Published on July 7, 2026

A Guide to the Commonwealth Games 2026 (Scotland & Glasgow)

The Commonwealth Games are coming home to Scotland and we can’t wait for it. We're All In for Glasgow 2026.

From 23 July to 2 August 2026, Glasgow hosts the 23rd Commonwealth Games, the second time the city has done so in just twelve years. The first weekend will buzz, the closing weekend will break a few hearts, and in between there's eleven days of world-class sport packed into one corner of the country. It’s going to be good, and nothing quite brings people together like the very best athletes competing at the highest of levels.

Let’s make one thing clear. This is not 2014 all over again. Glasgow 2026 is a completely different beast, built on grit and good sense rather than gold-plated stadiums. It's leaner, it's louder, and it's proudly Scottish. We like that idea a lot, because it's not far off how we think about food down here in Ayrshire. So we've backed it properly. We're All In for Glasgow 2026.

This guide covers the essentials, the dates, the venues, the tickets, so you can plan well. We will throw in a few secrets that only us locals know about, so you can make the best of your time here in Scotland if you are visiting. So here's our guide to the Games, told the way we'd tell it across the bar.

In this article:

• When & Where Are The Commonwealth Games 2026?
• Sports & Events at Glasgow 2026
• Glasgow 2026 Day-by-Day: What’s On When
• Planning Your Visit to The Commonwealth Games
• Commonwealth Games 2026 FAQs
• We're All In for Glasgow 2026
• Where to Eat & Drink During the Commonwealth Games

Key Details: Commonwealth Games 2026

Okay, so if you are in a rush, we have summarised the essential information about the Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2026 below:

• When: 23 July to 2 August 2026, an eleven-day Games.
• Where: Glasgow, Scotland, across four venues in a compact eight-mile corridor.
• What: 10 sports and 6 fully integrated para sports, with around 215 gold medals.
• Who: Roughly 3,000 athletes from up to 74 nations and territories.
• Tickets: On sale now from £26 (medal sessions), £17 (non-medal) and £12 (concessions). Book your tickets online.

That’s the basics covered, but there is so much more to cover on the Commonwealth Games. As such, we highly recommend reading the full guide so you know all you need to know about the event. Ready? Let’s get stuck in.

One quick note before we do. All details are correct at the time of writing, but we recommend checking out Glasgow2026.com for the latest official information on venues, schedules and event details.

When & Where Are The Commonwealth Games 2026?

The Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games take place from Thursday 23 July to Sunday 2 August 2026. It's an eleven-day Games, with ten days of competition after the opening ceremony.

Glasgow is the host city, Scotland's largest. It's the fourth time Scotland has staged the Games, after Edinburgh in 1970 and 1986, and Glasgow's own turn in 2014.

Around 3,000 athletes from up to 74 nations are coming, chasing roughly 215 gold medals. Quite the spectacle. The visitor experience has really been put to the fore, as all events will take place within a compact eight-mile corridor across the city. You won’t spend lots of time travelling, and it’s been carefully planned to maximise your time watching sport. If you've been to a major sporting event before and spent half of it on shuttle buses, you’ll understand why this is such a big deal. A big well done to Glasgow on the planning.

Why Glasgow Is Hosting

There is some interesting lore behind why the Games are coming home to Glasgow again. These Games were meant to be in Victoria, Australia. Australia were initially awarded the Games, but in 2023, they withdrew as costs spiralled way beyond what the Victorian government initially projected. And in fact, with our head chef Justin Galea being an Aussie through and through, this one hits closer to home for us.

Malaysia was offered the event and turned it down. For a while, the 2026 Commonwealth Games looked like they might not happen at all. The jeopardy was real. That was until Glasgow entered the frame.

Having delivered a highly successful Games in 2014, the city already had the venues, the know-how and the appetite to make it work. The catch was money. The Games were rebuilt on a smaller, privately funded model, with no public money, no new stadiums and no athletes' village.

Athletes stay in hotels this time, and the budget came in around 60% lower than 2014, which is a superb effort with such little notice. Even more so when you consider inflation has skyrocketed in recent years. It's a deliberately lean, compact event, which for a visitor is no bad thing at all. If Glasgow pulls it off, this ‘lighter, leaner’ approach could become the template for how these events are run in future. And we have complete faith that they will.

The Four Venues

Four venues for the Commonwealth Games 2026, and most of them you'll recognise from 2014:

• Scotstoun Stadium - athletics and para athletics, on a brand-new track laid for the Games.
• Tollcross International Swimming Centre - swimming and para swimming.
• The Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome and Arena - track cycling, para track cycling and artistic gymnastics.
• The Scottish Event Campus (SEC) - the OVO Hydro hosts the opening ceremony, then netball, the SEC Armadillo takes care of weightlifting and para powerlifting, and the SEC Centre covers boxing, judo, bowls and para bowls, plus 3x3 basketball and wheelchair basketball under one roof.

