The World's Greatest Music Festivals and How to Get There

These are those festivals. The ones that have built genuine mythology over years and decades. Where the ticket is harder to get than a flight and if you've been before, you already know you're going back.

Here's everything you need to know to actually get there: ticket prices, on-sale dates, how to get from Australia, and where to buy. Because wanting to go and actually going are two very different things, and the difference is usually just knowing where to start.

1. Glastonbury Festival: Somerset, England

Glastonbury is not a music festival. It's a temporary city. Every June, approximately 200,000 people descend on Worthy Farm in rural Somerset and transform a working dairy farm into the most famous festival site on earth, a labyrinth of stages, markets, theatre, circus, healing fields, and five days of music spanning every genre imaginable. The Pyramid Stage alone has hosted everyone from David Bowie to Beyonce to Adele. The Park Stage, the West Holts, the Other Stage, the Arcadia spider, there are enough experiences at Glastonbury to fill a week, and most people still feel like they missed things.

The mud is real. The queues for the showers are real. The moment the headliner starts and 100,000 people start singing in unison is also real and it's one of the great experiences in live music, full stop.

The Details

Location: Worthy Farm, Pilton, Somerset, England

Dates: Late June each year (typically last Wednesday to Sunday of June). Glastonbury does not run every year (i.e this year 2026) as it takes a 'fallow year' periodically to allow the land to recover.

Ticket Price: Approximately £375 (AUD $730) for a full festival ticket including camping. Tickets are non-transferable and require photo ID registration in advance.

When Tickets Go On Sale: Registration opens year-round at glastonburytickets.co.uk BUT you must register before tickets go on sale. The main ticket sale typically happens in October/November the year before the festival, selling out within minutes. A second sale (resale) follows in spring. Set an alarm. Be on the website early. Have your registration number ready.

Buy Tickets: https://www.glastonburyfestivals.co.uk/info/

Getting There from Australia

Fly into London Heathrow (LHR) or Bristol Airport (BRS). From London, take the train to Castle Cary station (approximately 2 hours from London Paddington). National Express coaches and dedicated festival shuttle buses run from Castle Cary to the festival site. From Bristol, coaches run directly.

HOWEVER! Most international visitors base themselves in London before and after (for recovery). Allow a full day of travel from Australia

2. Coachella Valley Music and Arts Festival: California, USA

Coachella is the festival that redefined what a music festival could be, part concert, part art exhibition, part fashion week, part cultural moment. Held across two identical weekends in April in the California desert, it draws a lineup that reads like a who's who of contemporary music, from chart-topping headliners to emerging artists that the rest of the world discovers six months later. The production is extraordinary: massive stage installations, interactive art pieces the size of buildings, and a site that genuinely has to be seen to be understood.

Be aware! The heat is real, April reaches 35-40 degrees. The dust is real. The cultural cachet is also real, and Coachella's livestream audience now rivals the on-site crowd. Nothing compares to being there as the sun sets over the desert and the main stage lights up.

The Details

Location: Empire Polo Club, Indio, California, USA

Dates: Two consecutive weekends in mid-April. Weekend 1 and Weekend 2 have identical lineups.

Ticket Price: General admission from USD $649 (AUD $1,000). VIP from USD $1,199 (AUD $1,850). Shuttle passes and camping are additional. Weekend 2 tends to have slightly better availability.

When Tickets Go On Sale: General sale typically opens in June/July the previous year via the Coachella website. Tickets routinely sell out within hours. Weekend 2 often has a slightly longer sale window. Sign up for the Coachella mailing list for advance notice.

Buy Tickets: coachella.com

Getting There from Australia

Fly into Palm Springs International Airport (PSP), the closest airport to the festival site, approximately 40 minutes by car. Alternatively, fly into Los Angeles (LAX) and drive east approximately 2.5 hours. Rideshare (Uber/Lyft) and official Coachella shuttle buses operate from Palm Springs, Indio and various LA pickup points.
Book accommodation in Palm Springs, Indio or the surrounding area months in advance, the entire Coachella Valley books out.

3. Tomorrowland: Boom, Belgium

If Glastonbury is the world's greatest general music festival, Tomorrowland is the world's greatest electronic music festival and it is, by design, unlike anything else. Set across two weekends in late July in the small Belgian town of Boom, Tomorrowland transforms a stretch of parkland into an elaborate fantasy world: themed stages that look like they've been built for a film set, production values that make other festivals look modest, and a lineup of DJs and electronic acts that represents the absolute pinnacle of the genre. Martin Garrix, David Guetta, Armin van Buuren, the residents of Tomorrowland are household names in electronic music.

The festival has also created a travel package system, DreamVille that handles everything from accommodation to shuttle transfers, making it one of the more logistically manageable international festival experiences. The crowd is genuinely international in a way few festivals match, with visitors from over 200 countries across both weekends.

The Details

Location: De Schorre Provincial Recreation Domain, Boom, Belgium

Dates: Two consecutive weekends in late July

Ticket Price: Day tickets from approximately EUR $180 (AUD $300). Full weekend passes from EUR $280 (AUD $470). DreamVille accommodation packages (camping + ticket) start around EUR $450 (AUD $750) and go significantly higher for premium options.

