Assembly Festival has recorded more than 500,000 tickets issued during this year’s Edinburgh Festival Fringe, marking the first time the organisation has reached that milestone since the Covid-19 pandemic.
The venue operator, which celebrated its 45th year at the Fringe this August, reported an average ticket attendance of 56% across its 2026 programme.
While welcoming the return of audiences at this scale, Assembly has used the occasion to outline a series of proposals designed to safeguard the long-term future of the Fringe ahead of its 80th anniversary in 2027.
Among the proposals is a suggested change to the festival calendar, with Assembly recommending that the 2027 Edinburgh Festival Fringe begin a week earlier than currently planned.
The proposal follows feedback from participating artists and companies, who have identified the current timetable, particularly the final week of the festival, as a growing pressure point. Assembly believes an earlier start would provide more time before Scottish schools return in August while maintaining the scale and impact of the Fringe.
Assembly has also called for an independently commissioned financial review of the festival in response to rising costs affecting performers, venues and audiences.
The organisation wants the review to examine accommodation costs during the Fringe, explore whether venues could reduce expenses through greater collaboration and shared services, assess how the relationship between venues and the Fringe Society could be improved, and analyse whether the Fringe Society’s expenditure could be made more efficient.
A further objective would be the creation of a formal contract between the Fringe Society and venues, clearly defining the responsibilities and expectations of both parties.
Assembly is urging public bodies to fund the independent review as a matter of urgency so that any recommendations can be implemented ahead of the Fringe’s landmark anniversary year.
The venue operator said stabilising venues remains central to the future of the festival, while reducing costs for performers is its foremost priority.
William Burdett-Coutts, CEO and Artistic Director of Assembly, said today, “I have spent 47 years working at the Fringe and the current fractured relationship between the core venues and the Fringe Society must be brought to a close. We then need to jointly advocate for the value of the Fringe to the Arts and Entertainment industry and the country at large, not only for the commercial benefit it brings to Scotland but for the development of work that feeds into all areas of these businesses
“This is the single largest festival of its kind in the world and is too important to fail. And yet the funding made available to it falls far short of what is required.
“We need to preserve its future and secure the ability of shows to attend without exorbitant costs, safe in the knowledge that the Fringe is valued by funders of all kinds, public and private”.
Assembly presented more than 260 shows across 5,394 performances during this year’s festival, including Stockard Channing’s directorial debut of Krapp’s Last Tape, alongside performances from Susie McCabe, Jack Dee, Jason Byrne and Julian Clary.
The company also recorded 625 sold-out performances during the festival.
Following the Princes Street fire, Assembly relocated its outdoor George Street operations to St Andrew Square and operated seven venue hubs throughout the city, including George Square Gardens, St Andrew Square, Assembly Rooms, Assembly Hall, Assembly Roxy, Dance Base and Shedinburgh at Assembly Checkpoint.
