Venue
Pilton, near Shepton Mallet, Somerset, England, United Kingdom
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Glastonbury Festival guide
Five days camping on Worthy Farm.
In short
Glastonbury suits festival-goers who want far more than headliners, with theatre, circus fields and late-night corners across the farm in Pilton. It usually runs Wednesday to Sunday in the last full week of June, with a fallow year roughly one year in five. General admission for 2027 has sold out, so watch for the resale.
Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Performing Arts is the largest greenfield festival of music and the arts in the world: five days on Worthy Farm in Pilton, Somerset, where around 210,000 people camp among the stages, theatre and circus fields, a cinema and late-night corners that most of the crowd finds by accident.
The Pyramid Stage headliners get the television coverage. The festival's character lives elsewhere, in the Green Fields, the circus and theatre tents and Shangri-La after midnight, and in a spirit inherited from the hippie and free-festival movements.
It is muddy in a wet year and dusty in a dry one. Regulars talk about both kinds with the same affection.
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Key Facts & Stats:
Ends: Sunday, 27 June 2027
Where: Glastonbury, United Kingdom
Venue: Worthy Farm
Held: Every year
Type of event: Live Events, Musical Events, Arts Festivals
Currency: Pound sterling (GBP, £)
Time zone: Greenwich Mean Time, UTC+0 (UTC+1 in summer)
Language: English
Map
Getting around
Hotels near the venue fill up around the event dates.
Packing for both mud and heat
Pack for mud and heat at once, and pack lighter than you think, because you will carry it all from the gate to your tent.
- Weather
- wellies and a waterproof, plus sun cream, a hat and a warm layer for the nights.
- Sleep
- earplugs and an eye mask. The site is loud and bright until late.
- Water
- a reusable bottle to fill at the free taps. On a hot day, drink more than you think you need.
- Health
- a basic first aid kit and any medicines you rely on.
- Camp
- your tent, sleeping bag and mat, tested before you leave home.
Where to pitch your tent and staying together
Your campsite shapes the whole festival. Pitch near the fields where you expect to finish your nights, since crossing the farm in the small hours is slow and tiring.
Go with people you trust in a crowd, and look out for each other. Agree a meeting point everyone can find without a map, and a time to check in each day.
Keep your ticket and wristband on you at all times, and carry valuables on your body, never in the tent. Leave space in the day for wandering: the best finds at Glastonbury are rarely on the schedule.
Where and how it is celebrated
The main cities where the festival is celebrated.
Pilton
What happens on the day
- Wednesday
Gates open
Many people arrive on the first day to claim a good pitch.
- Wednesday and Thursday
The quiet days
The main stages are still dark. Use the time to explore the smaller venues and learn your way around the fields.
- Friday
Main stages start
The Pyramid and the other big stages open, and the site is at full strength.
- Saturday
The busiest day
Expect the longest walks between fields and the biggest crowds in front of the headliners.
- Sunday
Last night
The final headliners close the festival; most people pack up and leave on Monday morning.
How Glastonbury tickets, deposits and resales work
General admission for 2027 sold out on 4 October 2026 in under 45 minutes. If you missed it, your remaining chance is the resale of cancelled and returned tickets planned for spring 2027, which goes just as fast. Only people who registered in advance can buy, and registration for everyone aged 13 or over closed on 25 September 2026. Each ticket carries the holder's photo, cannot be passed on and is checked against ID at the gate, so the name on your booking is the person who goes.
Payment comes in stages. A ticket costs £408, including a £5 booking fee, plus postage of £11.25 per order, or £3 if you booked a coach package. A £100 deposit secured each ticket, and the rest must be paid in the window from 1 to 7 April 2027. Put that week in your diary now. Miss it and the ticket is lost.
With the ticket settled, the rest of the planning is about travel and kit. Settle early on coach, train or car, since each shapes how much you can carry onto the farm. If Glastonbury is one stop on a longer trip, our United Kingdom page covers the rest of the country.
Rutland Boughton, Michael Eavis and the Pyramid Stage
The name is older than the festival. Between 1914 and 1926 the composer Rutland Boughton ran a summer school in the town of Glastonbury, and its concerts, lectures and recitals went out under the title Glastonbury Festival, drawing a bohemian crowd. The modern event began on 19 September 1970, when the dairy farmer Michael Eavis opened Worthy Farm to around 1500 people at £1 a head. A year later the first Pyramid Stage appeared, a one-tenth scale copy of the Great Pyramid of Giza placed over a blind spring.
It became an annual fixture in the 1980s, when the temporary pyramid gave way to a permanent stage and the festival began giving a large share of its earnings to good causes. WaterAid, Greenpeace and Oxfam have worked with it for years, and by the organisers' figures recent editions have passed on more than £3 million annually. A new Pyramid went up in the 2000s.
