Watching Arsenal in London with Kids
Start with the honest bit: most of the famous Arsenal matchday pubs are a terrible idea with a child. The Tollington clears its furniture out on match days to fit more bodies in. That is a brilliant place to watch a North London derby and a miserable place to be seven years old.
But "not the Tolly at 2pm on derby day" is not the same as "nowhere". There are London Arsenal pubs with kitchens, gardens and more than one room, and on an early kickoff they work fine.
What actually makes a pub work with kids
- Food. A pub with a proper kitchen has tables, and tables are the whole game.
- More than one room, so you are not stood in the middle of the noise.
- A garden. Half-time outside resets everyone.
- An early kickoff. 12:30 Saturday is manageable; 8pm Champions League is not.
The London ones that work
- The Plimsoll — gastropub ranked in the UK top 50, near Finsbury Park. Best food of any Arsenal pub in London, and the Arsenal crowd is still there.
- The Alwyne Castle — Islington gastropub near Highbury & Islington, more upscale than the Blackstock Road rooms, and the beer garden is a suntrap.
- The Faltering Fullback — the three-level treehouse garden. If the football goes badly, the garden is the day out.
- The Highbury Barn Tavern — reopened in 2025 after a £500,000 refurbishment, 200 capacity across three rooms. Space is the point.
- The Horatia — Holloway Road, rotating food pop-ups, fills fast but starts roomy.
- The Thornhill Arms and Hemingford Arms — the two anthem pubs on and around Caledonian Road. Both do food, both are a walk from the ground, both are calmer than N5.
The rules, briefly
In England and Wales a child can be in a pub with an adult if the licensee allows it — it is the pub’s call, not the law’s, and many stop admitting under-18s in the evening. Under-16s cannot be in a bar area that is exclusively for drinking. None of this is unusual or awkward; if you are unsure, ring the pub. They will tell you straight.
The honest take
If it is the kid’s first Arsenal pub, go for an early kickoff, go somewhere with food, and go an hour early so you get a table. Do the Emirates walk afterwards. The pub they remember will be the one where they got a seat and a plate of chips, not the one where they spent ninety minutes looking at somebody’s coat.
Sourced from fans via GoonerPubs. Child policies vary by pub and by night — ring ahead for a big fixture. Know a London pub that does this well? Add or update a pub on GoonerPubs.