Bonnaroo Sets 2018 Dates, Announces Improved Attendance

MANCHESTER, TN — The 2018 Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival will once again coincide with Nashville's CMA Fest, festival organizers confirmed.

The four-day festival in Coffee County is scheduled for June 7 through June 10 next year, once again the same weekend as the country-music festival in the Music City. (For more updates on this story and free news alerts for your neighborhood, sign up for your local Middle Tennessee Patch morning newsletter.)

Early-bird tickets for the event typically go on sale the day after Thanksgiving and the festival's line-up is traditionally announced in January.

Attendance for last weekend's Bonnaroo was up 40 percent over 2016, organizers announced. The event reported 65,000 attendees — which does not necessarily mean 65,000 tickets were sold. While a marked improvement, it is still the third-worst attended Bonnaroo in history and that number is 10,000 below the 10-year average for the event, which peaked with more than 85,000 attendees in 2011. Historically, Bonnaroo was tight-lipped about its attendance and ticket sales number until The Tennessean used an open-records request with Coffee County to pin down the figures last year.

Under its agreement with Coffee County, Bonnaroo sends $3 per ticket plus $30,000 to the county government annually. According to The Tennessean, that deal is due for re-negotiation this year.

Photo by Andrew Jorgensen via Bonnaroo Music & Arts Festival/Used with permission