Lucky Strike Bethesda

Reviews

• AS

  Adeline Sans

  Feb 24, 2026
  3.0
  Things broken but employées really nice
• BB

  Bryan Berman

  Feb 24, 2026
  2.0
  Recently, I started getting more into bowling. I purchased a brand new ball and began going to Lucky Strikes in Bethesda with some friends. My biggest issue with this location is that the lanes are all really janky. Some issues I experienced with the lanes are: 1) On most lanes, the pin setter doesn't work. For example, on the first shot of a turn, not all the pins (or none of the pins) will get set, so you have to keep resetting the pins until they eventually do. On the second shot, the pin setter may not pick up all the pins, causing more pins to get knocked over, affecting the score and overall experience. 2) The ball return doesn't work. My personal ball would often get stuck, and so I would have to ask a staff person to get it for me. However, this happens so often that it is frustrating for both me and the staff. When this happens it also damages the ball. I found my brand new ball had large chips in it from this problem. 3) The scoring doesn't always work. For example, you could get a strike and the system would count it as a 9 instead. You can easily change the score, but it is annoying to do after each time. 4) Lanes are rarely oiled. I was talking to one of the staff members about lane conditions and they said they haven't oiled any of the lanes in a while. This is disappointing as some balls are designed for fresh oil conditions. This is an issue for someone (like me) who wants to take bowling more seriously. Lucky Strikes Bethesda does not do a good job maintaining their lanes. It leads to wasted time, which ultimately causes you to waste money, especially when you pay by the hour. It seems this lane has a bad reputation too. I was warned not to go here before by the pro shop I picked my new ball up from. They said that Lucky Strikes Bethesda does not take care of their lanes and to go to the one in Gaithersburg instead.
• PP

  Pleasantness

  Feb 20, 2026
  1.0
  It pains me to leave such a negative review for a place like this that I frequent regularly, but something has to change or this place isn't going to last long. The employees couldn't be friendlier or more helpful, food and drinks are top notch, but when it comes to the actual bowling, that's the part that has become incredibly dysfunctional. Every time my friends and I come here, the mechanical parts running the lanes become more and more faulty. From pins resetting improperly almost every single frame, to balls getting stuck every 3 to 4 turns, pins needing to be manually reset every time someone makes a strike and scores being registered incorrectly on the screen. And the worst part is, most lanes are like this and seem to be a bit more worn down everytime my friends and I return, which is at least once a week at this point. We would love to keep coming to this location, but the chronic mechanical malfunctions from the lanes are making it impossible to justify that at this point. I'm not sure if the mechanisms in and under the lanes are ever getting regular maintenance work done, because it doesn't seem like it having visited this place at least 3 or 4 times already since the beginning of this year. If that issue (regarding the mechanics) were to be properly resolved, that that would bring this place back up to a 5/5 for me. Otherwise, it's just becoming unplayable here because of the lack of serious upkeep to the bowling machanisms at this location. The employees are awesome, food, drinks and arcade games are awesome. Music, screens above the pins are SO entertaining. It is simply that the mechanics attached to the bowling lanes themselves are in need of a serious, serious overhaul.
• AD

  Ariana Diggs

  Feb 15, 2026
  1.0
  Worst Lucky Strike location I’ve ever been to. Don’t waste your time coming here. The customer service is horrible, you’re waiting 45mins-1hr for a drink to arrive when it’s not busy. They overcharge you for items you never received. They don’t even bring the receipt when you have to pay, they just run your card and hope you don’t look at the charges afterwards. This location needs training and new management or just shut it down.
• AP

  Alex Polishchuk

  Jan 30, 2026
  2.0
  Good bowling but food very expensive and takes a really really long time even when there aren’t a lot of people Also my friend ordered a Dr Pepper and it took half an hour to get it, it’s a soda all you have to do is pour it, come on! Also the arcade was malfunctioning and the machine took all the credits and had to get it fixed

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