Festivals are another of the things people most want to know about North Cyprus... Among Cyprus festivals, the one whose date is easiest to predict is the orange celebration in Morphou (Guzelyurt). Its forty-eighth edition ran from 15 to 21 June 2026. For the rest of the island you know the month, and you learn the day once the organiser announces it: the concert season at Bellapais opens in April, while the olives at Zeytinlik wait for the end of September. In the 2026 programme we reviewed, every month from April to November had an owner, and December stayed empty. If you are picking a single week, which district that week falls in changes the plan...
In Spring the Stage Is at Bellapais Abbey
In the courtyard of Bellapais Abbey two festivals overlap from mid-April to the end of June, and in the announcements we compiled the two are taken for a single event. The first is the International Bellapais Spring Music Festival. It was held for the twenty-first time and fitted twelve ticketed concerts between 11 April and 14 May. Four days later the North Cyprus International Bellapais Music Festival, organised by the Music Foundation, took over, giving concerts starting at 20.00 from 18 May to 23 June, and this edition was free. How do you tell them apart? Just look at the date: anything up to mid-May belongs to the ticketed festival, anything after it to the free one.
The village squares do not stand idle. Eco Day is set up in Büyükkonuk (Komi Kebir) village square at the start of May, and previous editions had a fashion show, folk dancing and children's activities on the programme. A week later it was Yeşilırmak's turn: the strawberry festival was held for the fifteenth time on 9-10 May, with strawberry picking in the fields included. Büyükkonuk, by the way, appears twice in the calendar. It is held once more in the autumn, so if you miss May you get a second chance in October.
After Mid-June the Calendar Gets Crowded
After the middle of June three big festivals pile on top of one another. First in line is Morphou. The opening procession marched from Kurtuluş Primary School to Festival Park on 15 June. The closing concert on the evening of 21 June was given by Mustafa Ceceli. One note for you: the festival's purpose is to give visibility to citrus growers, so the crate on the stall is as much a part of it as the name on the stage...
As the stalls in Morphou are packed away, the weight of the programme shifts east to Famagusta. The International Famagusta Culture and Art Festival ran for the twenty-sixth time from 23 June to 16 July, with concerts starting at 21.00 at Othello Castle and the ancient theatre of Salamis. Opening night was free, and Pink Martini and Sertab Erener took the stage.
Before Famagusta's first week was over, Iskele opened too: the fifty-fourth Traditional Iskele Festival was held in Ecevit Square from 26 June to 5 July, all of its events were free, and Zülfü Livaneli opened it at 22.00 on 26 June accompanied by the Presidential Symphony Orchestra. The closing on 5 July fell to Semicenk. The twenty-ninth International Folk Dance Festival ran inside it, with troupes arriving from Uruguay to the Philippines; the roots of this second festival go back to before 1974.
The Grapes Are Picked in the First Week of August
With the months sorted, the last days of July shift the focus to the north-east, to Mehmetçik (Galateia). The Mehmetçik Grape Festival was held for the sixty-fourth time on 4-9 August 2026, admission was free, and a six-day programme of culture, art and sport ran through it. Mehmetçik and Büyükkonuk belong to the same municipality. The grapes in August and the Eco Day in May are the work of the same team.
The capital's August runs on two separate organisations. Nicosia Youth Days opened on 30 July and closed on 12 August; the seventeenth edition was led by the HASDER Youth Club with European Union funding, and the workshops were held on İplik Pazarı Street and at the EU Information Centre. At the end of the month came the sixteenth International Nicosia Folk Dance Festival, held from 27 August to 1 September in Erdinç Gündüz Square and Kızılbaş Park, with troupes from Türkiye to Brazil performing. Which one does a visitor to Nicosia in August run into? The first half of the month belongs to the workshops, the last week to the folk dancing in the squares. The Ozanköy Molasses (Pekmez) Festival is in the same month too; the municipality gives the month but not the day, so for now you can hold it as a possibility...
Olives and Theatre Fall in the Same Month, September
In September the island most certainly does not empty out the way you might think; the Cyprus festival calendar is full in autumn too, it is only the tourist crowds that thin out, and the olive festival is announced under Kyrenia's name. When we looked into it, though, the venue is not the town centre but the village of Zeytinlik, known by its old name of Templos. The opening performance is by Yeni Türkü. The time announced for the twenty-fifth edition is late September to early October, and the last two years fell in that band too, so you can count on it with confidence. Alongside this, five days of live music, folk dancing, and olive and handicraft stalls line the village square.
