How Much Does It Cost To Go To a Music Festival?
Music festivals are a popular trend among young people all over the world. With so many unique events popping up every month, there is no shortage of fun-filled festivals to add to your bucket list.
How much does it cost to go to a music festival? The amount of money that you will spend going to a music festival will depend on a variety of factors, from how you get there to where you sleep and even what you eat during your trip.
The music festival weekend passes themselves can range anywhere from $300 to $500 in total, but the price will go up significantly if you choose to purchase VIP passes instead. In addition, the tickets themselves are just part of the total expenses that you will need to account for when you are traveling to a music festival.
While it is true that music festivals are a passion that is shared by all types of music lovers worldwide, the cost of the tickets can sometimes match the experience. With that being said, we did some research to find out how much it really costs to go to a music festival.
If you are interested in attending a particular music festival soon or you are just getting out onto the scene, you will find some helpful information about how much you can expect to spend when you purchase your tickets. Keep reading to find out everything you need to know about music festival prices.
How Much Does It Cost To Go To a Music Festival?
Over the past several years, music festivals have become a popular phenomenon among teenagers and young adults. There are tons of individual festivals with unique themes and various styles of music that have built names for themselves and become very popular and sought after in the industry.
These music festivals are held all over the country, with some of them even branching out into other places in the world. Music festival fans and enthusiasts frequently travel from location to location in order to attend their favorite festival, since all of these events are never held in the same city.
With that being said, traveling is required for attending music festivals more often than it is not. Traveling to and lodging in another city for a weekend will definitely cost money, along with everything that you will be doing in between this time.
In this section, we will be giving you the full breakdown of everything that you can expect to spend your money on while you are going traveling to go to a music festival. Take a look at the list down below to get some quick insight on this topic, and keep reading for more details.
Here are some of the main expenses that you will have to consider when going to a music festival:
- Your tickets (for each day)
- How you will get there (and around)
- Where you will be staying
- What you will be eating
- What you will be wearing
The first, and most obvious, expense for a music festival trip is definitely your tickets. While some music festivals allow you to choose day passes instead of buying the entire package, most people will go with the three-day weekend pass that is the standard for most of these events.
The cost of your ticket will depend on a variety of factors, from the type of ticket that you receive all the way down to the location. There are typically two levels of music festival tickets: general admission and VIP.
As you can probably tell, the VIP tickets will cost a premium price, especially in comparison to the general admission tickets.
Aside from the ticket type, you can expect to see marked up ticket prices for the most popular and sought after festivals. The newer and more low-key music festivals will be a little bit cheaper, but they all usually range form $300 to $500 for a weekend pass.
In addition to your ticket, you will need to consider how you will get to the location of the festival. Will you need to get on a plane to fly to your destination? Are you close enough for a road trip? Or, can you drive less than an hour and make it to the festival on time?
This is a very important factor, because transportation can get pretty expensive, especially if you have to travel far and you will be away from home.
Along with your method of getting to the festival, you will need to have a way to get around in the area while you are there. For instance, if you flew into the city, you will probably need to get a rental car or make arrangements to take Ubers wherever you need to go.
On the other hand, if you were close enough to drive to the festival, you can use your own car to get from place to place. Since you most likely won’t be sleeping at the festival, you will need to have some form of transportation to help you get around quickly and efficiently.
When you finally get to your destination, where will you be staying? Obviously this factor will be left out if the festival is coming to your home city, but you will probably be traveling to get there unless you are very lucky.
Whether you stay in a hotel, motel, hostel, or Airbnb, you will need to account for the expenses of your sleeping accommodations. The amount of money that you spend is up to you, but don’t forget to consider this in the overall cost of your trip.
While you are at the festival, along with before and after you attend, you will need to have some kind of arrangement for food. There will be several food vendors all around the music festival, which is increasingly convenient for those who do not come prepared with their own meals.
However, this can get very expensive. Since the food will be in high demand among tons of hungry festival-goers, you can expect to spend triple the amount of what each item would normally cost in another setting.
With that being said, you might want to put a little bit more focus in into your planning for food. Once you get there, you will realize it is a more important factor than you might have thought.
Finally, you will need to consider what you will be wearing to the music festival. In most cases, you will not wear your everyday clothes to the event that you are attending.
Music festivals are notorious for the interesting outfits that come with them. Enthusiastic music fans are always very creative with their ensembles, with some of them even looking like Halloween costumes.
With these creative costumes comes an additional cost. As previously mentioned, this will probably be something that you don’t already have in your closet, meaning that you will have to buy new pieces.
Again, the cost of this particular expense will largely depend on what you choose to put together as well as how many days you will be staying at the festival, which directly translates to more outfits and more money.
Overall, these are all of the main expenses that you can prepare for when you are getting ready to buy your music festival tickets. While there might be some additional costs here and there, the bulk of the amount will come from all of the places that were outlined in this section.