Eavis is still the face of it, but his daughter Emily now handles most of the running. The roots in the hippie and free-festival movements show in the fields away from the main stages, where much of the crowd spends most of its time.
Getting there
Flying in
Bristol Airport is the nearest major airport for anyone flying to the festival.
By train
Castle Cary is the closest station, with trains from London Paddington. Free shuttle buses take ticket holders from the station to Pedestrian Gate A; in past years they ran about every 15 minutes from early on the Wednesday, stopping overnight when the trains did.
Travel light by rail
Castle Cary has no left luggage, and trolleys and four-wheeled carts are not allowed on the trains or the shuttles.
By car
Expect slow queues on the Somerset lanes, and park as close as you can to the campsite you plan to use.
On site
Everything is on foot, and crossing the farm takes far longer than the map suggests after rain.
Where to stay during the festival
We have no hotels listed in Glastonbury yet, so the ones below are in Bath, the nearest area where we list hotels. The next edition runs from 23 June to 27 June 2027. Book as soon as your dates are fixed, since rooms close to the festival are the first to go.
Bath
The Royal Crescent Hotel & Spa5-star hotel
No reviews yet
from$560.00/ night
- Free WiFi
- Swimming pool
- Parking
5 Rooms available
Book Now
Weather and what to pack
Late June in Somerset is mild. At Yeovilton, the nearest long-running station, June averages a daytime high of about 20°C and a night-time low of 10°C, with 57 mm of rain over about nine wet days (1991-2020 normals).
The same field can be dusty one year and deep mud the next, and nights under canvas get cold.
Worth packing
- Wellington boots, whatever the forecast
- A waterproof jacket and a warm layer for the nights
- Sunscreen and a hat for a dry year
- A head torch for the walk back to the tent
- Your photo ID, which is checked against the ticket at the gate
Car hire in Glastonbury
Airport transfer to Glastonbury Festival
Met at arrivals at Bristol Airport (BRS) and driven door to door to Worthy Farm.
- Bristol Airport (BRS) → Worthy Farm
- 43 km · 50 min
Restaurants and food in United Kingdom
Places to eat in United Kingdom before or after the celebrations.
Magpie Café
14 Pier Road, Whitby YO21 3PU, United Kingdom
Cuisine:SeafoodFish and chips
- Dine-in
- Takeaway
Ubiquitous Chip
12 Ashton Lane, Glasgow G12 8SJ, United Kingdom
Cuisine:ScottishModern British
- Dine-in
- Bar
The Kitchin
78 Commercial Quay, Leith, Edinburgh EH6 6LX, United Kingdom
Cuisine:Modern ScottishSeasonal
- Dine-in
Dishoom Covent Garden
12 Upper St Martin's Lane, London WC2H 9FB, United Kingdom
Cuisine:IndianBombay café
- Dine-in
- Bar
- Outdoor seating
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Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
General
Only a few. The demands on the water supply are enormous, so large banks of public showers are not possible. There are some at the bottom of the Kidzfield and in the Greenpeace field, but expect a long queue.
There are several types, and all are cleaned at least once a day. Use them, and nowhere else: urine running into the streams on the farm can kill fish and other wildlife, so the organisers take that rule seriously.
Yes, but not in glass, which is banned on site. Decant drinks into plastic bottles before you set out, and remember that you will be carrying them the whole way from the car park or the shuttle stop to your tent.
Not by their usual standards. Artists are reported to receive less than 10% of what they would earn for a comparable show elsewhere. The headline slots still have no shortage of takers.
Plenty. There is a cinema, the Unfairground, the Workers' Statue in William's Green and the Ribbon Tower for a view across the valley. The festival also prints its own free newspaper each day, and you might find yourself in it.
Huge. The public camping space alone covers around one million square metres, about 900 traders set up shop, and the festival gets through some three million gallons of water. That is why every crossing from one field to another takes longer than you expect.
The 2025 festival, held from 25 to 29 June, had The 1975, Neil Young and Olivia Rodrigo at the top of the Pyramid Stage bill. It was the last edition before the farm rested in 2026.
No. Worthy Farm is in Pilton, near Shepton Mallet. The name comes from an earlier Glastonbury Festival of concerts and lectures held in the town itself between 1914 and 1926, and Michael Eavis's event kept it.
National Express is the official coach partner, with departures from cities all over Britain straight to the festival. A coach package is bought with your ticket and cuts the postage on your order to £3. For many people it is the least stressful way to arrive with a tent.
Getting there
Around £30 in recent years, and more at the busiest times. The free shuttle bus from the station to Pedestrian Gate A is the cheaper option, but it does not run overnight.
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