Orkney Festivals & Events: The Year-Round Calendar

Orkney festivals are not evenly spread across the year. They cluster hard into a five-month stretch from April to September, then fall almost silent until the islands close the year with a mass street football match on Christmas morning. This is a calendar of what actually runs, when, and where, with every date taken from the event's own website rather than from last year's pattern. Six events have already confirmed their 2027 dates. Two that people still plan trips around are not running at all.

How Orkney's Festival Year Works

The pattern is driven by daylight and by farming. Between the New Year's Day Ba' and the end of March there is very little in the diary, which is when daylight is at its shortest and the weather is at its least predictable. The cultural season opens with blues in Stromness in April and runs through folk, classical, bluegrass and science until the archaeology festival closes it in mid-September. Threaded through July and August is a second, quite separate circuit: the agricultural shows, which are working county and district events rather than visitor attractions, and are all the better for it.

Then the calendar thins out. October has historically belonged to storytelling, but that has changed for 2026. November holds the OY Festival of Islands on Papa Westray and the Christmas light switch-ons in the three main towns, and after that the fixed points are the two Ba' games, which are worth a trip in their own right.

Orkney Festivals and Events Calendar at a Glance

Sorted by position in the year. “Not yet announced” means exactly that: the organiser had published no 2027 date when this page was checked on 19 August 2026, and no date has been inferred on their behalf.

Spring: Blues, Nature and the Folk Festival

The season opens quietly in Stromness. The Orkney Blues Festival runs across Stromness venues in April and has confirmed 23 to 25 April 2027 on its own site. It is a small, pub-centred festival rather than a marquee affair, which is the appeal.

May carries two more. The Orkney Nature Festival ran from Monday 11 to Sunday 17 May in 2026, a week of guided walks, boat trips and talks spread across the islands rather than concentrated in one town. It has confirmed 17 to 23 May 2027 on its own site, with the programme still to be announced.

Then comes the one most visitors have heard of. The Orkney Folk Festival ran its 43rd edition from 21 to 24 May 2026, and has already confirmed 27 to 30 May 2027. It is centred on Stromness, and the festival's own news post recorded more than 8,400 tickets sold for the four-day 2026 event. Stromness is a small harbour town, so that is a great many people arriving into a short stretch of waterfront street. This is the weekend to have travel and a bed in Stromness settled well in advance.

The ticketed concerts are only half of it. The sessions that spill out of the Ferry Inn and the Stromness Hotel are free, unscheduled and often the thing people remember. If you want the background to the fiddle style you will hear, the guide to Orkney's traditional music scene covers the players and the repertoire rather than the diary.

Midsummer: The St Magnus International Festival

The St Magnus International Festival is Orkney's classical and contemporary arts festival, built around St Magnus Cathedral in Kirkwall but reaching into island halls and churches. Its 2026 edition was the fiftieth, with fifty events running from 19 to 28 June. The 2027 festival is confirmed for 18 to 25 June 2027.

Late June is also when the light does something worth planning around. The festival sits inside the stretch the islands call the Simmer Dim, when the sky never fully darkens, and an evening concert followed by a walk at midnight is an entirely reasonable thing to do. The summer solstice guide explains what the light actually does at that latitude.

High Summer: Shows, Shopping Week and the Rally

July and August are the busiest weeks of the Orkney year, and the events change character. Alongside the music there is a circuit of agricultural shows, a week-long town festival in Stromness, and a vintage vehicle rally.

Water Sound Bluegrass & Roots Festival runs at Burray Hall on the small island of Burray, reached by road over the Churchill Barriers. It ran from 3 to 5 July in 2026 and has confirmed 2 to 4 July 2027 on its own site. Camping on site is part of the format.

Stromness Shopping Week describes itself as the longest running festival in Orkney and took place from 22 to 25 July in 2026. It is a town carnival rather than a music festival, with a parade, fireworks, a fun run and the long-standing Yard of Ale and Holms Swim events. No 2027 dates had been published when this page was checked.

The North Ronaldsay Sheep Festival is unlike anything else on the list. Volunteers travel to Orkney's most northerly island to help rebuild the Grade-A listed dyke that rings the island and keeps its seaweed-eating sheep on the shore, with knitting workshops, music sessions and lighthouse tours in the evenings. The festival's own site listed dyke-building days from 22 to 27 July 2026; it runs across roughly two weeks in July and August, and no 2027 dates were published.

The district shows come first, and this is the part of the calendar where you have to read carefully. Most of the island societies publish a recurrence rule rather than a date, and several have no website at all. Two dates are firm. The Dounby Show, run by the Orkney West Mainland Agricultural Society and second in size only to the County Show, was held at the Showpark in Dounby on Thursday 6 August 2026, stated twice on the society's own site. The Orkney County Show itself was held on 8 August 2026, and the Orkney Agricultural Society gives the durable rule in its own words: “Held each year on the second Saturday in August this is an agricultural show at its very best.” Orkney.com places it at Bignold Park in Kirkwall.

