Notting Hill Carnival 2026

Carnival runs across three days in 2026, and they are not interchangeable. Anyone who turns up on the wrong one for what they wanted has not seen a smaller version of the same event — they have seen a different event

The three days

Saturday 29 August is the UK National Panorama steel band competition. It is the one that gets left off the summaries, and it is the day on which the music is the point rather than the soundtrack

Sunday 30 August is J’Ouvert in the early morning, then the Children’s Day parade. This is the family day and the quieter of the two parade days — quieter being relative

Monday 31 August is the main parade: the adults’ day, and the busiest thing that happens in London all year

Sixty years

It is the sixtieth Carnival, counting from 1966. Organisers have put a record number of stewards on the route for it, and a plaque naming 70 people who built the event was unveiled at Westbourne Park station — the northern end of the parade route

Getting there

More than two million journeys are made on the transport network for Carnival each year, which is why the standing advice is to travel to Paddington and walk the last twenty minutes

The stations on the route are restricted rather than open: Ladbroke Grove is closed all day; Westbourne Park takes no entries after 11am; Notting Hill Gate, Queensway and Royal Oak take none between 11am and 6pm; Holland Park shuts at 3pm. Buses are diverted away from the whole area, with limited-stop specials such as the 148X running instead

What it costs

Nothing. Carnival is free and unticketed, which is a large part of why it is the size it is