Ice Cream in Ann Arbor – Where to Get a Scoop in 2026
The line is out the door. It’s 87 degrees, the pavement is doing that wavy heat thing, and everyone in Ann Arbor has the same idea at exactly the same time. The good news is this town has enough ice cream to handle it – from small-batch creameries that change their board weekly to a counter that has been scooping since 1934.
Here’s where to go, what to order, and the current hours so you don’t drive across town to a locked door.
Blank Slate Creamery
This is the one. Blank Slate makes everything in-house from a Michigan dairy, and the flavor board rotates weekly with combinations that sound weird until you taste them and then you’re mad you only got one scoop. Balsamic strawberry. Fresh basil with olive oil. Carrot cake with Zingerman’s Creamery cream cheese frosting swirled through it.
The shop on West Liberty is small – maybe eight people fit inside – so expect to wait on a Saturday afternoon. Get a waffle cone. They make those in-house too, and the smell when you walk in is half the reason to go.
300 W Liberty St. Blank Slate Creamery
Regular hours: Mon-Thu 12-10pm, Fri-Sat 12-11pm, Sun 12-10pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Washtenaw Dairy
If Blank Slate is the new Ann Arbor, Washtenaw Dairy is the Ann Arbor that never left. It has been on South Ashley since 1934, scooping more than 30 flavors behind a glass case in a room nobody has bothered to modernize. Michigan Pothole – chocolate ice cream with peanut butter cups and fudge – is the local order. Mackinac Island Fudge is the tourist order. Both are correct.
They also do cake donuts in the morning, which sell out early, so if you’re the type who eats ice cream for breakfast in the summer, get there before the counter gets busy. No judgment here.
602 S Ashley St. Washtenaw Dairy
Regular hours: Mon-Thu 5am-9pm, Fri 5am-10pm, Sat 6am-10pm, Sun 6am-9pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Michigan Creamery
Tucked onto State Street near campus, Michigan Creamery is run by the same people who used to run Stucchi’s, and it shows – this is scooped ice cream and gelato done by people who have been doing it a long time. The texture on the gelato is denser and silkier than standard ice cream, proper gelato, not soft-serve with an Italian name.
Toasted coconut is the sleeper. Anything chocolate hits hard if you want something rich. It’s the easiest stop if you’re already walking campus, right between the Diag and the State Theatre.
302 S State St. Michigan Creamery
Regular hours: daily 1pm-11pm, though the board can close early on a cold or slow night. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
El Harissa Market Cafe
You came for the North African food – the shakshuka, the merguez, the spreads – and then someone at the next table is eating gelato and you didn’t know they had gelato. El Harissa makes about twenty flavors of small-batch gelato and sorbetto that lean into their spice cabinet: think baklava, rose, cardamom. There are vegan sorbets in the case too. It’s different from anywhere else on this list, and that’s the point.
The cafe is on North Maple, a little off the downtown path, so it’s the move when you’re on the west side and want dessert that isn’t the usual.
1516 N Maple Rd. El Harissa Market Cafe
Regular hours: Tue-Sun 12-7pm, closed Monday. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Dairy Queen
Sometimes you don’t want a story, you want a Blizzard. The Packard Street DQ is a Treat-only location, which means no burgers, just soft serve, dipped cones, and Blizzards thick enough to turn upside down. It’s the plan-B when the line at Blank Slate wraps around the building and you have a kid melting down in the back seat.
Nothing fancy here, and that’s the appeal. Order the same thing you ordered when you were nine.
1805 Packard St. Dairy Queen
Regular hours: daily 12pm-10pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Dexter Creamery
Worth the fifteen-minute drive out Huron River Drive. Dexter Creamery sits right on Main Street in downtown Dexter, and it’s the kind of small-town scoop shop that makes the trip its own little outing – grab a cone, walk down to the mill pond, let the kids run around. Hand-dipped scoops, shakes, and a rotating flavor list.
Pair it with a stop at the Dexter Cider Mill in the fall and you’ve built a whole afternoon out of one dessert decision.
8106 Main St, Dexter. Dexter Creamery
Regular hours: Mon-Thu 3-9pm, Fri 3-10pm, Sat 12-10pm, Sun 12-9pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
la piña loca
Something different. la piña loca on Platt Road sells traditional Mexican paletas – hand-crafted fruit pops made from fresh ingredients rather than processed mix. Tamarind with chili. Mango with Tajin. Coconut. Watermelon. If you’ve only had paletas from a cart, these are a step up. There are creamy options too, made with real milk, alongside the sorbet-style fruit bars.
It doesn’t look like much from Platt Road – it’s a small counter shop in a strip plaza – but the regulars know it, and it’s the right move on a hot afternoon when you want something that isn’t the standard ice cream shop.
3980 Platt Rd. la piña loca
Regular hours: daily 11am-9pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Chick Inn Drive In
A Ypsilanti original. The Chick Inn on Holmes Road has been a drive-in since the 1950s – walk up to the window, order, and eat outside. Soft serve cones, dipped cones, sundaes, milkshakes. It’s the kind of place that shouldn’t still exist in 2026 but does, and is better for it.
Go for the dipped cone if you’ve never had one – vanilla soft serve pulled through chocolate shell that hardens on contact. It’s a thing. The shakes are thick enough to stand a spoon in.
501 Holmes Rd, Ypsilanti. Chick Inn Drive In
Regular hours: Mon-Sat 11am-9pm, Sun 11am-8pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
A Few More Worth Knowing
These spots don’t have a MIAnnArbor listing yet, but they’re worth knowing about.
Ben & Jerry’s, 304 S State St, is the campus scoop shop right across from the Michigan Theater – open late, generous with the free-cone samples, and exactly what you want after a movie. Regular hours: roughly 1pm-11pm daily, opens 3pm Wednesday. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Sanilac Creamery (the former Zingerman’s Creamery, same gelato and same people, renamed in late 2025) is at 3723 Plaza Dr, right by Zingerman’s Bakehouse. Their gelato comes from the same dairy program that goes into their cheese, and the chocolate is deep and serious. Regular hours: Mon-Thu 11am-6pm, Fri-Sun 10am-6pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
Luca Pastry, 3354 Washtenaw Ave, is an Italian bakery where you walk in for the cannoli and leave with gelato too. Pistachio is the test – if a place can do pistachio right, they know what they’re doing. Luca passes. Regular hours: Mon-Sat 10am-8pm, Sun 10am-4pm. Verified 27 Aug 2026.
One note on downtown: Kilwins on East Liberty closed at the end of 2025 after more than forty years. The storefront is becoming Quix Chocolate, which plans to sell Guernsey Farms ice cream alongside the chocolate, so there will be a scoop at that address again – just not the shop you remember.
The Scoop on Scoops
Most of these stay open until 9 or 10pm in summer, which means post-dinner ice cream walks are very much on the table. The stretch from Liberty to Ashley to State covers Blank Slate, Washtenaw Dairy, and Michigan Creamery in about a ten-minute loop, so if you can’t decide, just start walking and let your nose pick.
A few things worth knowing. Blank Slate’s line moves faster than it looks – they’re efficient scoopers. Washtenaw Dairy is cash and card, but the line is shorter if you know your order before you reach the counter. El Harissa is closed Mondays, so save it for another day. Downtown parking is free after 6pm and all day Sunday, and the Liberty Square structure off Washington puts you a block from Blank Slate.
For more places to eat, drink, and spend a summer afternoon in Ann Arbor, see our guides to the best bakeries in Ann Arbor and the best coffee shops in Ann Arbor, or explore the full directory at MIAnnArbor.com.