The venues do not need to spread far and wide. Compact and quality, we think this is going to be the blueprint for the Commonwealth Games to follow in the coming decades. Glasgow is just setting the trend.

Sports & Events at Glasgow 2026

Glasgow Commonwealth Games 2026 features 10 sports and 6 integrated para sports. Here is the full list.

The 10 sports:

• Athletics
• Swimming
• Artistic Gymnastics
• Track Cycling
• Netball
• Weightlifting
• Boxing
• Judo
• Bowls
• 3x3 Basketball

The 6 para sports:

• Para Athletics
• Para Swimming
• Para Track Cycling
• Para Bowls
• Para Powerlifting
• 3x3 Wheelchair Basketball

Yes, it's a shorter list than 2014's seventeen. Badminton, hockey, rugby sevens and squash all missed the cut this time. Some folk will grumble about that, but it is needed to make this new model work. And what's left is the good, raucous stuff, the sports that fill arenas with noise and an atmosphere you’d only find elsewhere at the Olympics or World Cup.

The Mascot

Keep an eye out for Finnie, the Games mascot. A Glaswegian unicorn with a traffic cone for a horn, a nod to the famous cone that's sat on the Duke of Wellington statue for the best part of forty years. Dreamed up by local schoolkids and named after the Finnieston Crane, she’s a good introduction to Glasgow's humour before you've even arrived.

Glasgow 2026 Day-by-Day: What’s On When

The full session-by-session schedule is on the official Glasgow 2026 website, and exact timings can still shift, so it's always worth checking there for the latest before you plan your day. But here is the shape of the eleven days and a standout to watch for on each:

• Thursday 23 July - the Opening Ceremony lights up the OVO Hydro, the first time a Commonwealth Games has ever opened indoors.
• Friday 24 July - competition begins. The first medals are decided in the pool at Tollcross, and para powerlifting becomes the first para sport ever to open a Games medal tally. Boxing, bowls, gymnastics and 3x3 basketball all get going.
• Saturday 25 July - netball tips off at the Hydro with twelve of the world’s best teams, alongside the gymnastics team finals and another night of swimming finals.
• Sunday 26 July - history in the pool, as the first-ever women’s 1,500m freestyle medals in Commonwealth Games history are awarded, plus the gymnastics all-around finals.
• Monday 27 July - one of the busiest days of the lot, with eight sports in action as the athletics programme gets under way at Scotstoun.
• Thursday 30 July - track cycling begins at the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome, judo starts at the SEC Centre, weightlifting reaches its climax and the netball group stage wraps up.
• Saturday 1 August - the biggest day of the Games, with 44 gold medals up for grabs across athletics, boxing, track cycling and judo.
• Sunday 2 August - the grand finale: medals decided across the board, the netball final at the Hydro, and then the Closing Ceremony to send the Games off in style.

Pick your days, book your seats, and settle in for a cracking eleven days of sport.

Must-See Events & Competitions

We’d call all of it a must-see, to be honest. But a few events are expected to be particularly popular at the Commonwealth Games 2026:

• Athletics at Scotstoun. The one that gets the headlines. The men’s and women’s 100m finals will crown the Commonwealth’s fastest, and there is a lovely piece of history too. The Commonwealth Mile returns, an event that nods back to the famous ‘Miracle Mile’ of 1954. A Scottish crowd on a warm evening, roaring the home runners down the home straight. Goosebumps.
• The velodrome. Named after Sir Chris Hoy, Scotland's greatest Olympian, it's hosting the biggest track cycling programme in the history of these Games, 26 sets of medals up for grabs. Fast, dramatic and simply brilliant live.
• The netball final at the OVO Hydro. Don't let anyone tell you netball isn't box office. The Hydro will be deafening for the medal matches, and Scotland get to play in front of their own.
• Finals nights in the pool at Tollcross. Swimming runs from 24 to 29 July, with finals almost every evening and Scottish favourites among those fans will be hoping to see on the podium. Tollcross was one of the standout venues of 2014, and finals week should deliver more of the same.

The opening ceremony on 23 July is a first in itself. Held indoors at the OVO Hydro, it’s the first time a Commonwealth Games opening ceremony has ever been staged under a roof. Given what the Scottish summer can be like, that's no bad thing.

Planning Your Visit to the Commonwealth Games

Glasgow is one of the easiest big cities in the UK to get around, and the compact venue corridor means less time travelling and more time watching. A few practicalities to get sorted ahead of your trip.

