The Badass Beer Fest is Tampa Bay Brewing Company's annual craft beer festival, held each November at the brewery's home in Tampa, Florida. Now past its twelfth year, the festival brings dozens of Florida and national breweries together for an afternoon of unlimited samples, rare pours, and the loud, unpretentious energy the name promises.
Balloons on the Hill is the hot air balloon festival at Heritage Hill Brewhouse in Pompey, New York - a working farm brewery on a hilltop south of Syracuse with one of the best panoramic views in Central New York. On festival evenings the field fills with balloon launches and glows against the ridgeline, with the brewery's beer, farm-to-table food, and live music rounding out a summer evening that has quickly become one of the region's most photogenic traditions.
Beer on the Bay is Erie, Pennsylvania's signature summer beer festival, held on the waterfront where the city meets Presque Isle Bay. Each year around fifty craft brewers pour alongside more than twenty vendors, with a silent disco, VIP tasting experiences, and a full afternoon of live entertainment set against one of the best views on Lake Erie. It is the kind of festival where the setting does half the work - a summer Saturday on the bay with a fresh pour in hand.
Brew Five Three is downtown Tacoma's beer and blues block party, named for the 253 area code it calls home. The festival brings together more than thirty breweries and cideries from Tacoma and the South Sound, pairing the tap list with live blues from local bands and a lineup of food trucks along a closed-off downtown block. It is a 21-and-over event, and proceeds have traditionally supported local community causes.
Gherkinfest is Knoxville, Tennessee's festival of all things pickled, hosted at Schulz Brau Brewing Company - a German-style brewery and biergarten on the north side of downtown. For one weekend each summer the castle-styled brewery fills with pickle-themed food and drink, craft vendors, live music, and special appearances from the festival's beloved Pickle Princesses. It is exactly as delightfully odd as it sounds.
Lake George Oktoberfest is really two events in the village of Lake George, New York, both put on by Adirondack Pub and Brewery at 33 Canada Street. The Lake George Village Oktoberfest is a free three-day street festival on Canada Street across from Shepard Park over Columbus Day weekend - in 2026 its fifteenth edition runs Friday, October 9 through Sunday, October 11, from noon to 10 p.m. on Friday and Saturday and noon to 5 p.m. on Sunday. The Adirondack Brewery Oktoberfest Charity Block Party follows on the Saturday after, October 17, 2026, from noon to 5 p.m. - a ticketed, 21-and-over tasting on Sewell Street beside the brewery, marking its twentieth year.
Oktoberfest in Leavenworth fills Washington's Bavarian-themed mountain village across the first three weekends of October, and regional beer press bills it as the Pacific Northwest's largest Oktoberfest. Produced by the Leavenworth Chamber of Commerce, the 2026 edition runs October 2-3, 9-10, and 16-17 - Fridays from 6 p.m. to midnight and Saturdays from noon to midnight, with no Sunday sessions. Three stages carry the music: the main stage in the Leavenworth Festhalle, a 10,000-square-foot hall for up to 1,400 guests at 1001 Front Street, the Bierzelt tent stage, and the Gazebo Stage in Front Street Park, with a street fair of vendors in between. Each Saturday the Festzug parade of alphorn players and costumed locals steps off at 11:45 a.m. and arrives at the Festhalle for the noon opening, and the ceremonial keg is tapped at 2 p.m. in Front Street Park.
The Festival of Darkness is Lost Forty Brewing's annual dark-beer festival and the release party for its barrel-aged Nighty Night Imperial Stout, held at the brewery in Little Rock's East Village neighborhood each fall - a Saturday in late October. It is equal parts beer festival and zombie apocalypse: costumes are encouraged, a costume contest is part of the program, and each edition carries its own theme, like 2025's Wild West-flavored Rodeo of No Return.
MGR Fest is the annual music festival presented by Moon Groove Records at ubergeek Brewing Company in Riverhead, New York. For one summer day the brewery's Long Island taproom becomes a stage for the label's roster and friends - a bill of independent bands playing through the afternoon with ubergeek's beer flowing alongside.
Milwaukee's Original Oktoberfest is the Bavarian Bierhaus's fall festival at Old Heidelberg Park, 700 West Lexington Boulevard in Glendale, on Milwaukee's North Shore. The Bierhaus bills it as the longest-running celebration of its kind in the city, dating the party back more than 60 years, and Milwaukee Magazine calls it the biggest Oktoberfest celebration in the area - a month-long run rather than a single weekend. The 2026 edition runs five straight Friday-to-Sunday weekends from September 4 through Sunday, October 4: Fridays from 4 p.m., Saturdays and Sundays from 11 a.m., closing at 11 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays and 7 p.m. on Sundays. Admission is $5 on Fridays, $10 on Saturdays, and free on Sundays, parking is free, and a kids' midway of carnival games runs on Fridays and Saturdays. Police officers, firefighters, EMTs, and paramedics get a free entree with a valid department ID.
The Oregon Brewers Festival is one of the longest-running craft beer festivals in the United States, held each summer at Tom McCall Waterfront Park on the banks of the Willamette River in downtown Portland, Oregon. Since its founding in 1988 the festival has showcased independent brewers from across Oregon and the wider Pacific Northwest, pouring a rotating lineup of IPAs, lagers, fruit beers, sours, and experimental one-offs to tens of thousands of attendees over multiple days.
The Portland Craft Beer Festival is an annual summer celebration of Portland brewing, bringing together dozens of local breweries and cider makers for a multi-day festival of beers made in and around the city. Attendees can work through a deep lineup of hop-forward ales, crisp lagers, barrel-aged projects, and seasonal releases while meeting the people who brew them.
The Sound Machine Music Festival is South County Brewing Company's summer music festival in Fawn Grove, Pennsylvania, in the rolling farm country of southern York County near the Maryland line. For one August day the brewery's grounds turn into an outdoor concert venue - a multi-act lineup running through the afternoon and into the night, food on site, and South County's beer poured steps from where it is brewed.
South Sound Brewers Fest is a farm-to-glass beer festival held at the McMillin Farm Collective in Puyallup, Washington, in the farm country between Tacoma and the Mount Rainier foothills. The festival debuted in August 2026 with about ten South Sound breweries pouring unlimited tastes across a working farm, backed by live music, food trucks, and farm tours - a harvest-season street fair energy in an actual field rather than a convention hall. It is a 21-and-over event.
The Talkeetna Beer Festival - known locally as the Talkeetna Brewfest - is a small-town Alaska beer festival with one of the best backdrops in American craft beer. Each September the lawn beside Susitna Hall at the Denali Education Center's Talkeetna campus fills with tasting tents pouring beers from more than fifteen breweries from around the state, with live music and an afternoon-long party under the shadow of North America's highest peak.
Urban Chestnut Oktoberfest - officially Oktoberfest St. Louis - is the annual Oktoberfest thrown by Urban Chestnut Brewing Company, first held in 2011 at the brewery's Midtown Biergarten in the year the brewery opened. The 2026 edition runs Friday, October 2 through Sunday, October 4 at the Grove Brewery and Bierhall, 4465 Manchester Avenue, and the brewery is promising a weekend of beer, festive music, and German fare and more. General admission has been free in recent editions, with beer bought by token or stein fill, and for 2026 a VIP package is sold in advance: a one-liter commemorative glass stein, two drink tickets, a buffet by Niche Food Group of bratwursts, pretzels, schnitzel, and pizza, terrace seating over the stage, a private bar and restrooms, and an Oktoberfest hat or flower crown, with tables of eight available and the VIP area 21 and over.