In the same September the capital moves on to an entirely different programme, the theatre season. The Nicosia International Festival opens on 12 September and runs until 1 November; its main venue is the Nicosia Municipal Theatre, and more than twenty-two productions are staged. The opening play is "Goodbye, Lindita", winner of the Silver Lion at the Venice Theatre Biennale. Going through the listings, we see these two names being confused, yet they are separate events run by separate institutions. In October the autumn edition of Eco Day returns to Büyükkonuk, but its day is not announced until October draws near; November is left to the loquats of Doğanköy, and the month of Lefka's date festival does not even appear on the official list.
In the Winter Months the Calendar Is Almost Empty
Cyprus festivals stop in winter, and the calendar fills with public holidays; December is blank on the list, and the celebrations return with New Year's Eve on 1 January. There is a small trap to watch for here: public holidays do not count as festivals, but they can upset your plan, so take them into account too.
In 2026 Eid al-Fitr (Ramazan Bayramı) fell on 20-22 March and Eid al-Adha (Kurban Bayramı) on 27-30 May, the day before each counted as the eve, and since the dates of both depend on the lunar calendar, they shift every year. Which days stay put? In spring, 23 April, 1 May and 19 May; in summer, 20 July and the public holidays in August; in autumn, 29 October and 15 November. Of these, 15 November is the founding day of the TRNC. Public institutions close that day, so if you have business at a bank or a government office, write it into your programme.
Where Do You Verify the Date?
Our advice is to look first at the page of the municipality or association organising the festival, because aggregator sites get the month right but frequently shift the name and the day. On some lists you may see a Cyprus carnival written in for August; this name has no independent counterpart and corresponds to Nicosia Youth Days. The same confusion exists with the halloumi festival. One list says Geçitkale (Lefkoniko), another Dilekkaya, and the only piece of information they share is early September.
Edition numbers will mislead you. Those numbers go up every year, and the number in an old news item does not give you today's date. Meanwhile, at village scale the day is the last thing to be confirmed: the big municipalities announce their dates months in advance, while the small harvest festivals hold off until they are close. It is worth checking the plan you have built around Cyprus festivals once more before you set off; for those who can spare only one week, the fullest band is the last week of June, when Famagusta and Iskele are running at the same time.
| Month | Event | Venue |
|---|---|---|
| January | New Year's Day (1 January, public holiday) | Across the TRNC |
| February | No recorded festival | - |
| March | Eid al-Fitr (Ramazan Bayramı) (20-22 March 2026, public holiday) | Across the TRNC |
| April | Bellapais Spring Music Festival (11 April-14 May), Karpaz Tourism Festival (dates unconfirmed), 23 April public holiday | Bellapais Abbey, Kumyalı |
| May | Büyükkonuk Eco Day (3 May), Yeşilırmak Strawberry Festival (9-10 May), start of the Bellapais International Music Festival (18 May), Eid al-Adha (Kurban Bayramı) (27-30 May) | Büyükkonuk, Yeşilırmak, Bellapais |
| June | Morphou (Guzelyurt) Orange Festival (15-21 June), Famagusta Culture and Arts Festival (23 June-16 July), Iskele Festival (26 June-5 July) | Guzelyurt Festival Park, Othello Castle and Salamis, Iskele Ecevit Square |
| July | Famagusta and Iskele festivals continue, Nicosia Youth Days begin (30 July), 20 July public holiday | Famagusta, Iskele, Nicosia |
| August | Mehmetçik Grape Festival (4-9 August), Nicosia Youth Days (until 12 August), Nicosia Folk Dance Festival (27 August-1 September), Ozanköy Pekmez Festival (dates unconfirmed) | Mehmetçik, Nicosia, Ozanköy |
| September | Nicosia International Festival (12 September-1 November), Kyrenia Olive Festival (late September-early October, single source), halloumi festival (early September, village unconfirmed) | Nicosia Municipal Theatre, Zeytinlik village |
| October | Olive Festival continues, Büyükkonuk Eco Day autumn edition (dates unconfirmed), 29 October public holiday | Zeytinlik, Büyükkonuk |
| November | Doğanköy Medlar Festival (dates unconfirmed), Nicosia International Festival closing (1 November), 15 November Republic Day | Doğanköy, Nicosia, across the TRNC |
| December | No recorded public holiday or festival | - |
For the venue of the spring concerts see our Bellapais Abbey article, for the August grape harvest our Mehmetcik wine festival page, and for the weeks when a festival coincides with a public holiday, our guide to Cyprus during Bayram holidays.
