Restaurants, bars and nightclubs will have to shut at midnight under new COVID-19 curfews coming into force.
The measures have been brought in to try and curb the recent spike in cases of the virus.
A further 3,633 new cases were reported on Wednesday - with 634 patients in hospitals and 119 in intensive care.
Several nightclubs around the country say they will open earlier in the evening as a result of the new restrictions.
Dublin's Tramline nightclub will open from 7.00pm until midnight, with a crowd of 900 expected on Thursday evening.
Owner and operator of the club, Ian Redmond, says shifting hours makes no sense.
"We're confused as to what difference timings make on what time someone comes to a nightclub at, and why closing at 12 is any different than closing at 3.
"It's pretty obvious to us that these measures are designed to actually just close us.
"And we would have rather that they just said 'Look, we're closing nightclubs'.
"We have to just do our best to keep our business running".
He says he believes clubs were not ordered to close entirely for financial reasons.
"This idea of closing at 12 rather than 3 it seems so non-sensical. If they want us to close we'll close, but tell us.
"And I think they're afraid that if we do, then that we'll have more rights towards further funding that they don't want to provide.
"They'll say 'We didn't tell you to close, you closed of your own free will'".
It comes as Foreign Affairs Minister Simon Coveney said the last thing the Government wants is another lockdown before Christmas.
"We can't rule out further restriction, and we will simply have to follow the behaviour of this virus in the weeks ahead to see whether we've done enough to protect society through winter or whether we need to do more.
"But certainly the last thing the Government wants is another severe series of restrictions in the build up to Christmas," he said on Wednesday.
While the Chief Medical Officer Dr Tony Holohan said now is not the time to be planning Christmas parties.
He told The Hard Shoulder the latest modelling suggests up to 200,000 people could pick up the virus next month - with as many as 4,000 people hospitalised over Christmas.
"I think a very responsible thing for people who are in a position where they are organising Christmas parties or where they are responsible for the health, well-being and welfare of their staff and the customers their staff look after, a responsible thing to do would be to conclude that now is not an ideal time to be planning major socialisation events that don't need to happen", he said.
"We know what happens over the Christmas season is lots of parties and we really do not have the capacity as a country to have significant Christmas-type levels of socialisation in the run-in to Christmas if we are to turn this around", Dr Holohan said.
