Great way to pass the time with friends and family. I like that you can choose which player that needs the bumpers. Simple check in process, same ol style bowling shoes. I also like that there is a place to get snacks. As when your having fun and enjoying yourself you want to nibble. The arcade is the highlight for my kids for sure. There is many many games to choose from to play. I always end up at the air hockey table. That is my favorite arcade game since i was a little girl. Something about the noise the air makes as it escapes the tiny holes on the playing field. The ping on the puck hitting the sides. The bowling area is large and has a ton of lanes, so on a busy night your still able to get a lane. read more

Great Customer Service! Place well kept and up to date. Would definitely recommend and re-visit.

It's a really nice bowling alley! Staff is nice, really the only downside is that it's pretty hot in there. I'd definitely recommend bringing some water! read more

I've been here a couple dozen times in the past ten years. We recently started going again. Lane availability is poor at best. The concession stand rarely serves anything during the week. Weekends, seems maybe a little better than half the time. It's not because it's unattended. Before COVID, I would have given it 3 stars. Based on the past 4 visits, I rounded up to 2 stars. read more

Bowling is ok, some of the lanes seem to hook a little and the sensors sometimes misread the pins. The biggest issue was the arcade. Half the machines didn't work and the constant trek to the counter to ask for tokens back got old real fast. read more

Bowlarena - Bowling Near Me - Jacksonville, North Carolina

I liked the bowling part of the bowling alley. The lanes and computers were really updated and made it fun. The bartender was not personable at all... and ordering food was a joke... we ended up eating else where. The customer service really could use a bump here but bowling was fun for sure. read more

This alley is by far the best I've been to. It was so good that I needed up getting a job here haha. The prices are fantastic especially if you've got a group of 4-5 people since it's only $15 per hour per lane. I just moved down towards the Jacksonville area and I'm having a great time here. I just joined a league to! Definitely come here for a good bowling experience with great prices. Definitely the best lanes I've bowled on. read more

Bowlarena - The alley - Bowling Near Me - Jacksonville, North Carolina

My family and I found this place last night and I was pleasantly surprised and impressed with this facility, overall. Very plain building and unassuming storefront, so i didn't really expect much before we went in. Inside was very clean and very retro-modern decor. Everything seemed new. Staff was friendly, concessions were reasonably priced with a good selection, and we had a great time. We haven't been bowling in a while and we're still new to this area, so I felt the price was a bit steep. It should be noted, however, that I'm not familiar with what it usually costs for a family of four (two adults, two kids) so it may be typical of what it usually costs. For (4) shoe rentals and two games, we paid $51. Again, this may be what it usually costs for a family of four, so I don't know -- it was just a little more than I thought it would be. read more

See all

Jacksonville can't get any worse. Bowling alley filled with rude workers horrible management. Bad drinks bartenders is disrespectful. Tried talking to the manager about bartender and she does not care. Avoid this place if you are trying to enjoy your time. read more

Has been totally renovated. Now has a larger snack bar area where you can have a bday party for your kids. The menu has been upgraded, they make the best fried naked chicken wings in jville now. Plenty of lanes where you can get in and out and the have new bowling packages. Definitely worth making a regular thing with the family. read more

Best place to go bowling. Hidden from the main drag, but very nice establishment. Staff is friendly, prices are very decent, food is good, and has a bar. Lanes are pretty up to date and clean. read more

Bowlarena - Bowling Near Me - Jacksonville, North Carolina

See all

Food bad, they do an only league night on Tuesdays and on base is closed so no bowling on Tuesdays not so friendly staff

I came here with my family expecting the usual bowling experience, the place was about half full but there are little to no bowling balls to use the one they do have are fifteen pound balls with small finger holes as if a 7 seven year old on steroids is about to bowl or somthing read more

Lots of fun!! Workers are super nice and friendly. It was clean, no problems. Will definitely be going back

For bowling I'd give it a 3 stars. They need more security there was a fight one of the last times I was there. The few Staff they have is not able to handle that and run the place. Do not eat at the snack bar if there is a tall young kid cooking and taking orders!!! He does not wash his hands or where gloves. He made multiple pizzas and worked the register with out gloves or hand washing. You could see him straight in the kitchen if you sit at the chairs in front. He makes his food and eats while making customers orders. The management know that he is a problem and they do nothing about it. He bully's other staff. Again they do nothing. Some one is going to get sick eating there. The health department should go inspect that kitchen. I bet they would close it if they saw how it is run with that kid there. Absolutely disgusting. read more

We were only planning on going to the arcade just to burn some time, as we didn't have much left to do in this area. Being ignorant and wanting to get to the games, we accidentally put a 20 dollar bill into the electric chair. We immediately told staff and the woman at the counter was extremely helpful and contacted the people who owned the machine who would be able to open the machine up and give us our money back. Ended up putting in 10 dollars while we waited and had a ton of fun. Exchanged all of our tickets for some candy and a few other little trinkets. We ended up leaving and left our contact info so we could swing by later to get our 20 dollars back. Staff is friendly and helpful. This place is perfect for children. read more

