Ok Leeds and Reading, Glastonbury and Isle of Wight are all epic festivals without a doubt. And if you love festivals, you’ll no doubt have a great time at them. But if you’re looking for something on a slightly smaller scale, then these small festivals happening in the UK in 2025 might be best for you. We’re not talking like 10 people, which is essentially just a house party, but we’re also not talking about 100,000, which is a huge number of people in one space…but a happy sort of middle ground.
From small festivals in coastal towns in England to fun events in Welsh mountains, here’s what you’ve got to look forward to in 2025.
Top 2025 small festivals in the UK
Discover the best small festivals in the UK that are going ahead this year, from retreat-like, soulful experiences to abandoned, lost villages to rave at.
- End of the Road
- Green Man
- Bluedot
- Truck Festival
- Wilderness
- Shambala
- Beautiful Days
- Deer Shed
- ArcTanGent
- Nozstock: The Hidden Valley
- Standon Calling
- 2000trees
- Lost village
- Lakefest
- Cambridge Folk Festival
Read more about each of these small UK festivals, as well as their 2025 dates and locations below.
1. End of the Road Festival
With its relaxed atmosphere and diverse lineup, End of the Road provides a perfect end-of-summer retreat for music lovers who appreciate a festival with a more personal and artistic touch. The festival’s setting, amid Victorian gardens with free-roaming peacocks and macaws, adds to its distinctive experience. There’s also a cinema, library, games area, karaoke, a bookshop, Create area, place for open BBQs and much more, so it’s pretty wholesome. Besides live music from typically indie, alternative or folk artists, End of the Road features a rich array of arts, including comedy, literature, film, and visual arts. Attendees can enjoy extra things like secret sets, late-night silent discos, and an array of workshops and activities. You’ll definitely come away thinking this is one of the small festivals in the UK that’s best kept small because it’s just so peaceful yet entertaining.
- Location: Larmer Tree Gardens, Dorset
- Date: 28th August – 31st August 2025
- Capacity: 15,000
2. Green Man Festival
Taking place in the lovely Brecon Beacons, Green Man Festival is a huge (but not too huge) celebration of music, science, and nature. This independent festival offers a diverse lineup across indie, rock, folk, and electronic music. Beyond live music, you can also get involved in some of its scientific activities, like talks, workshops, and installations in the Einstein’s Garden area. The festival also has dedicated zones for literature, comedy, film, and wellness, ensuring a broad cultural experience for anyone going. The family-friendly atmosphere includes the Little Folk area, designed for younger festival-goers with activities and performances tailored to children, which is ideal if you’re taking anyone younger with you. Green Man’s commitment to sustainability is evident through its use of renewable energy, waste reduction programs, and support for local communities and businesses. If you’re a sustainability or environmental sciences student – this is probably you in your element.
- Location: Brecon Beacons, Wales
- Date: 1th – 17th August 2025
- Capacity: 25,000 (per day)
3. Bluedot Festival
Located at a working observatory, this small UK festival in Cheshire is all about music, science and space! It’s got a diverse lineup of music genres, from electronic and indie to alternative and experimental sounds, alongside talks, workshops, interactive exhibits, art installations, film screenings, and…obviously…stargazing! Bluedot’s location means you’re in a prime spot to explore the cosmos, so you don’t really hundreds of thousands of people fighting over telescopes as they might if this was a big festival. Although, just to note, it does still have an approx capacity of 21,000 and is known for being a family-friendly camping festival so expect quite a few attendees still (and young ones too).
Bluedot is so good, it was voted ‘Best Small Festival’ by NME back in 2019. It tooke a break in 2024 but confirmed it’s returning in 2025 for more.
- Location: Jodrell Bank Observatory, Cheshire
- Date: 24th – 27th July 2025
- Capacity: 25, 000
4. Truck Festival
Believe it or not, this isn’t a festival celebrating trucks. In fact, it’s often dubbed the “Godfather of small music festivals in the UK,” and “the birthday party that got out of control” is held in Steventon, Oxfordshire. It was created by the Bennett family in 1998 who apparently thought Glastonbury and other big festivals were too commercialised and boring. They wanted something different and fun, hence opting to be an independent music festival, which spans indie, rock, punk, and electronic music and showcases both established acts and rising stars.
