From bands to bags to beer bins - everything you need to know ahead of Download festival
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- Download Festival opens campsites Wednesday 10 June at Donington Park, Leicestershire, with Limp Bizkit headlining Friday, Guns N' Roses on Saturday, and Linkin Park closing out Sunday.
- The 2026 lineup features more than 100 acts across the festival's four main stages, with non-typical bookings including hip-hop legends Cypress Hill, drum-and-bass act Pendulum, techno group Scooter, and pop band Five on the District X stage on Thursday.
- Camping tickets are sold out, and both Friday and Sunday day tickets have also sold out, with only Saturday day tickets still available at the time of writing, via official vendors See Tickets and Ticketmaster.
- Arena rules restrict entry to one A4-sized bag, ban alcohol, glass, and cans, and prohibit weapons, fireworks, flares, drones, umbrellas, air horns, and nitrous oxide — with all confiscated items kept by the festival and not returned.
- Travel logistics require booking car parking in advance and using a Derby postcode (DE74 2BN for the car park, DE74 2RP for the site), with shuttle buses running from East Midlands Parkway, Derby, Nottingham, and Loughborough stations, plus Big Green Coach services from as far as Aberdeen and Plymouth.
- The weather forecast points to a wet start with rain and possible thunder Wednesday through Friday, improving to 23°C on Saturday and 26°C on Sunday — a sharp shift from the muddy "Drownload" conditions of previous years.
Why it matters: With camping and two of three day tickets already gone, Download 2026 is drawing heavy demand, while the festival's explicit booking of pop band Five, hip-hop's Cypress Hill, and drum-and-bass act Pendulum marks a deliberate diversification beyond its traditional rock and metal base, even as Guns N' Roses, Limp Bizkit, and Linkin Park anchor the nostalgia-driven headliner tier.
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