Edinburgh Hogmanay 2026/27: Street Party, Torchlight Procession and How to Book

Torches on 29 December

The Torchlight Procession (The Meadows to the Old Town) opens the festival, and a torch puts you inside it. The flames wind up a narrow Old Town street as the light goes, orange firelight on the tenement stone. Wristbands start at £5.75 and a torch ticket is £25. The premium ticket adds a pre-show in the McEwan Hall at a higher price.

One torch covers two people, and extra walkers get wristbands. A party of ten buys five torches and wristbands for the rest. The procession is 12+ and under-18s walk with an adult.

Settle one thing before you book the flights. The New Year's Day Loony Dook at South Queensferry is cancelled for 2027, and organisers said it returns in 2028. Do not build the trip around that dip.

Princes Street and the gardens on 31 December

Edinburgh's Hogmanay Street Party (Princes Street) is the night the city is known for. The street fills from 8 p.m. until 12:45 a.m. with stage screens and pipe bands, Edinburgh Castle floodlit on its crag above the gardens. Entry is a general-admission wristband with no table system, so a crowd of any size walks in together.

Tiers start at £10 and a standard wristband runs £33 to £39 including fees. The age limit is 12+ and under-18s need an adult with them. This is open-air Scottish winter. Dress for sideways rain. Buy only through edinburghshogmanay.com, Ticketmaster or Tickets Scotland, because resale listings are void.

Hogmanay in the Gardens (West Princes Street Gardens) sits in the sunken valley directly beneath the castle rock, the big stage at the foot of the floodlit cliff, laser and projection beams hitting the castle walls. Underworld headline their first Edinburgh Hogmanay with corto.alto and LF System, and play 'Born Slippy' as the castle fireworks go up. The sightline on those fireworks is the best in the city.

Tickets start at £79, and the enclosure and premium tiers run from £89. Enclosure, Gardens and Premium platform are all standing only with no table bookings, and a group buys adjacent tickets and stands together. Underfoot it is sloping grass and tarmac paths. This is a separate ticket from the Street Party. The age limit is 12+, with under-18s supervised.

Ceilidhs on 29, 30 and 31 December

Ghillie Dhu (2 Rutland Place) is a converted Victorian church with stained-glass windows and a galleried wooden-balconied Auditorium, the ceilidh band playing from the altar end under tartan and dark timber. The live band runs until 2 a.m. and DJs carry it to 4 a.m. Guests step out onto Rutland Place for the fireworks and then go back in. This is the most accessible real ceilidh for a visitor.

Dinner is £85 in the main bar and £159 for the six-course Auditorium sitting, both on set-menu tables. After-party entry on its own is £20 to £40. Buy that for the dancing without the dinner. Large parties book by phone, and the room can be hired privately.

Assembly Roxy (Roxburgh Place) runs the XL Hogmanay Laldie Ceilidh with the HotScotch Ceilidh Band from 8:30 p.m. to 1 a.m. on 31 December. The room is a former church hall with bare stone walls and a raked horseshoe balcony over a wooden dance floor, the band on a small stage and dancers spinning in sets of eight. Ceilidh dancing needs those eight. Parties are the norm and no experience is required.

Admission is general with no reserved tables, at ££, and tickets are non-refundable. The same promoter runs warm-up ceilidhs on 29 and 30 December. This is the locals' Hogmanay.

The Biscuit Factory (Anderson Place, Leith) gives the Haggis Ceilidh Club a raw brick-and-concrete warehouse, exposed steel columns and roof trusses, festoon lights strung over a big open floor. The party runs 9 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. on 31 December with one of Scotland's hardest-working ceilidh bands and a licensed bar, at ££. It is a 20-minute walk or a short tram ride from the centre, which keeps you clear of the Princes Street crush. An earlier family session runs the same evening, and refunds are available up to 10 days before.

Dinner in Leith and on Queen Street

The Royal Yacht Britannia (Ocean Terminal, Leith) is black tie at £385 a head. Behind the royal blue hull with its gold stripe, the welcome is a red carpet and dinner is served in the Queen's own state rooms on 31 December, at the long polished mahogany table under brass lamps in the State Dining Room, the varnished teak of the Royal Deck outside. A table of 12 is sold for the price of 11, at £4,235. Smaller bookings are seated on shared tables.

