Feria de las Flores 2026 Visitors: 328,000+ Expected, $60.6M in Spending

Medellín’s 69th Feria de las Flores runs July 31 through August 9, 2026, and the city is projecting its biggest edition yet: more than 328,000 total visitors, an estimated $60.6 million in tourist spending, and hotel occupancy climbing toward 75%, according to El Tiempo’s report on the official projections. For US travelers weighing whether to book a trip around the flower festival, the Feria de las Flores 2026 visitors numbers are worth reading closely — this is the fair’s busiest, priciest window of the year.

The projections, broken down

Of the 328,000+ visitors officials expect, between 67,000 and 74,000 are projected to arrive by air through international and domestic flights, with the remaining 260,000 to 288,000 arriving overland through the city’s bus terminals, per El Tiempo. That’s a meaningful share of foreign arrivals moving through Medellín’s airports in a single ten-day window.

The projected $60.6 million in tourist spending marks roughly a 7% increase over 2025, according to Infobae’s coverage of the 2026 program, which also puts projected hotel occupancy at 70–75% citywide during the fair. The city has additionally allocated more than 1 billion pesos in public grants for community art and culture programming tied to the fair, per El Tiempo, and a separate 336 million pesos toward renewing the silleteros’ traditional dress — the first such update since 2017, according to Infobae.

Why this week is different from the rest of the year

The fair’s ten days pack in more than 200 public and private events, per Infobae, spread across all 16 comunas and the five corregimientos, with 21 free open-air music stages (tablados). It also lands directly on the heels of Colombiamoda, Latin America’s biggest fashion week, which wraps at Plaza Mayor the same day the fair opens — meaning hotels, flights, and restaurant tables are absorbing back-to-back waves of visitors rather than one isolated event.

That’s the practical takeaway behind the projected 70–75% occupancy: rooms in El Poblado and Laureles will be tighter, and pricier, than an average July or August week. If you’re planning around the numbers rather than just the parade dates, book lodging now rather than after the fair’s second week, when the 69th Desfile de Silleteros on Sunday, August 9 draws the single largest single-day crowd, per El Colombiano’s programming coverage cited in our guide to the fair’s free events and parade passes.

What it means for a US visitor’s budget

For anyone paying in dollars, the timing carries an upside the raw visitor numbers don’t capture: the Colombian peso has been trading near a decade-strong level against the dollar this year, which stretches a dollar-denominated travel budget further than it did in past editions — see our breakdown of where the exchange rate stood as of July 24, 2026 for the current numbers before you convert a trip budget. That said, official projections are citywide averages; individual hotels and short-term rentals in high-demand neighborhoods can price well above them during the fair’s peak dates, so treat 70–75% as a floor for how tight availability gets, not a ceiling.

The bottom line

Officials are projecting the largest Feria de las Flores on record by dollar volume: 328,000+ visitors, up to 74,000 of them arriving by air, and $60.6 million in projected spending — a 7% jump from 2025. If those numbers make you want to build a trip around the fair, plan for the crowds and pricing they imply: book before the Silleteros parade weekend, and pair the official dates with our guides to the fair’s food events and free programming and parade passes to build out the rest of the trip.

Sources: All visitor and spending projections above are attributed to the Alcaldía de Medellín’s official figures as reported by El Tiempo and Infobae as of July 23–26, 2026; these are projections, not final counts, and the city has not yet published a post-fair reconciliation.