Oktoberfest 2026: Everything you need to know

On Saturday, September 19, at noon, Oktoberfest will once again open with the ceremonial tapping of the keg, during which the mayor of Munich drives a tap into the first wooden barrel of beer and calls out "O'zapft is," a Bavarian phrase that translates to "It's tapped."

His call will be followed by 12 gunshots, a signal that lets all festival tents know that they can start serving beer.

More than 6 million people are expected at the world's largest Volksfest, which runs this year through October 4.

The festival grounds are enormous: Oktoberfest takes place on Munich's Theresienwiese, a 34.5-hectare site roughly the size of 48 soccer fields.

But crowds can swell, especially on weekends — sometimes to dangerous levels .

Last year, officials had to temporarily close the entrances.

One reason is that nearly all 38 beer tents operate in two or three reservation shifts. When one group of guests leaves and the next arrives at the 14 large tents — which each accommodate several thousand people — huge numbers of visitors end up trying to enter and exit at the same time.

That's how, on one Saturday afternoon at last year's Oktoberfest, the crowds became so dense that movement temporarily came to a standstill. The crush caused some visitors to panic.

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