with yeast-driven fruity or spicy notes. Common deal at gastropubs with deep tap lists.

Hoppy, bitter style of ale with a higher alcohol content than most lagers. The default 'craft beer' style in the US for the last twenty years.

Beer fermented cold with a specific yeast strain — produces the clean, crisp character of beers like Budweiser, Modelo, and most German pilsners.

A larger vessel — usually 60 oz — meant to be shared. Pitcher deals are common at sports bars during games.

The bar's house pour — the cheapest tier of every liquor (vodka, gin, rum, tequila, whiskey). Lives in the speed rail right under the bartender, hence the alternate name. Most 'well cocktail' specials are simple two-ingredient drinks (vodka soda, rum & Coke) made with these.

When you ask for a specific brand by name ('Tito's and soda' instead of 'vodka soda'). Costs more than a well, less than top shelf.

The bar's premium liquors — literally stored on the top shelf for visibility. Rarely included in well-cocktail specials; sometimes featured in their own price tier.

A canonical, recipe-bound cocktail — Old Fashioned, Manhattan, Martini, Negroni, Margarita, Daiquiri. 'Classic cocktail' specials usually mean a flat discount on this short list.

A drink invented by the bar — usually the menu's named cocktails, with their own ingredient lists. More expensive than wells or classics because of the prep work involved.

Margarita. Tequila + lime juice + orange liqueur, served on the rocks or up, salted rim optional. The default cocktail special at Mexican and Tex-Mex bars.

Gin (or vodka) + dry vermouth, stirred or shaken, served up with an olive or lemon twist. Anything else served in a V-shaped glass is technically a 'tini, not a martini.

Equal parts gin, Campari, and sweet vermouth, stirred over ice with an orange peel. Bitter, complex, and increasingly common as a frozen 'slushy' on summer happy hour menus.

Whiskey + sugar + bitters + orange peel, stirred over a single big ice cube. The oldest documented cocktail and a frequent special at whiskey-leaning bars.

Prosecco + a bitter liqueur (usually Aperol or Campari) + soda water, served over ice with an orange slice. Low-ABV, refreshing, and a patio favorite.

Any spirit topped with a non-alcoholic mixer in a tall glass over ice — gin & tonic, whiskey & ginger, vodka soda. Simple, fast to make, and what most well drinks actually are.

Rum-forward, tropical cocktails with elaborate garnish — Mai Tai, Painkiller, Zombie, Jungle Bird. Came out of mid-century Polynesian-themed bars and is having a long, ongoing revival.

1.5 oz of liquor in a small glass, meant to be drunk in one go. Shot specials usually feature whiskey or tequila — anything that doesn't need ingredients to taste like itself.

Liquor served at room temperature with no ice, no mixer, no water. Mostly used for sipping whiskey or aged tequila.

Served over ice. Opposite of 'neat' or 'up.'

Chilled (usually shaken or stirred over ice) and then strained into a stemmed glass without ice. A martini is served 'up.'

A martini made with a splash of olive brine. 'Dirty martini' = olive juice added; 'extra dirty' = a lot of olive juice.

A tasting set of three or four small pours — usually whiskey, rum, mezcal, or wine. Lets you compare without committing to a full glass of each.

Wine sold by the individual pour rather than the full bottle. Happy hour discounts almost always apply to BTG, not bottles.

The bar's default red, white, and sometimes rosé — the wine equivalent of a well pour. Cheapest tier, usually what '$7 wine' on a happy hour board means.

How much wine you actually get. A standard pour in the US is 5 oz; some bars do 6, some do 4. Always worth asking before you commit to the cheaper option.

A fee the bar charges to open a bottle you brought in yourself. Not a happy-hour thing, but useful to know.

Appetizers. Usually the menu category that gets discounted during happy hour — wings, fries, dips, sliders.

Tapas-style portions designed for sharing. Used interchangeably with 'apps' at modern American bars, but the portions are often a bit nicer and the price-per-bite higher.

The cheap, salty things designed to make you order another drink — popcorn, pretzels, nuts, chips. Sometimes free during happy hour, sometimes half-off.

A board of cured meats — salami, prosciutto, sometimes pâté — often served with cheese, mustard, pickles, and bread. Common 'fancy' happy-hour option at wine bars.

French fries (or Belgian fries, depending who's claiming credit). Almost always thinner than American steakhouse fries and served with a mayo-based sauce.

A happy hour focused on discounted raw oysters — sometimes a flat per-oyster price ('buck-a-shuck' = $1 each), sometimes half-off the regular menu.

A shareable mix of small bites — usually fried — at tiki and old-school Chinese-American restaurants. Half-price pu pu platters are a classic tiki-bar happy hour move.

A shot of Malört and a Miller High Life (or Old Style) beer, ordered together. Originally a service-industry ritual at dive bars in the Logan Square / Avondale area, now a citywide tradition. Often appears as a discounted combo on Chicago happy-hour menus.

A bracingly bitter Swedish-style wormwood liqueur, bottled in Chicago since the 1930s. Famous for tasting awful on purpose — which is precisely the point of every Chicago Handshake.

Chicago's downtown core, named for the elevated train tracks that loop around it. Lots of after-work happy hours catering to the office crowd.

Chicago's elevated train (technically the rail portion of the CTA). Knowing your nearest El stop helps you pick a happy hour you can actually get to.

A specifically Chicago concept: a bar that draws almost entirely from a 4–6 block radius. Tends to run modest, generous happy hours because they don't need to advertise to anyone but the neighborhood.