The Absolute Best Ice Cream Shops in Las Vegas

Sorry, Not Sorry has barely been open for four months at the time of this writing, but the word is FULLY out on this place thanks to their killer marketing and social media game. Also: their ice cream is BOMB. The small-batch, hand-crafted ice creams are made using milk from the century-old Scott Brothers Dairy farm in California and ingredients (like cookies, brownies, caramels, etc) are all made from-scratch in-house. What they don’t make themselves they source from other local businesses, like Blooming Buns Bakehouse. As for flavors, don’t miss out on the Ube Honeycomb made with honeycomb candy pieces from Blooming Buns, or the Whiskey Bananas Foster that tastes like it’s straight from Brennan’s in New Orleans. Maybe you like the contrast of sweet and savory, in which case you should opt for something like the Strawberry Balsamic with Black Pepper. The Crunchy PB&J is a fast fan-favorite, but there’s also Coffee and Doughnuts, Churros and Fudge, and O.G. Butter cake. It is seriously ALL so damn good. Don’t be surprised if the wait is over an hour on busy nights.
How to order: In-store.

TK’s Boba & Creamery, formerly Level Up, serves rolled and scooped ice creams, milk teas chock full ‘o boba, slushes, and iced teas alongside free-to-play classic console games and pinball. Try one of their house-rolled ice cream creations, many of which are named with nods to class video games: Rainbow Road, Pika Pika, and Atari-O are just a few of the options available.

Drill It Creamery specializes in “drilled” ice cream—soft serve ice cream with a variety of cereal mix-ins and toppings (over 30 options in total). They also have scooped ice cream, Dole whip, and beautiful custom “drilled” ice cream cakes (they do stock some in the fridge for last-minute ice cream cake emergencies, but order ahead at least 48 hours in advance to get the specific flavor combination you want). They also make all their edible cookie dough and fresh-baked cookies in-house and sell their edible cookie dough by the tub for those last-minute edible cookie dough emergencies. (Don’t be ashamed, we all know that feeling.)

You can catch Secret Creamery Fridays through Sundays operating out of a trailer in a parking lot behind Reef Dispensaries, but you’ll also find them posted up at various events around town, including EDC earlier this year and now at the totally overhauled Tao Beach. As a passionately local business, they utilize all Nevada-sourced milk in their ice creams, and source as much as they can locally. Rich, creamy flavors include some unique options like Fig and Honey and Pandan Coconut, and sweet and savory combos like Blueberry Goat Cheese and Black Sesame. But the best of the best is the vibrantly purple and dangerously addictive Ube Brownie ice cream made with rich chocolatey chunks of brownies from Carl’s Donuts, another local cult favorite.

This utterly charming scoop shop in the thriving DTLV Arts District is exactly what an ice cream shop in an arts district surrounded by mid-century modern vintage shops and rockabilly boutiques should be—a 1950s-inspired ice cream parlor complete with a vintage Wurlitzer jukebox, pastel-pink walls, a rainbow-colored floor that looks like melted pools of sherbet, and a colorful, bubbly ice cream sundae/fairy pinup mural covering one wall. They serve an assortment of house-made and Thrifty ice cream flavors, with a variety of options for toppings (including their secret “Cream Me” sweet sauce); soft serve and Dole whip; ice cream sandwiches on your choice of cookie, donut, or concha; and specialty sundaes. If you’re up for a challenge, order the $20 banana split —if you finish it by yourself in under ten minutes, it’s free!
How to order: In-store.

Rolled ice cream is a big thing here in Vegas and there are plenty of places where you can get it, but Frost N’ Roll is a few steps above most others. The ingredients they use are top of the line, including organic agave instead of sugar and fresh fruit that’s hand-picked daily. The premium dairy ice creams are all-natural, preservative-free, made fresh to order, and customized for each customer. They also have a whole line of fresh fruit sorbets, all vegan. Try one of the house creations, like the Chunky Monkey or Hawaiian Sunset, or concoct your own.

Located in Downtown Container Park, which is always a fun trip in itself, Waffelato serves puffy Hong Kong-style egg waffles and creamy Italian gelato. The waffles are made fresh to order (choose from vanilla, chocolate, or marble) and waffle “cones” are filled with your choice of rotating gelato flavors and topped with any number of candies and sauces. Or you can just pick from one of the popular signature creations like the very-Vegas “Elvis”—a vanilla waffle with vanilla gelato, Nutella, and banana.