Truck Festival is all about local community too. It often partners with charities, initiatives or local organisations, which also makes you feel good going to a festival like that. Plus, there’s also lots of food and drink too, where local vendors sell their stuff, as well as workshops, craft activities, and family-friendly entertainment.
- Location: Hill Farm, Oxfordshire
- Date: 24th – 27th July 2025
- Capacity: 13,000
5. Wilderness Festival
This one is getting quite popular, so it’s probably one of the most well-heard of in our list of small music festivals in the UK. It’s a multi-arts type of festival aiming to take you away from it all in some sort of wild escape (if you couldn’t tell from the name). There’s loads to do like theatre, dance, talks, and workshops. Attendees can even enjoy gourmet dining experiences curated by top chefs, participate in wellness activities such as yoga and meditation, and explore the natural beauty of the festival’s setting through wild swimming and nature walks. Being at one with nature obviously goes hand-in-hand with looking after the environment too, so they’re quite big on things like eco-friendly initiatives, including waste reduction, recycling programs, and the use of renewable energy.
- Location: Cornbury Park, Oxfordshire
- Date: 31st July – 3rd August 2025
- Capacity: 10,000
6. Shambala Festival
Shambala Festival is a smallish festival held on a secret location in Northamptonshire (you’ll only find out once you get a ticket). There’s live acts across different music genres like world music, reggae, folk and electronic, as well as theatre, circus, comedy and spoke word performances. The actual festival stages, venues and areas are pretty cool too. There’s the main psychedelic Shambala stage, the spiritual Sankofa stage, the Roots Corner, red palace Compass Presents, the Enchanted Woods and so many more regions to explore. There’s also a swing dance area and sensual pleasure parlour. It’s impossible to actually spend enough time in each place so my advice is to plan a bit beforehand. Also – make sure you get your tickets early as it sells out every single year! It’s
- Location: Northamptonshire
- Date: 21st – 24th August 2025
- Capacity: 15,000
7. Beautiful Days Festival
Created and managed by the band The Levellers, Beautiful Days Festival is known for being a really good family-friendly festival. It’s got multiple stages to listen to music, or watch theatre or comedy. But it’s also got a huge children’s area, which is probably why it’s so popular with families. It takes place in Devon, which is a popular UK staycation, so you could even make the Beautiful Days Festival a Beautiful Week Holiday too!
- Location: Escot Park, Devon
- Date: 15th – 17th August 2025
- Capacity: 17,500
8. Deer Shed Festival
Set in Bladersby Park, Deer Shed is an all-arts festival that includes sports too! They have random activities, where last year they had Rubik’s cubes over in the Science tent! Apart from experiments and things to stay active, the lineup is usually pretty good. In 2025 they host Wunderhorse, Idlewild and others. So while it’s a family-focused event, there’s loads that adults can enjoy – it will also bring out your inner kid too. There are lots of camping options such as vintage tents, yurts, and tipis, or you can set yourself up.
- Location: Baldersby Park, North Yorkshire
- Date: 25th – 28th July 2025
- Capacity: 10,000
9. ArcTanGent Festival
This award-winning Bristol festival takes place across three days in summer. It’s mainly a rock music festival, where acts like Heilung, Mogwai, Meshuggah, have performed in past years. But one of the iconic and unmissable parts of this small festival in the UK is the silent disco at the end. You can also enjoy drinks from the different bars and food stalls too. You might be wondering about the festival’s name…it officially means “the inverse function of the tangent”, however we’re pretty sure the festival was named after the album of the English metal band Earthtone9. If you love metal music – take a look at some of the other metal festivals in the UK happening too.
- Location: Fernhill Farm, Bristol
- Date: 13th – 16th August 2025
- Capacity: 10,000
10. Nozstock: The Hidden Valley
If you like cabaret, hip-hop, psytrance, electro swing, comedy, spoken word, circus or theatre – there’s a tent for you at Nozstock. It first started out as a BBQ – not a house party, a BBQ. It then grew into a pretty big party, covering all sorts of arts and entertainment and catering up to 5000. It’s had some pretty good acts in the past too such as The Wailers, Shy FX, Chase & Status, Goldfrapp and others. It’s also been nominated lots of awards like Best Dance Event, Best Small Festival, Best Dance Event and best of all…Best Toilets.
