LOCAL CUSTOMS · SINGAPORE
How happy hour works in Singapore
Singapore runs a full happy-hour culture under a tight liquor licence. The deal you will see most often is not “$5 off.” It is 1-for-1: buy one drink, the second is included, inside a posted window.
1-for-1 is the local happy hour
In the CBD, Boat Quay, Clarke Quay, and the hotel bars, the after-work window is a normal product. Offices empty toward 6 or 7. The board outside often says “1-for-1” on house wine, beer, or spirits, sometimes on cocktails, usually from mid-afternoon until 7 or 8. Half-price exists too. A 1-for-1 is a bad deal if you are drinking alone and a good one if the table is sharing. The Atlas treats “1-for-1” as a package, not as a single-glass price, so it does not pretend the second drink has a unit cost.
Hawker centres and coffee shops are a different market. Most of the Atlas’s Singapore list is licensed restaurants and bars, not a kopitiam beer.
The bill says ++
A food-and-beverage menu is allowed to show a price before tax. The letters “++” mean plus 10% service charge and plus 9% GST. GST is calculated on the price after the service charge, so the add-on is a bit more than 19%. “Nett” means the number on the board is the number on the bill. The Atlas’s price note under a Singapore deal says this. It does not add the ++ into the figure, because the venue didn’t.
Where and when you may drink
Selling liquor requires a licence from the Singapore Police Force. A typical on-premise licence (Class 1A) runs from 6 a.m. to just before midnight; extensions exist and cost extra. Public drinking — a park, a void deck, the street — is prohibited from 10:30 p.m. to 7 a.m. Little India and Geylang are Liquor Control Zones with tighter public-drinking hours. Drinking inside a licensed bar during its legal hours is the ordinary case and is allowed. You must be 18.
What the Atlas does not check yet
The clock on a deal is the venue’s clock. The page does not yet know whether that venue’s licence stops at 10 p.m. or midnight, and it does not redraw prices as nett. Confirm the licence hours if a deal claims to run late.
Cities
Sources
- Singapore Police Force — liquor licence classes
- Liquor Control (Supply and Consumption) Act 2015
- IRAS — displaying prices (F&B exception)
Laws and regulator pages as checked on 27 October 2026. A licence condition can be tighter than the statute. Confirm with the venue.