The rest publish a rule and nothing more. Orkney.com describes the Sanday show as usually held on the first Friday in August, East Mainland on the first Saturday, and Shapinsay on the first Tuesday, with the South Ronaldsay and Burray show also in early August. Those are patterns, not published 2026 or 2027 dates, and you will find sites that quietly turn the pattern into a date. Ask locally before you build a day around one of them.

The Orkney Vintage Club's own 2026 rally entry form is dated 1 and 2 August. The Kirkwall Riding of the Marches follows the County Show: a parade of horses, ponies and carriages through Kirkwall behind a standard bearer carrying the town's coat of arms, on a circular route from Broad Street to Scapa Beach, marking Kirkwall's Royal Burgh history. Orkney.com gives the rule as the second Sunday of August, the day after the County Show, which puts the 2026 ceremony on Sunday 9 August. No organiser publishes that as a calendar date, but a photograph of the pipe band on the Cathedral steps, taken that morning, is dated 9 August 2026, and NorthLink's guide lists the same day. Treat the rule as the reliable part.

The month closes with the Festival of the Horse and Boys' Ploughing Match at St Margaret's Hope, which is the strangest and best thing on this list. In Orkney.com's description, young girls “gather at the local school for a contest. Their costumes glint and jangle as they circle the square dressed as working horses”, while “the boys compete in a match at the Sands O' Wright—a vast beach just outside the village. They use their miniature ploughs to draw lines in the sand, learning the craft of the finely tilled furrow.” It has no website, its only official channel is a Facebook page, and its Orkney.com listing has not been updated since 2020. NorthLink lists 15 August 2026 and marks it TBC. Nothing else is published, so ask in the village. None of these August events had announced a 2027 date.

Autumn: Science and Archaeology, Back to Back

September holds two festivals that run almost consecutively, so a single trip across the first half of the month can take in both.

The Orkney International Science Festival ran from 3 to 9 September 2026, with talks, walks and field trips across the islands. The Orkney Archaeology Festival, run by the Orkney Archaeology Society, followed immediately from 9 to 13 September 2026, with events staged throughout Orkney. Neither had published 2027 dates when this page was checked.

September is a good month to visit for reasons beyond the programme. The seasonal picture, including what the weather and the birdlife are doing, is covered in the guide to Orkney in autumn.

Two Events That Are Not Running

This is the part of the calendar that most listings pages get wrong, because an event that does not happen leaves no announcement behind on the aggregator sites that copied last year's entry.

The Orkney Storytelling Festival is not taking place in 2026. The Orcadian Story Trust, which runs it, states on the festival's own site: “It is with deep regret that the Orcadian Story Trust, who run the Orkney Storytelling Festival, has to announce that there will be no festival this year, 2026.” The trust attributes this to “a cut in funding and no other sources of finances found to fill the gap” and says the festival's continued future “is uncertain at the moment”. One much-loved element does survive: an event at Betty's Reading Room is going ahead on Sunday 25 October at 2pm, free but with limited tickets.

The Orkney Food & Drink Festival is not running in 2026 either, but for a happier reason. After its debut in 2025 it became a biennial fixture, and the next edition is set for 18 to 19 September 2027. If Orkney produce is the reason you are coming, the guide to Orkney specialities and where to buy them covers what is available year-round without waiting two years for a festival.

Christmas and New Year: The Ba'

Before that, November has two things worth knowing about. OY, the Festival of Islands, is a three-day festival held every November at the Kelp Store on Papa Westray, with no dates published in advance on its Orkney.com listing. The Christmas light switch-ons in Kirkwall, Stromness and St Margaret's Hope fall in late November, on three separate evenings; the dates appear each year in an Orkney Islands Council road-closure order, and the 2026 order had not been published when this page was checked.

Then the event that needs no ticket and has no programme. The Kirkwall Ba' is played on Christmas Day and again on New Year's Day, when several hundred men pack into a scrum on Broad Street in front of St Magnus Cathedral and spend hours dragging a hand-stitched leather ball toward opposite ends of town. There is a Boys' game on both days too, throwing up in the same spot at 10am, with the Men's game following when the cathedral clock strikes 1pm. Both fall on a Friday this cycle: 25 December 2026 and 1 January 2027. Shopfronts along the route are boarded in advance, which tells you most of what you need to know. The full account, including where to stand and how to watch it without getting swept into it, is in the guide to the Kirkwall Ba'.

Events We Could Not Confirm a Date For

These two run, and they matter locally, but neither had a published date we could verify on 19 August 2026. They are listed here so you know to ask rather than assume.

• Orkney Rock Festival, Kirkwall. Orkney.com lists it as an annual September event at various Kirkwall venues, now in its eleventh year, organised by Orkney Live Wire, with a mix of free pub gigs for over-18s and ticketed all-ages events. Its listing gives no dates and points to a Facebook page.
• Stromness Yule Log Pull, Hogmanay. Listed by Orkney.com among the islands' festivals; no published date beyond the season.

For any of these, the practical route is the What's On section of The Orcadian, the local newspaper, or the events calendar on Orkney.com.

