Although Austin has no major professional sports team from the NHL, NBA, NFL or MLB, it still has professional sports: the Austin Ice Bats of the Central Hockey League, the Austin Wranglers of the Arena Football League and the Austin Toros of the National Basketball Development League. The Houston Astros' Triple-A baseball team, the Round Rock Express of the Pacific Coast League, plays in Round Rock, one of Austin's northern neighbors.

The key sports focus is upon the University of Texas and its Texas Longhorns. In 2005, the 'Horns won the College World Series and took home the National Championship in college football with a rousing win in the Rose Bowl in Pasadena, California. The 'Horns are also world-renowned for their annual fall football game with the Sooners of Oklahoma University. The 'Horns and the Sooners meet on neutral ground in Dallas at the Cotton Bowl for the annual shootout which awards bragging rights to the winner.

The other side of the coin for sports and entertainment has to do with Austin's music culture. The live music venues along downtown's 6th Street reverberate with country and western, bluegrass,jazz, blues and rock as the great and not-so-great entertainers play to enthusiastic and welcoming audiences. The annual film, music and multimedia festival known as South by Southwest also draws huge audiences, and the longest-runing concert music program on American television, Austin City Limits, is videotaped on the UT campus. Austin is surrounded by bicycle trails, gleaming lakes, local natural spring pools such as Barton Springs and hosts annual endurance and multisport races. The Capitol 10,000 is the largest 10K race for runners in the state. In addition, there are cycling races and triathalons, but if you're just not athletic, you can go to the Congress Avenue Bridge over the Colorado River in downtown Austin at dusk from February to December and watch the largest urban population of Mexican Free-Tailed Bats zoom out in search of insects. There are more than 1.5 million of them, and their departure each evening can even be detected on weather radar.

Austin is also a city of diverse cuisines, with emphasis on Tex-Mex, Texas Barbecue and what some describe as Hill Country Cuisine, a mix of German, Czech and Polish foods. It is also a city of haute cuisines with many upscale restaurants serving international fare in French, Italian, Asian and fusion styles.