A guide to Melbourne's best winter festivals and events

Rising is back for sixteen nights across three weekends from June 1-16. As a chill settles over the city, the festival returns with a nocturnal vengeance boasting a packed line-up of 116 events. Choose from a mix of free and ticketed options for performances and installations encompassing theatre, music, dance and art. A whopping 651 Australian and international artists will gather to warm Melbourne’s spirits, in a festival celebrating contemporary creativity of all kinds. There’ll be eight Australian premieres, six global premieres and 32 new commissions – nice!

It's baaack! After two hugely popular winter seasons, Melbourne's favourite illuminated event is returning. From June 14 to August 4, take a nighttime stroll through the Royal Botanic Gardens and experience luminous pathways, lit-up tree canopies, soothing soundscapes and brand new installations. For the upcoming season, you can expect a reimagined 2.2km trail accompanied by stunning lakeside reflections, large-scale illuminated sculptures and other wonders, with more than 100,000 tiny lights on display.

If you're keen to head on a cool-climate caper but aren't sure where to begin, you're in luck: the East Gippsland Winter Festival is returning for its fourth iteration. Rug up and hit the road for a month-long celebration packed with lavish winter feasts, fantastical art installations, live music, lantern parades, creative workshops, wellness experiences and much more. This year, the festivities kick off on June 21 and coincide with the winter solstice and the Victorian school holidays.

Firelight Festival is returning to Docklands this winter from Friday, June 28 to Sunday, June 30. The surrounding streets of Victoria Harbour will be set alight, literally, with fiery installations from 5pm on each of the three nights. Expect flames in all forms, with blazing sculptures, jets and performances. The free festival is a celebration of winter with a focus on family, community, food, music, fire and light. There’ll be vibrant cultural displays like Afro-Colombian dancing, roving performers to delight the little ones, warming foods and plentiful fire installations. 

Adventure Park's Winter Glow festival is bringing lights, fire, ice and snow to the amusement park this winter. The festival (which runs from June 22 to July 21) features more than 100 glowing installations, fire twirling, ice sculptures and 3.3 million lights that will twinkle all around the park along a 2km trail. While real snow might be a rare sight in Geelong, there will be a big snow play zone where kids can make snowmen and snow angels (warm gloves, gumboots and jackets are recommended!). 

Every year, the Yarra City Council puts on a beloved music festival focussed on showcasing and supporting local artists and venues during the quieter winter season. This year, Leaps and Bounds Music Festival is taking place across four days and nights from Thursday, July 25 until Sunday, July 28. Anticipate parties and performances to suit all ages and budgets, including plentiful free and family-friendly gigs. It all happens in Fitzroy, Collingwood, Fitzroy North, Abbotsford and Richmond – which are some of the suburbs that make up the City of Yarra area.

If you're keen to join in on seom French-inspired fun, swap your beanie for a beret and head over to Queen Victoria Market on July 13 and 14. Sheds C and D will transport you to a wintery French town square complete with vendors peddling cheeses, crêpes, Champagne and pastries (it wouldn't be a Gallic celebration without the scent of croissants in the air). While you feast, live entertainment like acrobatic performances, dancers and jazz musicians will take over the main stage. 

This year, a brand-new illuminated attraction invites Melburnians to experience something truly special, with an Indigenous-created event inspired by the rich tapestry of First Nations' traditional storytelling. Gumbuya Dreaming will be a mesmerising digital light experience, taking up residence at Gumbuya World theme park this winter. Captivating light installations and soundscapes will explore nature through her 60,000 year journey – highlighting the beauty of flowers, the dance of fire and water, and the majesty of land and animals. Set along a wildlife trail, visitors will also be immersed in a soundscape as they wander along the luminous trail. 

Melbourne's giant beer, cider and fun festival GABS is back for 2024, so get ready to get sipping. Normally, the epic event would be held at the Royal Exhibition Building but after news that the heritage site is in need of an estimate $50 million in repairs, the beer nerds have moved their long-running project to Melbourne Showgrounds instead. Despite the new digs, the GABS brief fortunately remains the same: go on a deep dive with some of the best and most experimental local and interstate brewers on the scene right now. 

Since 2017, this tasty fest has been serving up a brie-lliant line-up of local cheesemakers, and for 2024, it's set to be bigger and funkier than ever before. From June 28-29, Carlton's Royal Exhibition Building will be chock-full of Australia's finest producers. Whether you prefer tart blue-veined varieties and oozy camembert or hard cheddars and nutty gruyères, we can guarantee there will be something up your alley here. This year's line-up will showcase 100 varieties than span hard to soft, textured to earthy, strong to mild, with creamy raw milk curd nuggets and everything in between. 

Looking for a nearby winter getaway? Or need plans to keep your kids occupied over the school holidays? Eynesbury Homestead has got you covered with a two-week winter festival that's guaranteed to be snow much fun (see what we did there?!). Entry to the festival won't cost you an icicle (aka it's free), and once you're there, you'll have an abundance of activities to choose from. Hit the ice-skating rink while listening to pumping tunes by a local DJ, go for a spin on carnival rides, shop up a storm at the market stalls and enjoy a mean feed from a variety of food trucks and stalls. 

Australia’s longest-running short film festival, the St Kilda Film Festival (SKFF) returns this winter for its landmark 40th year. From June 6 until June 16, the festival is set to showcase more than 150 films to cast a light on Australia’s best local short filmmakers. From rip-roaring comedy to powerful drama and thrilling horror, you can catch the films at screening sessions across the City of Port Phillip, which presents the festival. There are screenings at famous venues such as the Alex Theatre and the Astor Theatre, as well as unexpected spaces like South Melbourne Market. 

There’s something a bit magical about this historic regional town in the dark, cold months – and this is exactly what the Ballarat Winter Festival seeks to capture.

From June 29 to July 21, the Gold Rush town will come alive with food and wine events, gigs and performances, an ice rink, a huge market and (our particular favourite) Winter Wonderlights at Sovereign Hill. 

More highlights of the program include the pop-up ice skating rink, which will host child-friendly, sensory and disco-themed skating sessions, and the Design Exchange Market, which brings together a number of independent designers, artists and creators.

For music and art lovers, a special late-night event called Art Late will takeover the Art Gallery of Ballarat with a California-inspired party featuring a curated music line-up from regional festival experts OK Motels. Plus, two candle-lit classical music concerts featuring the music of rock legends Queen and cinematic favourites from composers like Hans Zimmer will take place at the Ballarat Mining Exchange. 

Phew, talk about jam-packed! You can check out the full program on the Ballarat Winter Festival's website. 

For more frosty fun, check out our guide to Melbourne's winter festivals and events. Want to get lit? Here's everything illuminated in Melbourne this month.

It's the news we've all been waiting for: after being cut short last year due to flooding, the spectacular Moama Lights event is returning to the Echuca-Moama region bigger and brighter than ever. Running from July 5-28 (across Thursday to Sunday nights), Moama Lights is an immersive sound and light trail comprising state-of-the-art installations, projections and cutting-edge moving light technology. Also returning is the ice skating rink and the American Hotel beer garden, where you can load up on hearty food and drink options. 

News has just broken that this hot winter festival is returning to warm up the city for another year. Now or Never will be back from August 22-31 this year with a fresh new theme. In a quest to unlock the doors of our imaginations, the festival will have a theme of ‘Look Through the Image’. Festival organisers have hinted at a “dispersed festival footprint” this time around.