Hula Hula runs tropical karaoke on East Olive Way in Capitol Hill, a tiki bar that moved here from Queen Anne in 2017 and now sings 365 nights a year.
The room commits to the theme without apology: bamboo, blowfish lamps, carved masks and a stage that never goes dark. The original opened next to Tini Bigs in Queen Anne in 2006, then relocated to its current Capitol Hill home in 2017, a move documented by Seattle Met and the tiki press. The new room is bigger than the old one and built around the karaoke booth, with a horseshoe bar and enough seating to hold a birthday party and a few walk-ins at once.
Decor does the heavy lifting here. Fishing floats and thatch hang from the ceiling, the lighting glows amber and red, and the back wall frames the singers like a small stage. It is a themed room played straight, not as a punch line, and that commitment is why it has outlasted most of the bars that opened around it.
Order the Mai Tai or a Blue Hawaiian and split a scorpion bowl if the table is four-deep. Drinks land in the friendly range rather than the craft-cocktail tier, which fits the crowd and the volume, and most cocktails sit in the low-to-mid teens. The pours favor sweetness and rum over precision, which is the right call for a karaoke room. Yelp reviewers into June 2026 single out the singing as the real headliner, with a rotation that keeps moving even on a packed Saturday.
The crowd is young, loud and there to sing. The Search for the Ultimate Mai Tai, a tiki travel site, called it one of Capitol Hill's most reliable nights out for a group, and the room fills with bachelorette parties, off-shift service workers and regulars who have a go-to song. It is not a quiet sipping room and never pretends to be; the volume is part of the deal.
Best time to go is a weeknight if a turn at the mic matters, since weekends back up fast and the song queue can run an hour deep. Skip it if a calm conversation or a serious cocktail is the plan. It suits a birthday group, a karaoke crew, and a tiki fan who wants the drinks and the show in one stop without crossing town for them.
Getting there is straightforward. Hula Hula sits on East Olive Way a block from the Capitol Hill core, walkable from the light rail station at Broadway and John and a short ride from downtown. The kitchen keeps a short menu of bar food to soak up the rum, and the room takes walk-ins rather than reservations, so a weekend group should arrive together and early. The singing runs late, the floor stays warm, and the tropical theme holds up better here than at the newer rooms that have tried to copy it. The bar runs no cover and keeps the music going until last call at two, so a late arrival works as well as an early one for anyone willing to wait out the song queue.
What regulars say
- Yelp reviewers call the nightly karaoke the real headliner.
- Seattle Met documented the 2017 move from Queen Anne to Capitol Hill.
- Tiki writers rate the room among the Hill's most reliable group nights.
Who it's for
- A birthday group that wants a stage
- A tiki fan after Mai Tais and a show
- A loud night, not a quiet date
See where it sits among the best tiki bars in Seattle and explore more bars in Seattle or the wider Seattle cocktail bars guide.
Sources: Hula Hula official site (2026); Yelp (n=419, June 2026); Seattle Met; Tripadvisor (2026).
