Guide
Every list of things to do in Montreal starts with the Old Port and ends with a smoked-meat sandwich. Both are great. This list is for the second visit, the date that needs a plan, or the group that has already done dinner: things that are genuinely different, including plenty we don’t own.
Updated September 12, 2026
Each entry gives the neighbourhood, whether it is indoors or outdoors, roughly how long it takes, who it suits best, a budget band ($ under 25 per person, $$ 25–60, $$$ more) and one honest sentence on why it is different. Hours, prices and seasons change; the link on each entry opens the venue in Google Maps so you can check the current details before you go.
Entries that belong to our group, A\Maze, are marked as ours. We included them because they belong on the list, not because the list is ours.
Why it’s different. Coached axe throwing downtown: ten caged targets, real coaches on the floor, and a tournament to finish. Nobody arrives as the expert, which is why it works for groups.
Open →Why it’s different. A flying-trapeze school where a first-timer swings from the bar within the hour. It is far more accessible than it looks and nobody forgets it.
Open ↗Why it’s different. Spin art on a centrifuge: you leave with a canvas you actually made, and the technique makes talent irrelevant.
Open ↗Why it’s different. Aerial rope courses built into two pirate ships on the quay. Seasonal, and the rare attraction where a seven-year-old and their parents are equally busy.
Open ↗Why it’s different. An urban zipline over the Old Port basin. Short, cheap and a better photo than the Ferris wheel.
Open ↗Why it’s different. Tubing runs and skating on Beaver Lake, inner tubes to rent, and the city under snow from the lookout. The most Montréal thing on this list costs almost nothing.
Open ↗Why it’s different. Projections on the walls of Old Montréal tell the city’s history after dark, with an app for sound. Free, and it turns a walk you would take anyway into a show.
Open ↗Why it’s different. Immersive projection galleries you walk through rather than look at. Different from a museum in the way a concert is different from a record.
Open ↗Why it’s different. A spa built into a former ferry moored in the Old Port, with outdoor pools facing the skyline. The setting does something no land-based spa can.
Open ↗Why it’s different. A pub with a library of a thousand board games and staff who teach you the rules. You pay a small cover, you stay all evening.
Open ↗Why it’s different. Escape rooms with real sets rather than padlocks on a door. Pairs naturally with an hour at Rage on the same evening.
Open ↗Why it’s different. An outdoor electronic music festival in the coldest weeks of the year. Nobody else does this, for obvious reasons, and that is the point.
Open ↗We did not include restaurants, because every Montréal list already does, and we did not include anything we could not describe from experience or from the venue’s own published description. If something above has closed or changed, tell us and we will fix the entry.
If you are planning for a group rather than a pair, the size matters more than the activity: our guide to Montréal group activities by group size covers 4 to 60 people.
Axe throwing with a coach, a flying-trapeze class, a spa on a moored ferry, or Cité Mémoire’s projections on the walls of Old Montréal at night. The list above gives neighbourhood, duration and budget for each.
Rage, OASIS Immersion, Randolph’s board-game pubs, A\Maze escape games and Trapezium are all indoors and all bookable for the same day.
Tubing and skating on Mount Royal, Igloofest in January and February, and the indoor entries above. Axe throwing is a winter favourite because it is warm, loud and takes an hour.
Yes. At Rage, up to 40 people book a 60-minute session directly online; 41 to 60 guests, or 90 and 120-minute events, go through the group-event planner.
Book a 60-minute session at Rage, then pick your second stop from the list.
The other guide : Montreal group activities by group size: 4, 10, 20, 40 and 60 people.