New Zealand Fringe Festival

Get ready to experience a month of creativity, innovative performances, and fresh talent. The New Zealand Fringe Festival is back and ready to showcase an exciting lineup of local and international acts. Audiences can expect a vibrant mix of disciplines and content. The 2025 event is extra celebratory as it marks 35 years since the festival began. 

The New Zealand Fringe is an open-access arts festival. Artists make submissions offering to create work. That means there are pitches for hundreds of weird, wacky, and wonderful ideas. The audience is assured of creative and groundbreaking theatrical experiences. In 2025 you can witness over 170 original performances. There’ll be everything from theatre, cabaret, and comedy to circus acts, dance, outdoor spectacles, and music.  Fringe is often a springboard for celebrated national talent, with alumni like Rose Matafeo and Flight of the Concords. 

Highlights this Fringe include Nicola Brown’s solo show, the comically innovative ‘Space Invaders’. It has earned her awards in Fringe festivals from Auckland to Dunedin. Huen Sze Man Suzanne from Hong Kong presents her show ‘Dance with Dementia’. Local composer and Saxophonist Louisa Williamson brings her adapted composition ‘The Chasm Where We Fall Into Each Other’. Acclaimed indie and rhythm and blues artist Deva Mahal closes the festival with a night of masterful songwriting.