Guests staying on the Trust's Fingal ship get 10% off. It sells out months ahead, so book this one before anything else on your trip.

The Scotch Malt Whisky Society (28 Queen Street) takes two sittings on 31 December, an early dining experience and the later 'Last Dram of the Year' with live music and more than 200 single-cask malts. The ground-floor Kaleidoscope bar of the Georgian townhouse is lined with plain green bottles carrying only numbered labels and is open to non-members as well as members. The panelled members' room and its fireplaces are upstairs. Seating is dining tables and bar tables at £££. It suits a small group, and the whisky is the point.

Brewhemia, The Caves and The Voodoo Rooms

Brewhemia (Market Street) is a vast Bohemian grand café below Waverley, seven bars across five rooms, brass fittings, red velvet booths, beer-hall benches and a cabaret stage. The 'Glitterati' night fills all five rooms with drag artists, DJs and the Rollin' Drones, two minutes from Waverley station. It is the best-value big indoor night in the Old Town. Party entry is £30, a drinks package £75 and four-course dining £150, and a reserved drinks table adds £20 a head to party entry.

Two door rules decide whether your group gets in. Entry is strictly 21+, and the dress code bars sportswear, fancy dress and football colours. Last entry is 11:30 p.m. The venue has no cloakroom, so carry nothing you need to hang up.

The Caves (South Bridge) is candlelit 1788 stone vaults built into the substructure of the bridge, raw dripping brick arches and low barrel ceilings, with the wood-panelled Monteith Bar and Gentleman's Lounge off the main cave. A DJ plays until 3 a.m. on 31 December, at ££. Of every room here, this is the one to be in at the bells. The vaults are hot and loud and they queue badly.

Entry is general admission with no reserved seating, which gets a group in together. Arrive early. The door is strictly 18+ and smart dress, and last entry is 1 a.m.

The Voodoo Rooms (West Register Street) hosts VEGAS! The Grand Hogmanay Ball from 9 p.m. on 31 December in an ornate gilded first-floor ballroom above the Café Royal, black-and-gold plasterwork, chandeliers and a mirrored bar, showgirls in feathers and a Sinatra-suited crooner on stage. Swing, burlesque, blackjack and disco run across the ballroom, the speakeasy and the casino lounge. Entry is £30, general admission across all the rooms, and a group can roam between them. Dressing up is strongly encouraged, and the night lands best if your party will actually wear the 1950s outfits.

Cheap and late on the Cowgate

Stramash (207 Cowgate) is a converted stone church under the South Bridge arches, gothic arched windows and a galleried upper level looking down on the band, 850 people deep around a low stage. Scottish trad and covers bands play into the small hours on 31 December for £20. Music starts at 8:30 p.m. and it is walk-in until 10:30 p.m., after which you need a ticket. The venue has no table service, so get your group in before that cut-off. It is a two-minute stagger from The Caves and The Three Sisters.

The Three Sisters (139 Cowgate) is a huge cobbled courtyard walled in by tall soot-dark tenements, big screens and gas heaters over long benches, three separate themed bars opening off it. Live music and DJs start at 8 p.m., karaoke at 9 p.m., and confetti cannons go off at the bells. Entry is £, with bookable tables alongside general-entry tickets, and the courtyard takes stag and hen-sized parties without strain. It is loud and young and has no dress code. A quiet dram is not on the menu.

La Belle Angele (Hastie's Close off the Cowgate) is a low-ceilinged brick basement reached down the close, soundsystem speakers stacked either side of the stage and red and blue wash lighting over a sweaty packed floor. Samedia's Hogmanay Tropical Soundclash runs 11 p.m. to 5 a.m. on 31 December with Samson Sounds live plus reggae, afrobeat and global bass, and it has sold out four times before. Tickets are £11 to £19 plus booking fee. The door is 18+, there are no tables, and this is a dancefloor club. Choose dancing over fireworks and it is the best value late night in the city.

Booking and the days that matter

Three dates carry the whole festival. 29 December is the procession and the first warm-up ceilidh, 30 December the second, and 31 December everything else.

Book the Britannia first and the Street Party only from its three official sellers, and remember that Assembly Roxy refunds nothing while The Biscuit Factory will. The Loony Dook is off for 2027. See the Edinburgh guide and the Edinburgh hotel search.