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Pub Of The Month - April 2026 with Bucking Fastard on the Pub Forum

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Submitted on Wednesday, 20^th December 2023
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The City Arms, Cardiff

12 Quay Street
Cardiff
CF10 1EA

Phone: 02920641913

Correct details

Served areas

Cardiff Central

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The City Arms Today’s cask ales for you all 11:58 AM Jun 18th 2021 from Twitter for iPhone

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Reviews of The City Arms (Average Rating: 7 of 10) Add Review see review guidelines

David Walton left this review about The City Arms

Visited 13/04/26. Visited for ticking purposes on 05/04/18, but many times before then and around then but not for a few years.

Cask here was most of the Brains regular ales, the Bitter, the Dark, SA Gold, SA and Rev James. Keg offerings were Guinness, Brains Bitter Smooth, San Miguel, original SB, Barry Island IPA, Thatcher's Gold, Carling, Cruz, Moretti, Carlsberg, Estrella, K1664 and the Blanc variety.

The venue is an old school Cardiff city centre boozer. There are a few picnic style benches on the pavement at the front. Bare boarded with a three-sided bar counter just inside the left- and right-hand entrances at the front of the venue. The left-hand side of the venue is mostly regular tables and chairs plus some drinking ledges around the three pillars in the middle of the space and there is a single tall table with tall stools opposite the front edge of the bar counter. The space hosts a couple of TVs silently showing snooker on my visit, a dartboard, a large Brains mirror and several framed prints. The front of the bar counter running between the left- and right-hand seating areas has a couple of tall stools at the bar counter and there are a couple of tall tables in the front leaded glass windows. The right-hand seating area is smaller with just a high seat leather banquette serving a few tall tables and opposite the right-hand side of the bar counter. There is a single TV showing the aforementioned snooker and again a large etched brewery mirror on the wall opposite the bar counter. There is another seating area in the rear right-hand corner beyond the end of the bar counter that has an orange studded leather banquette serving a few regular tables. An upstairs seating here has never been visited by me and indeed wasn't open on this visit.

Until recently (when I discovered this was now a Brains establishment and so ahead of this visit) this was my favourite and what I knew as the best pub in Cardiff. It used to be a magnificent cask ale venue, loads of choice and always of the utmost quality. Bit disappointed didn't get to review for here when it was at its magnificent best, but left to last open venue on here to review to complete the Cardiff postcode set of venues for nostalgic reasons (I do have one after this but not likely to get to visit as it is ostensibly a nightclub). Whilst I have nothing particularly against Brains, couldn't put it high on my list now so I sadly think I am unlikely to revisit this one even though it is a good outlet for their beers. The magic has gone!

On 17^th April 2026 - rating: 6
[User has posted 1590 recommendations about 1565 pubs]

Tris C left this review about The City Arms

Located just behind Tiny Rebel, this was my last and solo pub of the crawl.
The interior is fairly traditional with a bare boarded floor, unwatched cricket and at least one games machine. Customers were mixed locals and no sign of Gemma Ford, or maybe I’m just not ‘fit’ enough.
A Brains outlet, so their brews: Bitter, Dark, SA Gold, Rev. James and SA, £2.39 a half and boring.
On balance, this pub is above average, by which I mean above average by Cardiff Central standards.

On 3^rd June 2025 - rating: 5
[User has posted 2324 recommendations about 2267 pubs]

Please Note: This review is over a year old.

Blackthorn _ left this review about The City Arms

A good sized pub located just a stone’s throw from the stadium, it occupies a large corner plot and was presumably at one time, two or three units that have been knocked together.

Internally it consists of a number of interconnected rooms arranged around a central wood panelled bar counter. Flooring was bare boards, whilst the ceiling was covered in embossed wallpaper in that nicotine colour of old, that you see less and less of these days. Walls were mostly a sort of maroon shade with pine wood panelling on the lower part, although I did note that one of the rear rooms had the walls entirely plastered in old Wales rugby photos. Other rugby memorabilia included a signed shirt and a Welsh flag on the ceiling. Seating was a mixture of chairs, stools, and some padded banquette seating off to one side. There were several TV screens dotted around showing sports fixtures, as well as a juke box and a fruit machine, which is normally the sort of thing that would put me off a pub somewhat, but here it somehow managed to blend in without being at all intrusive.

Beers on tap were all from Brains with their SA, SA Gold, Dark, Bitter and Rev James. Ciders were well represented with Rosie’s Pig in Strawberry, Rhubarb and Raspberry flavours, Old Rosie, Inch’s, Aspall’s, Strongbow regular and Dark Fruit, and Thatcher’s Gold and Haze. All in all, not a bad pub, and I’d happily stop by again if in the area.

On 21^st December 2023 - rating: 7
[User has posted 2113 recommendations about 2011 pubs]

View more reviews of The City Arms (10)

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