Booking Around a Festival

Two things drive the timing. The first is that Orkney is an island group, so getting there is itself a booked, capacity-limited step rather than a decision you make on the day. Ferry sailings and the flights into Kirkwall are covered in the guide to getting to Orkney, and vehicle deck space in particular is the constraint people underestimate.

The second is that festival demand is concentrated in one or two small towns. Stromness during folk festival weekend and Kirkwall during the St Magnus Festival are the two pinch points in the year. Both towns are small, and both festivals now have 2027 dates fixed, which is the whole reason to plan in autumn rather than spring.

A practical approach: fix the festival date from the organiser's own site first, then travel, then a bed, in that order. Widening the search beyond the host town is the usual solution, and Orkney's road distances are short enough that staying twenty minutes away is a mild inconvenience rather than a problem. For ticketing, go to the festival's own site and check current ticket details there. Ticket structures, release dates and what is included change year to year, and no third-party page is a reliable source for them.

Frequently Asked Questions

When is the Orkney Folk Festival?

The 2027 Orkney Folk Festival runs from 27 to 30 May 2027, confirmed on the festival's own website. The 2026 edition, its 43rd, ran from 21 to 24 May. It is based in Stromness, over a long weekend in late May.

What festivals are on in Orkney in September?

Two, running almost back to back. The Orkney International Science Festival ran 3 to 9 September 2026, and the Orkney Archaeology Festival followed from 9 to 13 September 2026. Neither had published 2027 dates as at 19 August 2026. The Orkney Food & Drink Festival returns on 18 to 19 September 2027.

Is the Orkney Storytelling Festival still running?

Not in 2026. The Orcadian Story Trust announced there would be no festival this year following a cut in funding, and says the festival's future is uncertain. A single associated event at Betty's Reading Room goes ahead on Sunday 25 October at 2pm, free with limited tickets.

What is the biggest festival in Orkney?

By profile, the St Magnus International Festival, which ran fifty events across its fiftieth edition in June 2026. By sheer concentration of visitors into one small town, the Orkney Folk Festival in Stromness, which sold more than 8,400 tickets across four days in 2026.

How far ahead should I book for a festival weekend?

As far ahead as you can, and travel before accommodation. Ferry vehicle space and flights into Kirkwall are the real constraint, and both the folk festival and the St Magnus Festival now have confirmed 2027 dates, so there is no reason to wait. Fix the date from the organiser's site, then book the crossing.

Are there any Orkney festivals in winter?

Very few. The main season ends in September. After that there is the OY Festival of Islands on Papa Westray in November, the Christmas light switch-ons in Kirkwall, Stromness and St Margaret's Hope in late November, the two Kirkwall Ba' games on Christmas Day and New Year's Day, and the Stromness Yule Log Pull at Hogmanay. Only the Ba' has a fixed, published date.

Sources for Every Date on This Page

• Orkney Folk Festival — 2026 and 2027 dates
• St Magnus International Festival — 2026 and 2027 dates
• Orkney Blues Festival — 2027 dates
• Orkney International Science Festival — 2026 dates
• Orkney Archaeology Society — 2026 festival dates
• Water Sound Bluegrass & Roots Festival — 2026 and 2027 dates
• Stromness Shopping Week — 2026 dates
• North Ronaldsay Sheep Festival — 2026 dyke-building days
• Orkney Nature Festival — 2027 dates, and the 2026 day pages for the May 2026 week
• Orkney Agricultural Society — County Show 2026 date and the second-Saturday rule
• Orkney West Mainland Agricultural Society — Dounby Show, Thursday 6 August 2026
• Orkney.com — Riding of the Marches, second Sunday of August
• Orkney.com — the Ba', Boys' game 10am and Men's game 1pm
• Orkney.com — Festival of the Horse description (listing itself is out of date)
• Orkney.com — OY Festival of Islands, November, Papa Westray
• Orkney Vintage Club — 2026 rally dates
• Orkney Storytelling Festival — 2026 cancellation statement
• Orkney.com — Food & Drink Festival biennial schedule and 2027 dates
• Orkney.com — Nature Festival 2026 dates
• Orkney.com — Orkney Rock Festival listing
• Orkney.com — festivals directory
• Geograph — dated photograph of the Riding of the Marches ceremony, 9 August 2026, quoting Orkney.com on the second-Sunday-of-August tradition
• NorthLink Ferries — 2026 dates for the district agricultural shows, the Riding of the Marches and the Festival of the Horse (a secondary source, not the organisers; its County Show and Riding of the Marches dates match sources we checked independently)

Image credits. All photographs on this page are real Creative Commons images of real Orkney events, not illustrations. Kirkwall City Pipe Band at the Riding of the Marches, 9 August 2026, by Des Blenkinsopp. Session outside the Ferry Inn, Stromness, by Donald MacDonald. Cattle judging at the Orkney County Show by Bill Boaden. New Year's Day Men's Ba', Broad Street, Kirkwall, by Ian Balcombe. All four are licensed CC BY-SA 2.0.