This August Edinburgh International Festival presents a hand-picked selection of leading international and local artists in the world’s Festival City, with 24 days of world-class opera, dance, music and theatre. The Festival’s 2025 programme offers opportunities to experience world-class artists in thought-provoking and unconventional ways – including an eight-hour choral extravaganza, a distinctive outdoor promenade dance piece and a circus infused opera.
Audiences can also get involved in many Festival performances, from an outdoor mass-singalong to interactive concerts where the audience chooses the repertoire. Two major world premiere productions in UK theatre and dance: Make It Happen, an eye-opening take on the 2008 financial crisis set in Edinburgh, starring Brian Cox and Mary, Queen of Scots, an iconic story of one of Scotland’s most famous women, that blends classicism with modernity. In a landmark year for choral music, marking the 60th anniversary of the Edinburgh Festival Chorus, this renowned chorus of singers from around Scotland performs at the monumental Opening Concert.
Now in its third year under Festival Director and celebrated Scottish violinist Nicola Benedetti, the 2025 programme welcomes over 1,700 artists from 42 nations to Edinburgh —including 600 from Scotland—across 133 performances. The Truth We Seek is the theme underpinning the 2025 Edinburgh International Festival, inviting audiences to explore their relationship with truth – within themselves, between one another and in understanding our place in the world.
The world’s Festival City
Nicola Benedetti, Festival Director, Edinburgh International Festival said: “Our 2025 Edinburgh International Festival invites you to explore The Truth We Seek—a journey into the elusive nature of truth, in our personal and public lives. In an era of ‘alternative facts’ and manipulated narratives, the arts offer us something deeper: a poetic and metaphorical wisdom that is both more nuanced and more precise. This Festival—born in the city of the Enlightenment—has championed artistic expression as a means of discovery, insight, and mutual understanding. This year, we proudly present seven world premieres, exceptional international and Scottish artists, and celebrate 60 years of our Festival Chorus as well as the brightest emerging talent. Join us this summer as we seek and find truth together. Your curiosity will be rewarded with thought-provoking, and potentially transformational, experiences that you simply won’t find anywhere else.”
Edinburgh International Festival is the original festival. It’s the one that started it all, the igniting spark that established Edinburgh as the world’s Festival City. The Edinburgh International Festival was founded in 1947, the inspired idea of Rudolf Bing, a cultural pioneer and Jewish refugee, working with a group of civic and artistic leaders. Together, they created a festival that transcends political boundaries through a global celebration of the performing arts.
Over the following 77 years the International Festival’s hand-picked programme of world-leading dance, opera, music and theatre has continued to bring people of different cultures and viewpoints together every August. Meanwhile, the International Festival’s sister festivals have grown up around it – each of them contributing to the atmosphere of unparalleled excitement that transforms the city each summer. Shining far beyond what you see on stage, the International Festival also offers year-round pathways for people of all ages and backgrounds to discover and participate in live performance.
The Edinburgh International Festival takes place from 1-24 August 2025, at venues across the city. Learn more at: www.eif.co.uk.