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Seasonal Roundup · Holiday 2026

Christmas Tree Lightings 2026: Ceremonies by Date

Written by the USA Fest Bot team with AI help. · Published · Updated

A tall Christmas tree covered in colored lights above a crowded ice rink between skyscrapers at night
The Rockefeller Center Christmas tree in New York City, 2021 (not one of the lightings below). Photo: Anthony Quintano, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY 2.0, cropped.

A tree lighting is the night a town switches on its Christmas tree, usually with carols, a countdown and a visit from Santa. This guide lists 53 Christmas tree lighting ceremonies in 25 states and Washington, D.C., for 2026, grouped by date, with links to each listing and the organizer’s website. The busiest nights are Friday, November 27, the day after Thanksgiving, and Thursday, December 3. For parades and more, see our Christmas events hub.

Christmas markets have their own guide, Christmas Markets 2026, and a Christmas markets hub. USA Fest Bot doesn’t sell tickets.

Dates can change, so check the event’s website before you go.

Early lightings: November 7 and 19

The season starts in Chicago, where Christmas Around the World at Griffin MSI began in 1942 as a single tree and is now an indoor forest of more than 50; its festival lights the 40-foot Grand Tree. In Columbia, South Carolina, Vista Lights keeps more than 60 galleries, shops and restaurants open late around its tree lighting.

Weekend before Thanksgiving: November 20–21

Stonington’s Lobster Trap Tree is built from lobster traps and decorated with buoys hand-painted by more than 170 artists and 40 local families, and you can step inside it. The Physick Estate lighting opens Christmas in Cape May at an 1879 house museum, and Concord, North Carolina, lights its tree the night before one of the state’s oldest continuously running Christmas parades.

Thanksgiving weekend: November 27–29

Indianapolis’s Circle of Lights turns the 284-foot Soldiers & Sailors Monument into what the city calls the world’s largest Christmas tree, with 4,784 LED lights that IBEW Local 481 volunteers have put up since 1962. In Portland, Pink Martini’s Thomas Lauderdale leads a sing-along before Santa switches on nearly 10,000 lights at Pioneer Courthouse Square. Cleveland’s WinterLand Kickoff lights its 50-foot tree every half hour, and Austin’s Zilker Holiday Tree is 155 feet of LED streamers around the park’s Moonlight Tower. See also Thanksgiving events.

Weeknights: November 30 – December 2

Boston lights the tree in the newly renovated Copley Square with the Boston Children’s Chorus, and Vienna, Virginia, turns Church Street into a Gingerbread Wonderland. At Wauwatosa’s Pocket Park, Santa arrives on a fire truck after the countdown.

Thursday, December 3

The National Christmas Tree Lighting traces back to 1923, when President Calvin Coolidge lit a 48-foot fir decorated with electric bulbs. The Boston Common tree is a gift from Nova Scotia, a tradition dating to 1971 that thanks Boston for sending a relief train after the 1917 Halifax Harbor explosion, and the New York Stock Exchange has lit a tree on Wall Street for more than a century. The Ohio Statehouse lighting is indoors.

Black-and-white photo of a large crowd in hats and winter coats gathered for a Christmas tree lighting near the White House
A crowd at the White House Christmas tree lighting ceremony, December 24, 1947. Photo: Abbie Rowe, U.S. National Archives, Wikimedia Commons, Public domain, cropped.

First weekend of December: December 4–8

Christmas Tree Lane in Altadena is billed as the oldest large-scale outdoor Christmas lighting display in the country: for over 100 years its association has lit a mile of deodar cedars. Ivoryton lights one of Connecticut’s largest living Christmas trees, Santa Lucia lights the Great Tree in Geneva, Illinois, Albuquerque decorates a 30-foot sequoia replica in Old Town, and Boone lights a solar tree.

A downtown Christmas tree strung with blue, green and red lights at a foggy Main Street corner at night
A downtown Christmas tree on Main Street in Irwin, Pennsylvania (not a lighting in this guide). Photo: Andre Carrotflower, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0, cropped.

Lightings with a parade

Several towns pair a parade with the lighting. In Northville, Michigan, the tree lighting follows the Holiday Lighted Parade, and in West Chester, Pennsylvania, a 28-foot tree on the Historic Courthouse steps is lit before the Christmas parade. Reston Town Center holds its parade in the morning and lights the tree at 6 p.m., and Fell’s Point in Baltimore lights its tree just before a Lighted Boat Parade. Browse more holiday parades.

Skating, drones and other extras

Buffalo’s lighting opens the skating season at Fountain Plaza, and Knoxville’s falls on opening day of Holidays on Ice. Manhattan, Kansas, adds an aerial drone show, and in Ivoryton thousands of lights are synced to music on 101.5 FM. For light shows that run all season, see holiday lights.

Before you go

Most lightings are in the late afternoon or early evening and build up to a countdown, so arrive early for a view of the tree and dress for standing outside. West Chester goes on rain or shine. Seats at the National Christmas Tree ceremony need tickets, so check its official site well ahead; the ceremony also premieres on the National Park Foundation’s YouTube channel. Brookfield, Wisconsin, holds a coat drive at its lighting, so bring a coat if you can.

To find more events near you, open Christmas events and filter by state or ZIP, or browse all states. Missing a tree lighting? Submit a listing.

Quick answers

When is the National Christmas Tree lighting in 2026?

Thursday, December 3, 2026, on the Ellipse in Washington, D.C. Dates can change, so check the event’s website before you go.

What is the busiest night for tree lightings?

In this guide, Friday, November 27, the day after Thanksgiving, with 10 lightings, then Thursday, December 3, with 8.

USA Fest Bot is not affiliated with any event in this guide and does not sell tickets. Found a date that has changed? Send a correction.