Your Guide and Insider Tips for Lollapalooza 2024
Your Guide and Insider Tips for Lollapalooza 2024
When Lana Del Rey was announced as a headliner for Lollapalooza Chicago 2023, we spontaneously booked a trip to go to the festival. We had never been to Chicago before and hadn’t been to a big festival like this in years! Since we were travelling all the way from New Zealand, we bought four-day tickets and had the best time.
The following guide includes our experience and some tips that may help if you are thinking about buying tickets to Lollapalooza Chicago 2024, especially if you are travelling there from outside of the USA.
Table of Contents
When is Lollapalooza Chicago 2024?
Thursday 1st August – Sunday 4th August 2024.
When’s the lineup announced?
The lineup for Lollapalooza Chicago 2024 is out now!
When does the schedule come out?
The schedule is released a couple of months after tickets go on sale. If you like more than one headliner be aware – they could be on the same day, at the same time. There are two headliners per night at opposite ends of the festival (approximately 1 mile/1.5km apart).
How much do tickets cost?
In 2023 it cost us $365 USD for a four-day GA ticket. With two tickets, plus service fees and Chicago Amusement Tax, the total ticket price in 2023 for us was $437.37 each ($874.74 together, approximately $1,500 NZD). The tickets have gone up slightly this year.
How to get to the festival?
One of the best things about Lollapalooza Chicago is the location. The festival takes place in Grant Park, right within the heart of the city. This is fantastic for a number of reasons:
- You can stay in accommodation ranging from hostels to high end hotels and be within walking distance to the festival.
- You can walk in and out of the festival throughout the day. This is great if you want to freshen up or eat outside of the festival.
- If you are staying further away there is a good public transport network
- Chicago O’Hare International Airport is located in close proximity to the festival.
- The festival has to finish at 10:00pm each night because of the inner-city location. Have a good night’s rest before doing it all again the next day, or you can head out to the city afterwards, or to an official afterparty.
Where to stay?
There are lots of options for all budgets. Prices are going to be more expensive than usual over that weekend, so book as far in advance as possible. You are able to buy tickets that include accommodation if you are looking for an easy option with less organisation.
We booked a hotel close to the festival location which was easy to do in advance. Book your accommodation soon after securing tickets to avoid disappointment. Hundreds of thousands of people attend the festival over the four days.
Our hotel, Fairmont Chicago, was fantastic to stay at. It was close to the festival (easy walking distance, you could walk directly to the festival from the basement level), a big room, and friendly, helpful staff.
How many stages are there?
In 2023, the main stages included Bud Light, Tito’s, Bacardi, BMI, Kidzapalooza, Perry’s, Coinbase and T-Mobile. Plus some additional areas such as Bud Light Backyard, Casa Bacardi and Toyota Music Den. Bud Light Backyard was a personal favourite of ours with great DJs and everyone having a good time.
Tip: Something we didn’t realise initially were the areas around the festival that offer free merch. For example, Toyota had free bandanas, Casa Bacardi had amazing artists that could airbrush graffiti anything you liked onto your clothes, Bud Light Backyard had free custom koozies (stubby holder), and there will have been more that we didn’t find.
In addition to merch, there were lots of cool areas to take photos in (if you’re looking for grammable locations). If there is a night you don’t care about too much about the headliner, find those spots then. We did this one night unintentionally. It was great to get photos in areas that were crowded during the day, and they had great lighting at night.
Do I need to upgrade to GA+ or VIP?
Honestly, we enjoyed this festival so much with General Admission and no extras. If there is an artist who you really want to see, you don’t want to fight crowds and it’s a bucket list moment of your life, consider paying the extra money and treat yourself! Alternatively, if money isn’t an issue for you, go for it.
What is the food and drink like?
This was much better than what we expected. Lollapalooza had so many food stalls (called Chow Town) that catered for a wide variety of dietary requirements. I enjoyed lots of gluten free tacos and we thought the food was reasonably priced. In a slightly different area, there was Dessert Island with loads of delicious treats!
There wasn’t a huge range of drinks, prices were okay for a festival (e.g. $11 beer, $13 seltzer, non-alcoholic $5). If you went into different areas, you could find different types of drinks (e.g. Bacardi sold in Casa Bacardi area).
The best thing was not waiting in massive lines, we probably waited five minutes at the most. If you didn’t want to eat at Lolla, as mentioned earlier, you could leave and come back into the festival later on.
Tip: There were lots of hydration stations around the festival to fill up your water bottles for free. We took an empty plastic water bottle in, used it for the day, and then recycled it before leaving. It was easier than lugging around a heavy drink bottle.
Tips for the first day at the festival.
Collect your wrist band
As international buyers we had to pick up our wrist bands. The pickup location was right beside the main entrance. You could’ve done this a few days leading up to the festival, but we arrived in Chicago the night before. We went to the ticket collection point quite early the morning of the festival and didn’t need to wait in line at all – they had a very organised set-up.
After collecting our wrist bands, we lined up at the gates to enter. This was the longest time we spent waiting the entire festival. We possibly could have gone and got a coffee somewhere instead of standing in the scorching hot sun. But as first-time big festival goers, we didn’t know any better, and the vibes were exciting!
Get photos by the Lollapalooza sign
Do this early before it gets too crowded. If you don’t get your photo by the Lolla sign, did you even go?
Merch tent
The merch tent also wasn’t busy early in the day. We bought what we wanted (and more than what we were intending!) then returned to our hotel to drop it off. Again, that’s the great thing about Lolla, you can leave and come back into the festival throughout the day.
21+ wrist band
Show your ID to a staff member who is giving out the 21+ bracelets. There were lots of staff available as we first walked in. Once you have your festival wristband and 21+ ID band you don’t need to bring anything else with you when you enter again. This is great as there is no risk of losing your ID or cards throughout the festival.
Link your debit/credit card to your wrist band
How do I pay for things at Lollapalooza? Through your wrist band which you can link to your credit/debit card (handy yet dangerous!). We linked ours to our Wise cards when we went back to the hotel to drop off our merch. It’s quick and easy to do.
What to pack for the festival?
See our Lollapalooza packing list here.
Should we do anything else before/after the festival?
As we had never been to Chicago, we also did a five-day road trip around Lake Michigan and explored the city centre, both were amazing!
Lollapalooza Chicago was one of the highlights of 2023 and we definitely want to go to another one in the future. We hope this guide helps you with your planning for the event. Enjoy Lolla!
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