This place was a lot of fun!! It cost $4.25 a game and $3 for shoes. It was a pretty good deal. After 9 pm it turns into cosmic bowling and they have music videos playing. It gets you all pumped and have fun. You can also request songs to play too!! I requested the song I walked down the aisle to and my husband was all excited when it played :) They also have a snack bar and a lounge. Sadly the lounge lost their liquor license so they only sell beer which was good for my hubs. He got this huge tube filled with beer (about 2.5 pitchers) for $15. It was really cool. No over all had a blast!! We will definitely be coming back!! read more

I was very surprised that this bowling alley is so clean and well kept. We went last Saturday at 4pm. It wasn't crowded at all. The snack bar and the arcade were also clean and well kept. I absolutely recommend this place! read more

It would be far more enjoyable if the lady working the food bar wasn't rude to everyone. Everyone else was great. I get that dealing with the public can be draining, but she was the worst part of the experience. The lanes are great (balls felt limited) and it was clean. The food is okay. We only had fries but they were burnt. If you want a slushee expect to wait at least an hour or just not get any at all.. read more

Bowling was fine but we found multiple unidentifiable floating black particles in our beer. The bartender charged us for two contaminated pitchers. We were cordial to the staff - just asking for a replacement, but they were not accommodating. We pulled a black particle out of the beer that opened up a flew away. We can't make this up. read more

Bowlarena - Bowling Near Me - Jacksonville, North Carolina

This is a great experience for adults and kids! Clean and fun establishment for the whole family.

Poor organization. States party room. We were seated in the bar area. Staff were all nice but overall as a parent I will not do another birthday party here. This is the second party and there has been no improvement. read more

Had a good time bowling here with friends, but they randomly wouldn't serve tap beer for like an hour, and were trying to get everyone to buy more expensive bottles instead. They never really explained why it happened, and I just thought that was really weird and shady. Otherwise a pretty good time. read more

There is a lack of balls here, which really hampers the experience. If you have normal man sized hands the odds of you finding a ball to fit your fingers into is very rare, especially if more than 4 lanes are occupied with adults. The staff especially in the kitchen are slow and seem fairly uninterested in helping you out, not necessarily rude, just uninterested. read more

Had a great time on friday night. Had to wait a while but it was nice playing pool in the bar while i waited. Great cheap fun

If I could I would give it no stars. The snack bar food was disgusting and did not taste good at all. The lanes were dry and had no oil and made it hard to bowl. The attendant at the front was rude for no reason and had attitude. Definitely not worth my money. Will not be going back ever. read more

I came here with another family and we had a great time, however the parking arrangement was awful. We drove around looking for parking and it seems they share a parking with what looks like a church next door and the church goers were parking in the front and side of bowling and walking over to the church. Another problem I had was the older lady in the food court who seemed to be very rude and on top of being rude she gave me frozen chicken wings that I had to bring back. Besides that there was good music and great prices. read more

Went here tonight on a last minute invite from our besties, The Ortegas. They live in Jacksonville and we live in Wilmington. We had pitchers of beer, bowled 2 frames, ate in the cafe and played in the arcade. It was easy to find (although the gps tried to take us down some unexplainable dirt path). It was Halloween but the night bowling was a blast with the black lights and laser show special. We had a blast and will be back each time we visit The Ortegas. Thank you for an awesome Halloween, Bowlarena!!! read more

We had a birthday party from 12-2 on a Saturday. We pre-ordered two pizzas and had the room booked for a month or so. After arriving right at 12 and talking to our "party server" we really had no understanding of the flow of the party. So we set up the room and decorated with our decorations, trying to hide their 1990s style decor. One pizza came out at 12:30 and the other about 10 minutes later. The kids dig in and we have to ask our server when we will be able to bowl and get shoes etc. I get the answer: after I drop off the rest of the food I will come back and get sizes. So around 1ish we are done eating and head out to bowl. A few minutes later the server comes out and tells an adult that we only have the room for 45 minutes and we have to get our stuff out. We do and continue to bowl, quite surprised and upset about the lack of service and knowledge about what was happening. My sister who paid the bill,asked to talk to the manager and he basically said take your business elsewhere. We sure will next time and recommend other families do the same. read more

Bowlarena - Party room - Bowling Near Me - Jacksonville, North Carolina

The worst place I have by far been to for bowling and food. The employees acted as if they hated their lives there, were so rude and not to mention there was a cockroach in our pizza and refused to give us a refund, instead they wanted to make us more food. No thank you. I will never ever be coming back. Disgusting. read more

The place doesn't look that spiffy, but my family and I had a great time. It's not overly loud inside, which was really nice. A few nautical decorations so it was kid friendly. They do have some food and adult beverages if you need to spike your game. Saw a lot of good casual bowlers here!! I think they have league practices or tournaments as well. read more

Great family fun. We recommend it! Relaxed atmosphere, helpful, friendly staff that aim to please. Enjoyed hot dogs, nachos with cheese, lemonade, candy from the vending machine, video games that take you back to the good old days. Clean bathrooms and shoes. Automated bumpers for children and a cool automated scoring system that displays comments on your bowling like "bummer" or "cool dude." Very enjoyable and reasonably priced. Don't let the outside of the building deceive you. Have fun and enjoy, we did!!!! read more