GDC Festival of Gaming 2026 attendance drops 30% to twenty,000 guests

This yr’s GDC Festival of Gaming noticed a 30% decline in guests, leading to a complete of 20,000 attendees.

Barring a dip following the return of the present after the COVID pandemic, it marks the bottom turnout since 2011, when 19,000 individuals gathered at San Francisco’s Moscone Center.

Attendance rose to twenty-eight,000 in 2023 and broke data in 2024, reaching over 30,000. That quantity was maintained final yr.

The lower in customer numbers has been attributed to complaints about attendance prices and issues amongst worldwide guests about US immigration crackdowns.

Sources advised GamesIndustry.biz that some firms that didn’t attend or despatched fewer workers had shifted their budgets to different occasions akin to Develop Brighton and Tokyo Game Show.

This yr’s convention, the primary version of the rebranded GDC Festival of Gaming, hosted greater than 700 periods from 1,100 audio system, alongside over 300 exhibitors.

“This was the first year of a bold new concept for GDC,” stated GDC president Nina Brown. “We are thrilled that 20,000 unique attendees representing our global community showed up from over 85 countries and trusted us with this evolution.”

“The energy across the Festival, from packed sessions to a vibrant show floor and thousands of meetings happening throughout the week, demonstrates how powerful it is when our industry comes together to learn from one another, build partnerships and shape what comes next for games.”

Brown continued: “This transformation was built directly from community feedback, and we’re excited to continue listening, learning, and evolving the GDC Festival of Gaming as we look ahead to 2027.”

GDC Festival of Gaming will return subsequent yr, going down from March 1 to March 5 at San Francisco’s Moscone Center.