Manchester AO Arena
AO Arena, formerly Manchester Arena, NYNEX Arena and Manchester Evening News Arena (or M.E.N. Arena in short), is a large arena venue in Manchester. The arena was designed by DLA Design, Austin-Smith:Lord and Ellerbe Becket. It opened in 1995 and originally housed a multiplex cinema with the arena and a multi-storey parking. The cinema closed in 2000 and is now a call centre. It was one of the first venues in Europe to be built around a 360-degree sitting layout. The arena is located a short distance away from Victoria station. The arena has also been home to Manchester Storm and Manchester Phoenix ice hockey teams and the Manchester Giants basketball team. Currently, the arena is not used by any sports team but is only used for one-off sporting events. The arena also claims to have the largest indoor video scoreboard. Despite it now being deactivated it is still mounted on the roof and has been replaced with an LED ribbonboard mounted on the scoreboard's exterior.
The arena was named "Busiest arena in the world" between 2001 and 2007 based on concert ticket sales, and was voted Europe's favourite arena at TPi Awards in 2008 by touring companies. As of 2006 it has a seated capacity of 19,000 (expandable to 22,500), thus it is the largest indoor arena in Europe.
The arena hosted many events, including WWE and UFC fights, and also paid host to many boxing matches with boxers such as Amir Khan, Mike Tyson and David Haye. In 2019, the arena hosted the World Taekwondo Championships. The World Taekwondo Qualification Event for the Beijing Olympic Games was held at the arena in 2007. In April 2008, the arena hosted the FINA Short Course World Swimming Championships. For this occasion, the arena has been transformed with two olympic swimming pools. Since 2008 it also hosted a week of the Premier League Darts.
In May of 2017, after the Ariana Grande concert which was part of the Dangerous Woman Tour, a suicide bombing attack took place in the arena's foyer area, killing 22 people, including the bomber, and injuring 500. Following the events, the arena was closed until September. The foyer was renovated and the arena re-opened with a benefit concert.
Muse appearances
Venue address
AO Arena
Victoria Station Approach
Hunts Bank
Manchester M3 1AR
United Kingdom