The Average Prices Of Popular Music Festivals
With the overall expenses of going to a music festival in mind, you are probably wondering how much it costs, on average, to purchase tickets at one of these events.
If you are a frequent traveler or if you have been to the location where the festival is taking place, you can probably come up with an estimate of what you might be spending on your trip as far as flights and hotels.
However, those who have never been to a music festival before will most likely not know where to start when it comes to coming up with a ballpark guess of how much they can add on just for their tickets.
In this section, we will be going over some of the average prices that you can expect to spend on your music festival tickets alone. Keep in mind that all of the items listed below are quoted for the general admission weekend pass, which is the most basic level of tickets and the cheapest price.
Here are some of the average prices of general admission weekend passes for the most popular music festivals:
- Coachella – $429
- EDC – $325
- Life Is Beautiful – $265
- Lollapalooza – $340
- Bonnaroo – $319
- Rolling Loud – $506
As you can see, there are a lot of differing prices between each type of music festival. Included in the list above are all genres of music events, from electronic dance music (EDM) to indie and pop.
The price of a three day general admission to any one of these festivals will depend on a variety of factors. One of the biggest factors is the popularity of the particular festival, which goes hand in hand with the demand for the tickets, consequently driving the prices up.
Coachella is one of the most popular and sought after music festivals, with the general admission weekend passes starting around $429. However, the initial tickets sell out really fast when they become available, and you might be stuck paying triple the amount due to others reselling them at a much higher price.
The newer and more low-key festivals, on the other hand, such as Life is Beautiful, rest on the cheaper end for a three day admission pass, just under $300 in total.
The actual price of the music festival ticket that you choose will depend on when you are able to secure it and how many additional fees and taxes are added on at the time of purchase.
How To Save Money At a Music Festival
Now that you have gotten the full breakdown of everything that you have to pay for when you are going to a music festival, you are probably scared away from buying tickets.
While you might have already gotten wide eyes when you saw the ticket prices alone, it’s hard to imagine what you felt when you realized you have to get there and stay somewhere in the meantime.
All of this information can seem overwhelming at first, but there is no reason to be scared about spending money on a music festival. After all, you can’t have great memories if you are unable to put anything into the experience.
Even with that being said, you still don’t have to spend and arm and a leg just to attend a music festival and see your favorite artists performing live, right in front of you.
Instead, you can follow some helpful tips and guidelines that will help you to save money at a music festival, in a really big way. Take a look at the list down below, where you can find all of these suggestions in an organized row, with more details to follow.
Here are some ways that you can save money at a music festival:
- Find deals on flights and hotels
- Couch surf or stay with someone you know (for free)
- Pack light on your flight
- Settle for not so great accommodations
- Bring a lot of your own snacks and water
- Try to cook for yourself when you can or just snack in between meals
- Walk where you can instead of paying for transportation
First and foremost, you will need to find as many deals as you can on flights and hotels. These will undoubtedly be the biggest expenses on your music festival trip, aside from the actual tickets themselves.
If you have ever traveled on a plane, then you know how expensive the tickets can get. This is especially true if you are very far away from the destination city.
While there is no way to avoid purchasing a plane ticket if you live far away, but what you can do is try to find the cheapest rates possible for airfare.
If you are close enough to drive to the location instead and it proves to be less expensive, then you can go with that option over flying.
When you reach your destination, you should try to walk into an accommodation that is equally as cheap as the flight, if not much more.
If you are able to find a free place to stay from something similar to a couch surfing website, or if you have friends or family that live in the area, you will be good to go as far as sleeping arrangements are concerned.
All in all, whether you are staying with someone for free or going really cheap on you hotel, just be prepared to settle for accommodations that are not so great.
Another helpful tip to keep in mind for saving money at a music festival goes back to the flight conversation. No matter how many days you are planning to stay at the festival for, you should try to pack as lightly as possible.
If at all possible, you should do your best to fit everything into one to two bags at most. This will help you slide past the additional baggage fees that airlines charge when you exceed the limit.
When you are at the actual music festival, there will be a lot of food trucks and carts all around tempting you with delicious menu items with skyrocketed prices. If you are trying to save a little bit of money on your trip, you should stay away from these at all costs.
In order to divert your attention away from the expensive food vendors, you should bring some of your own snacks. To not miss out on all of the unique cuisine at the music festival, you can split your eating up accordingly.
For instance, you might eat your own breakfast and snacks in between meals to hold you over, but you plan to purchase something from the food vendors for lunch and dinner. This is an effective way to save some money while still enjoying yourself.
Finally, you should walk where you can to avoid paying for transportation. Uber and Lyft are great for the modern day traveler, but the rates will likely be marked up for the weekend of the festival, and the small ride fares can really add up when you use them frequently.
As you can see, the cost of going to a music festival goes far beyond just the price of the ticket. Unless the festival is coming to your home town, you will have a lot of extra expenses on your hands.
However, if you prepare yourself for this reality and budget accordingly, you will have a stress-free experience at your next music festival outing.