Tickets

Tickets are on sale now through the official Glasgow 2026 ticketing portal. Prices start from:

• £26 for medal sessions
• £17 for non-medal sessions
• £12 for concessions
• Booking: https://www.glasgow2026.com/tickets

The tickets are not extortionate, and the Glasgow Commonwealth Games have set these carefully so nobody is priced out of the event. Around 500,000 tickets are available across the Games.

As you’d expect, the popular nights sell out fast. The big nights like the athletics finals and the netball medal matches will go quickly. Book your must-sees before you lock in your travel plans, then build your trip around them.

Getting to Glasgow & Around the Venues

Glasgow has two mainline train stations, Glasgow Central and Queen Street, with fast, frequent trains from across Scotland and the rest of the UK. Glasgow Airport sits just outside the city, and Glasgow Prestwick Airport sits south of the city in Ayrshire.

And yes, Glasgow has a subway, one of the oldest underground systems in the world, though it mainly loops the city centre, the West End and the south side. For the Games venues themselves, ScotRail trains and buses tend to be the handier option, with stations close to the SEC, Scotstoun and the Emirates Arena. Within the eight-mile corridor, walking is often quicker than you would think. If you are driving in Scotland, save the car for exploring beyond the city rather than the daily run to the venues.

Things to Do in Glasgow During the Games

Glasgow rewards the wanderer, and there is plenty to fill the gaps between sessions. A few of our favourites:

• Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum - one of Scotland’s most-visited attractions, free to enter, and a West End landmark.
• The Riverside Museum and the Tall Ship - a fun museum of transport on the Clyde, great for all ages.
• The West End around Byres Road - the city’s best stretch for independent bars, restaurants and live music.

With Glasgow, save your exploring for a quiet midweek slot. The first weekend and the final weekend will be heaving. Expect big crowds and a great buzz around the city.

Commonwealth Games 2026 FAQs

A few quick answers to the questions people ask most about Glasgow 2026.

When are the Commonwealth Games 2026?

The Glasgow 2026 Commonwealth Games run from 23 July to 2 August 2026.

Where are the 2026 Commonwealth Games being held?

In Glasgow, Scotland, across four venues within an eight-mile corridor: Scotstoun Stadium, Tollcross International Swimming Centre, the Sir Chris Hoy Velodrome and Arena, and the Scottish Event Campus (including the OVO Hydro).

Why is Glasgow hosting the 2026 Commonwealth Games?

Glasgow stepped in after the original host, the Australian state of Victoria, withdrew in 2023 over rising costs. The city is delivering a smaller, privately funded version of the Games.

How many sports are at Glasgow 2026?

Ten sports - athletics, swimming, artistic gymnastics, track cycling, netball, weightlifting, boxing, judo, bowls and 3x3 basketball - plus six fully integrated para sports.

How do I get tickets for the Commonwealth Games 2026?

Tickets are on sale now through the official Glasgow 2026 ticketing portal, starting at £26 for medal sessions, £17 for non-medal sessions and £12 for concessions.

Who is the Glasgow 2026 mascot?

Finnie, a Glaswegian unicorn whose horn is a traffic cone, a playful nod to the cone that famously sits on the city’s Duke of Wellington statue.

Where can I eat near the Commonwealth Games?

For something away from the city crowds, The Kirkmichael Arms in South Ayrshire is a Michelin-listed restaurant named Best Scottish Pub at the 2025 Scotsman Scran Awards, around 50 minutes from Glasgow.

We're All In for Glasgow 2026

We couldn't let a summer like this pass without doing our bit. So we've signed up to All In, the Scotland-wide movement getting communities behind the Games and helping roll out a proper welcome for everyone making the trip.

It's a simple idea, and a brilliant one at that. From Glasgow shopfronts to village pubs like ours, businesses and communities the length of the country are playing their part in their own way. It's our Games, your Games, a'body's Games. Let’s all get behind it and make sure it’s unforgettable for every visitor. Let’s show them what Scotland is really all about.

You don't need to be in the thick of the city to join the party. And being All In for us, well, it comes down to one thing above all else. Creating a warm welcome for all. It doesn't matter whether you're backing the home favourites, Australia, Cameroon, Canada, or one of the island nations sending a handful of athletes with a whole lot of heart, you’ll get the same warm welcome at our door.

How We Are Going All In

So what does that look like in practice? A couple of things we've got planned for the summer to show our support for the Games:

• A Games Quiz Night. On Friday 31 July, we're hosting a Commonwealth-themed quiz night, questions all based around the Games and the nations taking part, with themed bar snacks inspired by the countries competing, from Scotland and Australia to New Zealand and beyond. A proper community night to get everyone behind the Games.
• A warm welcome for Games-goers. Throughout the Games (Thursday 23 July to Sunday 2 August), anyone who's been along to a session is welcome to show their ticket at The Kirkmichael Arms for 10% off their bill. Our way of giving visitors a proper welcome after a day at the Games.

