Rose of Tralee International Festival
Friday 14 to Tuesday 18 August 2026. The televised Selection Nights close it, on the Monday and Tuesday.
Runs every year
Tralee, about 25 km north of Killorglin.
The Rose of Tralee has run since 1959, and it is less a beauty contest than a long, sentimental television institution. Women of Irish descent from around the world, 32 of them this year, come to Tralee as Roses for their county or their city, and over two televised nights they are interviewed on stage, do a party piece, and one is selected. It is broadcast live and a large share of the country watches it.
If you are in Kerry while it is on, that is the point. The Selection Nights are the two evenings when the whole county is watching the same thing, and most pubs will have it on. It is an odd, warm, slightly old-fashioned spectacle, and watching it in a bar in Kenmare or Cahersiveen with people who know one of the Roses is a better evening than the format suggests. Free, and no plan required.
The rest of the festival is on the streets of Tralee: a parade, funfair, street entertainment and the Feile Tra Li programme alongside it. Tralee is about 25 km north of Killorglin, so it is a detour from the loop rather than on it.
The practical warning stands whether or not you care about the festival. It overlaps Puck Fair and fills accommodation across the whole county for that fortnight. If you are driving the Ring in mid-August, book everything early: beds in Killarney and Killorglin get scarce and prices rise accordingly.
How it runs
- Opening weekend The Roses arrive and the town fills Parades, street entertainment and a funfair, alongside Feile Tra Li in the town centre.
- Final two nights The televised Selection Nights, live on RTE One and RTE Player Two nights from 8pm, breaking for the Nine O'Clock News and resuming about 9:35pm. The new Rose is crowned on the second.
2026 programme
- Friday 14 Festival opens in Tralee
- Sunday 16 The Sunlight Parade through the town
- Monday 17 Selection Night one, 8pm on RTE One Resumes at 9:35pm after the news.
- Tuesday 18 Selection Night two, and Caoilfhinn Ni Choiligh of Westmeath was chosen as the 2026 Rose The 25-year-old succeeds the 2025 Rose. Broadcast from 8pm on RTE One and RTE Player.