La Flor de Michoacan specializes in Mexican frozen treats, including ice cream in flavors like Pistachio, Guava, and Strawberry Vanilla; cream popsicles and fruit popsicles chock full of huge chunks of hand-cut fruit; shaved ice; chamangos; and more. Popsicles are really the least-respected of the frozen treats and truly deserve more love—on a hot day when you’re craving something icey cold, a fresh fruit popsicle can hit the spot in a way that ice cream or sorbet simply can’t. The popsicles here come in dozens of unique flavors like Tamarind, Soursop, and Nance Fruit, and are edible works of art—kind of like those soaps you see in stores that look like slices of fancy cakes you want to eat but can’t. These you actually can!
How to order: In-store.

Because everything is Instagram and Instagram is everything, many ice cream shops go out of their way with outrageous dessert creations. At Scoop LV, they’ve got bear bottles—bear-shaped souvenir bottles for your milkshakes, slushes, and milk teas loaded with boba. (There are also light bulb-shaped bottles.) It’s unabashed food porn that steadily attracts flocks of foodfluencers, but damn if their house-made ice creams don’t earn it. There are super fun flavors like Cookie Monster, Nutella Banana, Hokkaido Milk Tea, Fruity Pebbles, Brown Sugar Boba, Black Sesame, and Surian. But most importantly, they have vibrant purple Ube Ice Cream—try it in their ube Oreo caramel shake! They’ve also got a variety of vegan ice cream options, halo halo, giant macaron ice cream sandwiches, and cookie ice cream sandwiches.

Gus Dean’s churns out premium ice cream from its Las Vegas production facility that’s sold at retail outlets inside the Grand Canal Shoppes at the Venetian and at Pawn Plaza downtown. Made very simply with butter, sugar, and nonfat milk powder for a smooth texture, Gus Dean's offers over a dozen flavors including all the classics and modern favorites like Salted Caramel, Mocha, and Butter Almond. The signature flavor, however, is Rebel Red, a strawberry, almond, and cookie ice cream named for the UNLV Rebels.
How to order: Walk-up locations at the Grand Canal Shoppes and Pawn Plaza are both open.

If you don't know what the words “Asian ice cream desserts” mean, get a crash-course education at Creamberry, where they make almost all of them. The spot has nearly two dozen ice cream and sorbet flavors, nearly 50 topping options, and more than 20 syrups and drizzles to finish them off. The kicker is that you can order them in all kinds of crazy shapes: rolled ice cream, rolled tacos (rolled ice cream in a waffle taco), bubble waffles, bear waffles (shaped like a cartoon teddy bear), halo halo, shaved ice, snow ice, and honey toast sundaes, among other things. And by “other things,” we mean the Cotton Candy Rainbow Ice Cream Burrito, which is, obviously, a dessert that exists specifically for Instagram that takes about 15 minutes to craft (so wait times can get really long if there are a lot of ‘grammers ahead of you in line).

This place is classic Vegas—and classic walk-up custard stand. Located spitting distance from the Strip in the shadow of the STRAT in downtown Las Vegas, Luv-it has been around since 1973 (that’s historic in Vegas years) and serves two unique rotating and seasonal flavors, in addition to the staple vanilla and chocolate, all made fresh daily. Check the calendar online for exciting flavors like Sin-a-Buns or Death by Chocolate. The shop also now accepts credit card payments and has their own app for order-ahead pickup and home delivery.

Nielsen’s Frozen Custard is a blast from the past—back to the days of soda shops and sock hops. Think vintage tin Coca-Cola signs and black, red, and white checkered packaging. Nielsen’s custard is made fresh in-store every few hours, always with a unique “flavor of the day” (check Facebook) in addition to chocolate and vanilla. You can order a custard cone or a pint to go, but their specialty is the Concrete, a “very thick shake you eat with a spoon” (think DQ Blizzard, only way thicker) with any number of candy, chocolate, fruit, brownie, or nut combinations. Their custards are also available to take home by the pint or quart.

CJ’s serves house-made soft serve custard, gelato, and Italian ice, with over 30 flavors of custard and 12 flavors of Italian ice available daily. Flavors change constantly, but expect some nostalgically unique ones like Cinnamon Toast Crunch custard, Orange Saltwater Taffy custard, Cotton Candy Gelato, and Sour Patch Kid ice. The shop also offers a variety of waffle cones dipped in chocolate and coated in cereals, candies, cookies, and sprinkles, and with the sheer number and variety of toppings and sauces available, the number of possible permutations of combinations for your concrete or sundae is probably in the thousands. There’s a lot of decision-making involved, so to make it easier on yourself stick with one of their customer favorites, like Instagram-famous BOBAlati, a mix of boba, Italian ice, and gelato all rolled into one; or the Spicy Sandia, made with mango ice, watermelon ice, pineapple Dole whip, chamoy, tajin, fresh watermelon and strawberry, and a “spicy stick.” CJ’s is known for its innuendo-heavy Instagrammable moments by way of neon signage inside its shops that make a lot of use of the word “lick,” so come ready for your selfie and order something ostentatious!