Whoever you're here to cheer for, we want you to see the Scotland that sits just beyond the city of Glasgow. And as it happens, some of the best of it is closer than you'd think.

The Best Kept Secret For Visitors

Most travellers miss the best part about visiting Glasgow, and it actually sits right on the doorstep. When you fancy a proper sit-down and a bit of peace, the countryside is nearer than most realise. Some of Scotland's most breathtaking scenery and interesting history is barely half an hour south in the county of Ayrshire.

Simply put, Ayrshire is unmissable for anyone coming to the Commonwealth Games 2026. For a start, this is one of the great homes of golf, with championship links at Turnberry, Royal Troon and Prestwick that draw players from all over the world. But there's far more to it than the fairways, from the clifftop views of Culzean Castle to Burns country at Alloway and a wild, natural coast that feels a world away from the bustling city of Glasgow.

Build a day or two here into your trip to the Commonwealth Games, and you will see a side of Scotland that the city crowds never reach. For more, see our full guide to the best things to do in Ayrshire.

Where to Eat & Drink During the Commonwealth Games

We could sit here and plug you some of the usual food or drink spots you hear about in Glasgow. And whilst some of these offer a good bite and pint, to find the very best the region has to offer, it’s worth digging a little bit deeper.

About 50 minutes south of the city, tucked into the hills of South Ayrshire, you'll find The Kirkmichael Arms. We’re Ayrshire’s only Michelin-listed restaurant and were recently named Best Scottish Pub at the 2025 Scotsman Scran Awards. For visitors who want to taste real Scotland rather than tourist Scotland, this is the place. In one form or another, we’ve been here since 1700.

How We Do Things

We do everything the painstakingly long way. We smoke our own salmon, garlic, leeks and venison. We churn butter. Cure bacon. Bake bread. It's pre-industrial, old-style cooking, done that way because you can taste it. But tradition without evolution is just nostalgia, so the result is the finest Scottish produce reimagined with French techniques, Asian influence and an unmistakable Scottish heart.

Think dry-aged Girvan beef from cattle that graze just miles from our door. Game through the colder months, lobster in summer. No two days at The Kirkmichael Arms are the same, and that goes for the menu as well. What we source and forage the day before is what arrives on your plate. There is no set menu. Each day, our team come up with new dishes created from the very produce we have gathered in the days before. None of it goes to waste. It's a lean, local way of cooking and it's exactly the kind of thinking All In is about. Less waste, more local and rooted in our community.

Still a Proper Pub

But don’t think of us as pretentious. We are still a pub at heart. You can enjoy a dram by the fire, a quiz night with the locals or one of our open-mic jams. Whisky is a big deal to us, and there is a thoughtfully chosen list of wines and malts to work through, plus whisky tastings that are about as good an introduction to Scotland’s national drink as you will find. After a day of crowds and queues in the city, an hour spent here is the antidote.

And it pairs perfectly with a wider Ayrshire day. We're a short drive from Culzean Castle on its clifftop above the sea, from the world-famous golf links at Turnberry, Royal Troon and Prestwick, and from Alloway, the birthplace of Robert Burns. Make a day of the coast and finish it at our table. Browse an example menu so you can get a better idea of what we are all about. Tables are going fast during the Commonwealth Games, so we highly recommend making a booking well ahead of time.

Getting Here From Glasgow & the Games Venues

The Kirkmichael Arms is in the village of Kirkmichael, near Maybole, in South Ayrshire (3-5 Straiton Road, KA19 7PH). From Glasgow and the Games venues, head south down the coast through Ayrshire; it's an easy run of around 50 minutes by car, give or take traffic.

If you're flying in, Glasgow Prestwick Airport is the closer of the two Glasgow airports and sits right here in Ayrshire. The nearest town of any size is Ayr, and the nearest railway station is at Maybole, a short stretch up the road.

Book Your Table at The Kirkmichael Arms

We're open Thursday to Sunday from 1:00 pm. Whether you're a visitor here for the Games or a local heading up to Glasgow for the action and want somewhere proper to come back to, a warm welcome awaits.

Book your table online, call us on 01655 750 200, or email enquiries@thekirkmichaelarms.co.uk. The Commonwealth Games weekends will be busy across the whole region, so it's worth getting your table in early.

However you spend your Games, we're All In for Glasgow 2026. Good food, good company and good times. We'll see you in the summer.