Thai bar girls are a large part of Thailand’s nightlife scene, attracting a huge number of foreign male tourists to destinations like Pattaya, Bangkok, and Phuket, and are a common feature in the bars of towns and cities where expats live and work.
There is no mystery to Thai bar girls, and this guide is not a great reveal of Thailand’s sex tourism and bar girl scene. If you’re visiting for the nightlife and plan to meet them, though, here is everything you need to know about Thai bar girls, including who they are, what they do, and why.
What is a Thai Bar Girl?
A typical Thai bar girl is a woman who works in bars and adult entertainment venues that cater to foreign men in tourist destinations such as Pattaya and Bangkok, and is also a sex worker.
Whether they are employed as waitresses, hostesses, or gogo dancers, bar girls are employed primarily to attract customers to the bar and keep them entertained so they spend more money buying drinks for themselves and “lady drinks” for their newfound bar girl friends.
As an incentive, the girls earn a commission on drinks a customer buys for them.
How it Works
For a fuller explanation of how meeting Thai bar girls works, including buying lady drinks, paying bar fines, and what “long time” and “short time” means, read this guide on paying for bar girls in Pattaya.
Bar Girls vs Freelance Girls
You could easily mistake freelance girls for bar girls when you meet them in so‑called ‘freelancer‑friendly’ bars. The difference is that you don’t usually pay a bar fine for freelance girls. Otherwise, you’ll mainly find Thai freelance girls in nightclubs and online on dating apps.
Who are Thai Bar Girls?
Every Thai bar girl working in touristy destinations like Bangkok, Pattaya, and Phuket has her own story of how and why she became a bar girl.
For some women, especially exceptionally attractive women, being a bar girl is a way to make lots of money quickly in order to start a business of their own, provide a better future for their kids, get out of debt, or any number of other things.
When you’ve been around the bar scene for a while, you’ll notice a familiar theme to many of their stories: most Thai bar girls you meet come from Northeast Thailand (Isan).
Isan is a mainly rural region. Much of the work is poorly paid agricultural work, so a typical bar girl’s parents might be poorly paid rice farmers.
Many live hand-to-mouth in small village-like communities. The family home may be nothing more than a bare brick or wooden building with a tin roof.
In many cases, her parents can’t afford to send her to university or college. That means getting a well-paying job is extremely difficult. The only options might be to follow in her parents’ footsteps or take a similarly poorly paid job, such as working in a factory.
For many of these girls from Isan, or elsewhere, working as a bar girl can provide an opportunity to earn considerably more money than they could in a poorly paid job back home. Or, if they’re lucky and it’s what they’re looking for, they might even find themselves a wealthy foreign boyfriend.
Things You Need to Know About Thai Bar Girls
They are mostly fun-loving and friendly, and the Thai girlfriend experience is a good description of what being with them can be like.
Being in the “customer relationships” business, they are often very perceptive and soon able to figure out what a guy is looking for and whether he is kind-hearted, a cheap charlie, or a newbie in Thailand.
Whether it concerns their marital status, sexual history, or how long they have worked in the bar, they don’t always tell the whole truth.
Many Thai have at least one sponsor regularly sending them money, the sponsor being a customer she met previously and who now thinks she is Thai sweetheart and that they are in a relationship.
Prostitution is technically illegal in Thailand under national law, but in practice consensual adult sex work is widely tolerated. Thai law strictly prohibits commercial sex with anyone under 18, and bar girls are usually 20 years and above due to drinking age and employment restrictions.
How Much Do Thai Bar Girls Earn?
Bars pay the girls a basic salary, plus commission on lady drinks and a share of any tips. Most importantly, bars are a place to meet customers who pay the bar a “bar fine” so that they can take girls out for an agreed period, known as “long time” and “short time.”
In beer bars, girls might only earn a small basic salary of around 12,000 baht per month, while gogo dancers can get up to 30,000+ baht per month.
Other ways bar girls make money are:
- Commission on lady drinks, 30–50 baht
- Payment from customers, 1000–3000+ baht
- Percentage of shared tips plus personal tips
- Sometimes a percentage of the bar fine
A Thai bar girl’s earning potential depends on her popularity, which in turn is usually reliant on her looks.
An attractive Thai bar girl working in a popular bar might have at least ten lady drinks bought for her every day and be “bar fined” by a customer once a day.
In the case of a dancer at a popular gogo bar, on a salary of 1000 baht per day, commission plus tips, and payment from a customer, her earnings could exceed 5000 baht per day, compared to a factory worker on 400–500 baht per day.
Where to Meet Bar Girls in Thailand
You will find Thai bar girls, girlie bars, and red light areas in Bangkok, Pattaya, Phuket, Koh Samui, Chiang Mai, and most other touristy places in Thailand.
Towns and cities in Thailand where ex-pats work and live, such as Khon Kaen, Udon Thani, Songkhla, and Ban Chang, also have areas where girlie bars and Thai bar girls can easily be found.