- Location: Bromyard, Herefordshire
- Date: TBC for 2025
- Capacity: 5,000
11. Standon Calling
Standon Calling refers to its self a festival in the UK that’s “small and perfectly formed”, starting off as a birthday garden party. It’s now pretty big and has a great selection of emerging artists each year playing. There’s also been not-so-emerging artists too, like Mel C, Years & Years, Rick Astley, Florence and the Machine, and more. There’s also lots of other things to do like having a massage, going in the hot tub, watching comedy, talks or a Dog Show?! And there’s usually a pool, which you can indulge in if the weather lets you, as well as fancy dress competitions and much more. Standon Calling is also known for being a really friendly UK festival, as well as having lots for families to enjoy.
- Location: Standon, Hertfordshire
- Date: 24th – 27th July 2025
- Capacity: 10,000
12. 2000trees Festival
It’s actually self-classified as a medium-sized festival, but it’s still worth having on our list (we’re justifying that it’s smaller than the more mainstream mass-crowd festivals). It won the Grass Roots Festival Award three times over the years, which is because it’s known for being a great platform for underground rock artists. It’s very strong on community and staying true to it’s roots (hence the name), as well as remaining an independent festival – which is really highlighted in their manifesto. Therefore, they want it to feel like ‘coming home’ for festival goers. From all this, you can tell what the vibe at 2000strees Festival is like – really chilled, non-pretentious and just all about having a good time with other people and feeling included.
- Location: Upcote Farm, Cheltenham
- Date: 9th – 12th July 2025
- Capacity: 10,000
13. Lost Village Festival
This is definitely a different festival, which takes place among abandoned, old buildings, gardens, junkyards and more and hidden woods. As you can tell by the name, it’s about escaping into another world – a lost village. It’s primarily a house and techno music festival, where a disused airbase is an amazing setting for an all-out rave. But one of the things everyone loves at Lost Village Festival is the attention to detail. It’s a completely well-thought-out experience that really takes you to another place to celebrate music. Although Lost Village Festival is one of the UK’s small festivals, it’s so popular it will probably grow over the years.
- Location: Norton Disney, Lincolnshire
- Date: 21st – 24th August 2025
- Capacity: 18,000
14. Lakefest
Now more of an indie music festival, Lakefest used to be all about cider! It started off with around 1,500 people gathering to drink 8,500 pints of cider, as well as partake in random games like skittles and Welly Wanging (no idea either). But it is a pretty cool small music festival in the UK, and has seen popular artists like Fun Lovin’ Criminals, Toploader, The Magic Numbers, Newton Faulkner, Ocean Colour Scene and The Coral all play there. You can go camping or glamping here, and it’s another good one for families too.
- Location: Eastnor Castle Deer Park, Herefordshire
- Date: 6th- 10th August 2025
- Capacity: 10-15,000
15. Cambridge Folk Festival
As you can tell, the Cambridge Folk Festival is one of the small festivals in the UK that is dedicated to folk music. If you love folk music, or are living/studying in Cambridge, it’s worth checking out because it’s just a really nice atmosphere. It has three stages for music, as well as a small tent that is nicknamed “The Hub”, where you can practise or jam together – or go to one of their workshops. They also have workshops in The Flower Garden, which often includes some sort of storytelling or informal sessions by local artist. Even though folk music isn’t necessarily mainstream, they have had acts like Mumford & Sons, Laura Marling, and Jake Bugg among others, and even Van Morrison and Sinead O’Connor for their celebratory event in 2014.
- Location: Cherry Hinton Hall, Cambridge
- Date: 31st July – 3rd August 2025
- Capacity: 14,000
For more festival fun, be sure to take a look at what’s happening further afield too. There are plenty of European music festivals to enjoy, as well as bucket list festivals abroad that you can’t miss!