When Tickets Go On Sale: Tickets typically go on sale in February/March for the July festival. The Global Journey travel packages (which bundle flights, accommodation and transfers) sell out extremely quickly, often within hours of release. Register on the Tomorrowland website well in advance to receive on-sale notifications.

Buy Tickets: tomorrowland.com

Getting There from Australia

Fly into Brussels Airport (BRU), approximately 30 minutes from Boom by train or shuttle. Amsterdam's Schiphol Airport (AMS) is an equally good option with a direct train to Brussels and connecting shuttles. Tomorrowland operates an extensive official shuttle network from Brussels, Antwerp and other Belgian cities during festival weekends. The Global Journey packages handle all transfers as part of the booking, the easiest option for international visitors.

4. Fuji Rock Festival: Niigata Prefecture, Japan

Japan runs one of the most civilised music festivals on earth, and that description is entirely intentional. Fuji Rock, held at the Naeba Ski Resort in the mountains of Niigata Prefecture each July, is a three-day festival in a landscape of forested peaks and riverside walkways, the stages connected by walking paths through trees, with food vendors, art installations and river swimming spots strung between them. The lineup balances international headliners with an extraordinary range of Japanese artists, and the crowd reflects Japan at its best: enthusiastic, respectful and immaculately organised.

There are no lines at the toilets. Nobody pushes at the stage. Lost property finds its way back to its owner. Fuji Rock is the festival that makes you realise how good music events could be if everyone simply agreed to be excellent to each other. And the mountain setting, particularly as the sun drops behind the peaks and the stage lights come up, is genuinely breathtaking.

The Details

Location: Naeba Ski Resort, Yuzawa Town, Niigata Prefecture, Japan

Dates: Last weekend of July (Friday to Sunday)

Ticket Price: 3-day passes from approximately JPY $55,000 (AUD $550). Day passes available from JPY $20,000 (AUD $200). Camping passes are additional.

When Tickets Go On Sale: Early bird tickets typically go on sale in January/February, with general sale following in March/April. Tickets are available through the official Fuji Rock website and Japanese ticketing platforms including e+ and Lawson Ticket. International visitors can purchase through the Fuji Rock website directly.

Buy Tickets: fujirockfestival.com

Getting There from Australia

Fly into Tokyo (Narita or Haneda), direct flights from Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane operate daily. From Tokyo, take the Joetsu Shinkansen bullet train from Tokyo Station to Echigo-Yuzawa station (approximately 80 minutes), then a connecting shuttle bus to the festival site. The total journey from central Tokyo is around two hours. Most international visitors base themselves in Tokyo before and after, combining the festival with a Japan trip. Accommodation options near the site include on-site camping, the on-site hotel (books out very early) and accommodation in Yuzawa town.

5. Burning Man: Black Rock Desert, Nevada, USA

Burning Man is not quite a music festival. It's a temporary city, a social experiment, an art installation and a community and it happens to have extraordinary music. Every year in late August, approximately 80,000 people build Black Rock City from scratch in a Nevada desert playa, live there for a week according to ten guiding principles (including radical self-reliance, radical self-expression and gifting), and then dismantle it completely, leaving the desert as they found it. The eponymous 'Man' a towering wooden effigy, burns on the Saturday night in what is one of the most extraordinary communal spectacles in the world.

The music is everywhere and around the clock: massive art cars become mobile dance floors, themed camps host DJ sets through the night, and sound camps pump bass across the playa from sunset to sunrise. But the music is only part of the experience, the art installations alone are worth the journey. Nothing quite prepares you for Burning Man, and nothing quite compares to it once you've been.

The Details

Location: Black Rock Desert, Pershing County, Nevada, USA

Dates: The week before and including US Labor Day weekend, typically late August to early September

Ticket Price: Main sale tickets from USD $575 (AUD ~$890). Low-income tickets (USD $225) are available in limited numbers. Vehicle passes (USD $150) are required for cars. Everything at Burning Man operates on a gifting economy, no money changes hands inside the event except at the Centre Camp Cafe (coffee) and ice sales.

When Tickets Go On Sale: Burning Man uses a lottery system, not a first-come-first-served sale. The ticket lottery typically opens in late January/February, register at burningman.org to participate. Results are notified in March. A directed sale for first-timers and theme camp members follows.
Tickets also appear on the official STEP (Secure Ticket Exchange Program) closer to the event.

Buy Tickets: burningman.org/tickets

Getting There from Australia

Fly into Reno-Tahoe International Airport (RNO) in Nevada, Reno is approximately 2 hours drive from the festival site. Direct flights from Sydney to Los Angeles (LAX) are the most common Australian routing, with a connection to Reno. Car hire from Reno is essential, there is no public transport.
Many participants organise carpools from Reno or join organised shuttle services. Prepare for a multi-hour traffic queue on entry during peak arrival days (Thursday/Friday before the event). Bring everything you need for the week, Black Rock City has almost no retail infrastructure.