The 22th FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS takes place from 9-18 October 2026. The exact locations can be found on our programme website.

The FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is a format and a brand for staging cities, city quarters and squares. We turn the city into a stage and the monuments, buildings and squares into the stars.

The FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS can be seen as an open air light art gallery that invites you to stroll. Connected to the festival is a communication platform for partners, companies, institutions and organizations for their storytelling. The Berlin Festival of Lights was not and is not initiated or financed by the State of Berlin.

The lighting times of the venues in the festival period are daily from 7 pm to 11 pm. The times may vary for individual illuminations, we point this out separately on our website.

You will find an overview map shortly before the festival on our programme page.

Birgit Zander is the initiator, producer and also artistic director of the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS. Born in Berlin, she has been making her hometown shine in artistic lighting since 2005.

The FFESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is not an event of the State of Berlin. It is a cultural initiative – free of charge for visitors, which is financed and made possible by many supporters, partners and sponsors. The agency Zander & Partner GmbH has been one of the main sponsors and producer at the same time since 2005. The FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is organized in Berlin and in other cities by the FOL Festival of Lights International Productions GmbH. The Festival of Lights in Berlin is also supported by the Friends of Berlin International eV association.

The patron of the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS 2026 is the governing mayor of Berlin, Kai Wegner. To the greeting message.

We would be happy to inform you about the details of a festival partnership and look forward to a message to: partner@festival-of-lights.de

The FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is a cultural initiative and is financed by sponsors, supporters and licensees.

Do you want to contribute to the success of this unique event and are you interested in a cooperation? Then we look forward to a short message to:

info@festival-of-lights.de

No, the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is free of charge for you as a visitor!

All the latest information about the festival can be found on our programme page, which is updated daily. For live updates during the festival you can follow our WhatsApp channel (don’t forget to activate push notifications).

Our digital FOL magazine also provides additional information about this year’s Festival of Lights. It will be published on October, 9th. Further news is available on our social media channels, e.g. on Facebook and Instagram .

Since the illuminations are viewed from the outside, the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is also suitable for wheelchair users. Also our events “Festival of Lights in Concert” and “Beyond the Light”, happening inside of the Berliner Dom, are barrier-free. In addition, some LightSeeing partners offer barrier-free tours.

You can reach us at the following email address:

info@festival-of-lights.de

The 22nd FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is presented under the motto “Colours of Love”.

With great attention to detail, we combine light, art, and music with fresh perspectives, making Berlin’s landmarks glow and our guests’ hearts beat faster. This time, everything revolves around the most poetic and profound feeling of all: love.

We stage diversity artistically with light throughout Berlin. Our artists come from all over the world and show us their unique light art to take us into colorful worlds. But also beyond the art, we want to show the fantastic diversity of Berlin and focus on values such as uniqueness, dignity, respect and acceptance. Because only in this way can we live together in a diverse society. Differences make all our lives more colorful – and better.

We want to use light art to show how multifaceted and beautiful life is in a diverse society. And how a creative diversity arises from very different ways of shaping life, which always brings forth something new and exciting. To this end, we also cooperate with organizations that support and value this diversity.

We want to create visibility and explicitly support PoC, people with a history of flight and migration, the LGBTQIA+ community and people with disabilities.

Whether on foot, by boat, or by bus – this year’s Festival of Lights once again offers informative Lightseeing Tours led by trained guides and knowledgeable local providers.

All our LightSeeing Tours are offered by license partners, you can book them directly here or via visitBerlin. If you have any questions or issues with your booking, please contact the external organizers directly.

The FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS is a temporary art event to which the rules of copyright apply. Hobby photographers are permitted to use photos of motifs from the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS on social media platforms for non-commercial use without the need for a license from the organizer. For all other licensing questions, please contact us.

There are numerous possibilities to participate creatively and artistically in and in the festival. We always look forward to new ideas! Information and details on participation in the FESTIVAL OF LIGHTS: call@festival-of-lights.de

This does not restrict freedom of the press in any way, as all current reporting and personal media documentation of the Festival of Lights is of course permitted – licence-free and free of charge.

Commercial use, e.g. marketing in image databases and licensing the photographs taken, infringes the copyright of the Festival of Lights. This is because it is not a matter of current reporting, but of generating licence fees based on the copyrights to which the Festival of Lights is entitled. Photographers cannot invoke freedom of panorama in this case.

Commercial use is only permitted with the consent of the Festival of Lights.

The Festival of Lights invites visitors to capture their experience of the Festival of Lights in photographs and videos and to make these publicly available in private settings as well as on social media. This also includes recreational photographers who do not make their photographs publicly available on social media for their own commercial purposes. Such private recordings are licence-free and free of charge.