Adelaide Fringe Festival 2024: Every Date, Show and Appearance You Need to Know About

Merry Christmas, people! Adelaide Fringe has announced its program highlights for 2024, and it’s set to be a spicy one. If you’re an arts fan and you’re excited about the return of Australia’s biggest arts festival, here’s everything you need to know ahead of its arrival.

What is Adelaide Fringe?

If you’re somehow unfamiliar (no judgement, welcome to the party!) Adelaide Fringe is an arts festival based in South Australia that has been running for an incredible 60+ years. The festival is a celebration of art and culture and is an event in which you can catch everything from live music and comedy, to cabaret and drag. There’s also a whole lot of incredible food and wine to be enjoyed.

From the Fringe team itself, the festival is described as:

…a world-renowned, annual arts festival that celebrates culture, place and artists from across the globe. 

When is Adelaide Fringe 2024?

The festival is set to launch in February 2024 and will run through to March. The program with kick off on Sunday, February 11, with First Nations Cultural Tours of Adelaide Botanic Garden.

Official festival dates, however, are February 16 through to March 17, 2024.

What are the best shows at Adelaide Fringe 2024?

We’re still in the initial stages of the program rollout for Adelaide Fringe 2024, but the team has shared its highlights from the list of shows so far, and we’re damn excited.

The catalogue of shows this year is 1,300 strong and spans across comedy, theatre, circus, cabaret, visual art, music, interactive and more. The highlights shared by the Adelaide Fringe team include the below.

• The Dome: an immersive, planetarium-style cinematic experience in Freemasons Hall, featuring the Dark Side of the Moon – an immersive experience with the full Pink Floyd album 
• Natural Wonders: an outdoor art gallery under the stars hosted in Adelaide Botanic Garden from the second weekend of Fringe, featuring strong installations and projections by local South Australian artists Alex Frayne and Katrine Penning, Liam Somerville and Michael Ellingford (who wowed us with Noise Nature in Botanic Gardens in a previous year), light and installation duo “Harsh Realities” and Ngarrindjeri woman, Nicole Gollan’s piece called The Spirit Lives On 
• SAGE 2024: Adelaide’s most exciting event for video game developers, players and fans – and everyone in between! Presented by the South Australian Film Corporation
• The Inflatable Church on Light Square where you can get married or renew your vows with some Fringe fun 
• YOAH Circus: An Australian premiere from Japan’s most talked about contemporary circus company. 
• LIMBO: The Return. The debut of the latest work from the creative producers of the critically acclaimed BLANC de BLANC, THE PARTY and of course, LIMBO.
• Beatles Dub Club: the Australian premiere of the Glastonbury smash-hit, opening weekend only. 
• Robo Bingo: Presented by Fox Dog Studios arriving fresh from their sellout season in Edinburgh Fringe 
• In Pursuit of Repetitive Beats: an interactive VR spectacular that takes you back and puts you in the shoes of rave culture pioneers. 

Who will be at the festival this year?

Each year, Adelaide Fringe brings in incredible global talent, and 2024 is certainly no different.

This year’s Fringe Ambassadors include Professional Basketballer and Cabaret Singer Isaac Humphries, Prinnie Stevens and Aussie chef Adam Liaw – who will be doing two nights of SBS’s The Cook Up live on stage!

In addition to the ambassador line up, we’ll also see performers Cece Peniston, Sneaky Sound System, Drag Icon Anetra and 2023 Fringe Ambassador Kween Kong hit the stage.

Reader, when I tell you I screamed upon hearing Anetra would be present…

Adelaide Fringe Director and CEO Heather Croall said of the upcoming festival:

“To say we are excited about the 2024 season is an understatement. In 2023 we sold a million tickets – a first for any arts festival in Australia. Next year’s program is looking spectacular and I hope we can reach this incredible milestone once again. We are gearing up for another bumper year, thanks to all the participants, the State Government, all our Festival Partners and donors.”

We’ll keep you posted on any fun updates we hear in the coming weeks. Until then, you can keep reading about the rest of the events hitting Australia in December 2023. You can also keep across the festival itself here.