Chiang Mai has done it again – and not to anybody’s surprise. Today, the Time Out world’s 20 best cities for art and culture in 2026 list has dropped, and our city made the cut.
Quizzing over 24,000 urbanites across over 150 cities to rank the best cities on the planet for music, art, theatre and more, Time Out set out to find today’s cultural capitals – places where art, theatre, music and cultural all come together in a way that’s accessible and affordable to locals and visitors alike.
Combined with insight from Time Out’s culture panel – editors, writers and local experts – the highest-scoring cities for each country were selected. And we’re hardly surprised Chiang Mai made it to the list.
Sitting at a respectable 19 on the list, Chiang Mai received particularly strong approval for its festival scene from Thai locals. Of those we surveyed, 75 percent gave the city a high rating for the quality of its arts scene, and 73 percent said culture is affordable.
Founded some 700 years ago, Buddhist art, temples and cultural evolution frame the city’s identity, but there’s a lot more to Chiang Mai’s ‘culture’ than murals and stupas. Around the city, you can find countless gallery exhibitions, indie studios and creative neighbourhoods – Pong Noi area being one of our faves – all popping up alongside longstanding craft traditions, while initiatives like Chiang Mai Festival City are turning the calendar into a near year-round programme of events.
And the timing couldn’t be better. This weekend is the city’s most auspicious ‘city pillar’ festival – locally known as the Inthakin Festival, that celebrates the foundation of the city in 1296.
