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Melbourne’s events calendar is set for a shake-up in 2026 as three of the city’s most popular events move to new dates.
The Australian Open, which has historically held its finals on the Australia Day weekend in late January, will stretch from January 12 to February 1 next year.
Tennis Australia boss Craig Tiley and Mecca founder Jo Horgan on December 1 at the announcement of Mecca’s partnership with the Australian Open.
Tennis Australia chief executive Craig Tiley said the late start was a quirk of the sport’s calendar rather than a deliberate change by the tournament.
“It’s really how the calendar works. Every seven years, it creeps forward, and then it jumps [back] again,” he said.
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Tiley said the tours had been helped out in 2025 by an earlier start as there were not enough weeks in the year to fit the whole season in. In 2026, the later start will allow the tournament more of a runway for its opening week, which Tiley has dubbed the “qualifying week” in a bid to stretch out the tournament.
The revised dates mean some children will be back at school for part of the Open’s final week, but Tiley said this had not dented ticket sales at this stage.
Asked about the impact on Melbourne’s other major events, he quipped: “They can work around us, so it will be fine.”
That may be the case, but Melbourne’s jam-packed events calendar is carefully calibrated to ensure hotel room availability and that there are no event clashes for the city’s A-list.
When the Australian Grand Prix announced it would bring its 2026 race date forward by a week to coincide with the Labor Day weekend in March, the Melbourne Fashion Festival, which had previously run over the long weekend, quickly shifted its dates too.
A spokeswoman for the Australian Grand Prix Corporation said the calendar was set by Formula 1 and the exact order of races around the world varied each year.
“Hosting the season opener poses a great opportunity for Melbourne to further elevate its place on the global stage,” the spokeswoman said. “With the event falling on the long weekend, fans have the opportunity to extend their stay and experience how vibrant Melbourne becomes at that time of year.”
Melbourne Fashion Festival chief executive Caroline Ralphsmith said she believed the change of date would be a positive for the festival, which announced last week the launch of the Melbourne Fashion Festival Foundation to support emerging designers.
Melbourne Fashion Festival chief Caroline Ralphsmith at the launch of the Melbourne Fashion Festival Foundation last week.
Ralphsmith said hosting the festival over the long weekend had always been a challenge as some potential attendees would not be in town. So when the grand prix shifted dates, it “quite nicely aligned”.
“I’m really hoping we can see a slightly different profile of sales for tickets, and really with our 30th anniversary, having that fantastic celebration at the end of the week, not having to sort of face into a long weekend, but making it a true end-of-summer event,” she said.
Lord Mayor Nick Reece said the City of Melbourne and the state government were aware of the proposed dates of major events well in advance as they required permits and significant planning with authorities.
“These changes present huge opportunities for Melbourne,” he said.
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Reece said the council worked closely with traders to ensure they were maximising the peaks in the major events season.
“Melbourne is Australia’s events capital because we don’t just host events – we turn them into citywide celebrations,” he said.
The scheduling of other major events including the Melbourne Art Fair, the Melbourne Food & Wine Festival and the Melbourne International Comedy Festival remains consistent with previous years.
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