Joe's Crab Shack - Galveston - Seawall

The food was horrible we all got sick
From eating there way overpriced and priced high for the little food you do get

Service was great. Drinks were okay. We ordered crab pots. A little disappointed. Should have believed the reviews.

Crab legs were spoil!! Smelled and tasted like ammonia

Making a reservation was pointless, we had to wait 45 minutes to be seated and people that were coming in after us got seated before us because with a reservation you have an assigned table and you have to wait for that table to be clear. Made no sense to me and didn't help that the hostess was rude and so unhappy.

Hostesses were rude, crab was over cooked. Other than that it was fine. Waiter was great.

Requested corn instead of fries, were told yes, not done. Broccoli arrived after we requested the bill and had finished everything else. Cocktails were poor. Crab was a sad example. Dishes were edible. Went to another restaurant to change the flavor.

Despite reservations, we waited an hour to get a table. Food was just ok. We always think of Joe's Crab Shack as a 'fun' place to eat... it was not fun.

James (our server) was awesome! A big thank you to those that came to work at Joe’s so visitors to Galveston could enjoy our time!

It isn’t the restaurants fault but there aren’t enough employees. Our waiter, Josh, was great. He had a big area to cover but was always attentive. The crab is always good but the sides are always lacking. I would definitely want Josh as our waiter again. He is a hard worker.

We are frequent diners at this location. We had come in the night before and it was a 2 hour wait. We saw plenty of open tables. So we made a reservation for Sunday at 12:30 as it was Labor Day weekend. On Sunday, we got there 30 minutes early and waited an hour to get our food. Again, plenty of open tables. We were told the wait staff was full. However the kitchen staff was not. Once we got our food, we enjoyed our meal. No complaints. Our server was named, Dutch and she was fantastic and upbeat. She was what saved our dining experience.

Food was okay at best. Some things were cold. We chose not to do anything about it because it took so long for our order to even come out.

Not one of their better nights

Great food and service.

Made reservations didnt get seated until 820. They had tons of open seats but werent seating anyone . The next night we checked in at 7 for a 730 again and didnt try to seat us until 830. But they sat a group of 6 without a reservation at 740. Its ridiculous only good part was our server.

Server was working hard. Very confusing on checking in. Food was fair.

They were super busy but we were there for almost three hours and our main course was deliver before our appetizer.

Go somewhere else service was bad crab was soggy and way overpriced

Loved it! The food was great and our waitress was Awesome!!

We had went to the app to make reservations. Didn’t get in until 30 mins or so after our reservation. Greeters were very stand offish. Bartender forgot our drinks as we were waiting. Had to tell her again after we had paid and she took our tickets. This was our families first experience and won’t be going back to a Joe’s:(

Had reserved but had to wait for a little while once we got there and was seated outside area which was fine.

This bad review is for not for the services or our waitress. The bad review is for the food! Everything was terrible! My husband had the supposedly steamed crabs and other stuff, the food tasted like it was coming right out of a microwave. The crab meat was rubbery. I ordered clams and mussels, the taste is rubbery and old.

Waited a half an hour for our table (we had a reservation) and another hour from the time we ordered our food to when it arrived

Joe's was great. It'd been years since we've been. I was quickly reminded how good the food is. Our server, Bessie, was awesome. She ended up with a giant table next to us (with no help mind you) yet our service never wanted. She was a trooper for sure! Great food, great servers and a fun atmosphere. Eat at Joes!

On a island that has way more options then space, I would look elsewhere. Better quality food at a much fairer price is not terribly hard to find (I got roughly the same amount of food from Number 13 that was much fresher and cheaper!)

Staff was friendly, energetic, & helpful.

Everything was very good!
Good food and service. The only thing is we had to wait a long time for food to arrive.

Shrimp and crab were over cooked in our Steampots. Slow to get food out of the kitchen.

Caesar salad served with honey mustard dressing rather than Caesar dressing- only about 5 small shrimp with it- way over priced. The Shrimp platter was more like a “broccoli and rice” platter. Slow service due to being under-staffed…waited 30 minutes (after making a reservation). Needed to take fewer walk ins or manage a different way

The food was good. They forgot the hushpuppies on one order. Food took 45 minutes to come out. They had 4 people checking reservations and putting people on waiting list but only 4 servers. Whomever schedules staffing needs to think about priorities. We sat down and there was so many empty even for coronavirus accommodations. My husband drank a glass of tea and they came back twice and said it was still brewing, never got a refill.

The hostess was rude and spent more time talking to her friend/coworker instead of paying attention to the guests trying to check in. Our waiter was fantastic and he seemed to be the only one really working.

Great food make sure and share market price tho had the money too pay but was a little bit of a sticker shock on price

Had 1900 reservations, showed up twenty minutes early to make sure we got seated on time, still didn't get seated until near 1930. Server did great job, but they are significantly understaffed

This was our first time at Joe's Crab Shack and we enjoyed it.

We made a reservation for 6:15 but still had to wait 45 minutes to get a table once we arrived. Otherwise it was great!

Food and drinks were really good. Our server sucked though. He barely paid attention to us. The only reason I even had a good time was because a host that was being used as a food runner noticed that our server wasn’t doing his job and helped us with everything. she was awesome.

Love this place

I wouldn't return. From what everyone has said about them I was thinking I was going in for a great meal and was given dirty unflavored mushrooms and very bland everything else. The waitress we had was the best part of our experience. She was helpful, friendly and willing to go over everything with a high level of energy.

The patio was covered with dozens & dozens of flies swarming our food. It was gross and not enjoyable. We had to hurry through our meal. They need to put some fly traps on the patio.

We had made a reservation through OpenTable for 6:45. When we arrived at 6:30, we were told we could be seated outside or have to wait up to almost 2 hours for a table inside. It was over 80 degrees outside, but we chose outside so we could eat. It was poor management of our reservation and of the seating of customers inside since I saw a table that could have accommodated my party sitting empty for the first 45 minutes while we were there. The waiter did fine even though you could tell he was new and inexperienced and did not know the menu well. Our food was not very good. The seasoning on my dish was dumped on one spot of the food. My sons steak was supposed to be medium and came back over done. Un edible. They advertised souvenir cups with their margaritas and they did not have any. Outside dining smelled like fish and when other parties were done, the dirty tables were left unattended for long periods of time. Local birds would be feasting on the leftover scraps. We were there to celebrate my sons birthday and it was noted in my reservation. The whole experience was so bad, nothing special was done by the staff for his birthday. He didn't even get a dessert.
Would not recommend this restaurant until they get their act together.

I made the reservation for 6:15. We did not get seated until almost 7:00. They were short servers which I understand but they could tell people that when they arrive so we can make an educated decision whether to stay or not. They were telling people 30/40 min wait time which actually turned into over an hour to hour and a half wait. We talked to several people around us as we waited and heard all their wait time stories. They were afraid to leave because they new they would have to wait somewhere else all over again.
Our server was great though. We told her that we were in a hurry because of how long we had to wait so she was great to get our food ordered right away and kept our drinks full.
I think the host just didn’t know how to handle the short staff and didn’t want to turn people away but it kind of backfired on him as people were getting impatient including me as I had a reservation.