A short, curated list of major US Highland Games and pipe band competitions worth knowing about, plus the regional associations that maintain the full schedules.
We are a navigator, not a calendar service. The full schedule lives with the regional associations. What follows is a short list of the games most worth your first weekend.
The biggest piping events on the calendar over the next three months, from North America to Scotland. Highland Games, festivals, and championships.
One of North America's largest Highland games, marking its 75th year in 2026 and home to the North American Pipe Band Championship. Dozens of bands compete alongside solo piping and drumming, heavy athletics, and Highland dance.
glengarryhighlandgames.com →One of Canada's largest Scottish festivals, three days of pipe band and solo competition, heavy athletics, Highland dance, and clan tents in the Grand River valley northwest of Toronto.
fergusscottishfestival.com →One of the largest and most famous Highland gatherings in the world, held on the Cowal peninsula since 1894. Its Saturday finale, the massed pipe bands marching through Dunoon, is one of piping's great spectacles. A worthwhile trip if you can pair it with the Worlds two weekends earlier.
cowalgathering.com →The 160th edition of the Caledonian Club of San Francisco's Labor Day weekend games, among the largest in the western United States. WUSPBA-sanctioned pipe bands and solo competition across grades, plus athletics, dance, and clan tents.
thescottishgames.com →Now in its 51st year, among the largest Scottish festivals in the Northeast. Three days at Loon Mountain with EUSPBA-sanctioned piping and drumming, solo and band competition across grades, heavy athletics, and a Friday-night ceilidh.
nhscot.org →The 54th running of one of the Southeast's largest games, set below the granite face of Stone Mountain. EUSPBA-sanctioned pipe bands and solo piping, heavy athletics, and Friday and Saturday evening dances. A strong close to the outdoor games season.
smhg.org →Long-running outdoor games and major piping championships where bagpipes are central to the event, listed by when they usually fall in the year. Exact dates shift a little from year to year, so confirm on each event's site. The precise dates for what is coming up next are in the Next 90 Days list above.
Single-day EUSPBA-sanctioned games in the Carolina foothills with a Friday-night Great Scot Parade in downtown Greenville. Solo piping, drumming, and pipe band competitions across grade levels.
gallabrae.com →The Chicago Scots Scottish Festival and Highland Games, two days over Friday and Saturday in mid-June. MWPBA-sanctioned, with what the host bills as North America's largest pipe band competition at its center, plus solo piping and drumming, Highland dance, and clan tents.
chicagoscots.org →The largest Scottish festival in Utah, three days at the Utah State Fairpark in Salt Lake City. WUSPBA-sanctioned piping and drumming competition, Highland dance, heavy athletics, and clan tents. A regular stop for top Highland Games athletes from around the world.
utahscots.org →One of the longest-running US solo piping championships, hosted by the US Piping Foundation. EUSPBA-sanctioned, indoor venue, amateur and professional grades all day into the evening final. Worth knowing about as the calendar-year counterpart to the outdoor games on this page: same world, different shape.
uspipingfoundation.org →One of the largest Scottish festivals in the United States, four days at MacRae Meadows on Grandfather Mountain. Pipers travel from around the world to compete at every level from beginner to professional, with the EUSPBA-sanctioned competition spread across Saturday and Sunday.
gmhg.org →A long-running single-day event in western Pennsylvania, EUSPBA-sanctioned. Solo piping at 9 a.m. by grade level, pipe bands and drum majors through the afternoon, massed bands at the closing ceremony.
ligonierhighlandgames.org →Labor Day weekend at the Waukesha County Expo Center. MWPBA-sanctioned Champion Supreme contest with amateur solo, quartet, and band competitions, set within the broader Wisconsin Highland Games festival. Friday-night opening ceremonies and ceilidh, Saturday solo and band competition, Sunday a full festival day.
wisconsinscottish.org →The largest Scottish gathering in the western United States, run by the Caledonian Club of San Francisco over Labor Day weekend. WUSPBA-sanctioned piping and drumming alongside athletics, dance, and clan tents.
thescottishgames.com →A three-day mountain-resort festival with EUSPBA-sanctioned piping and drumming, a very large clan presence, and one of the most scenic backdrops on the games calendar. Easy day trip from Boston.
nhscot.org →Traditionally the third weekend in October. A well-attended Southeastern games with EUSPBA-sanctioned piping and drumming, Highland dance, athletics, and Scottish harp and fiddle competitions.
smhg.org →
Glasgow Green, Scotland. Friday and Saturday, August 14 and 15, 2026. Two days of competition with around 8,000 pipers and drummers taking part. The championship at the top of the piping world, run by the Royal Scottish Pipe Band Association.
Most US pipers will never compete here, and that's fine. But if you can get to Glasgow on a mid-August weekend even as a spectator, it is the experience nothing else on this calendar can match.
rspba.org →For the full contest schedule in your region, the regional associations are the source of truth. They sanction the competitions, publish the rules, and keep the calendars current. Find your region below.
The Eastern seaboard from Maine to Florida and inland to roughly the Mississippi. Largest of the three US associations by member count. Sanctions most of the games on this page. The "Compete" tab on their site lists the full sanctioned event calendar.
euspba.org/compete →The American West. Washington, Oregon, California, Nevada, Arizona, and the Mountain states. Split into a Northern Branch (Northern California and Northern Nevada) and a Southern Branch. Maintains a contest calendar across both branches plus its own AGM and championship weekends.
wuspba.org/events →The American Midwest. Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, South Dakota, Wisconsin, and Arkansas. Sanctions contests across the region and hosts Winter Storm Weekend in Kansas City each January, a major indoor competition and concert event.
mwpba.org/contests-2026 →The continental umbrella. Ties together the three US associations above plus six Canadian associations (Alberta, Atlantic Canada, British Columbia, Ontario, Prairie Manitoba, and Saskatchewan). Useful if you are crossing the border or are unsure which US region applies to your address.
anapba.org →The major games above are a starter list, not a directory. There are dozens of regional Highland Games and Celtic festivals across the United States every year, plus St. Patrick's Day parades, Tartan Day events in early April, local Caledonian society gatherings, and pub crawl performances that never make the association calendars at all. If you want to find every event near you, the regional associations are step one. Local Scottish or Irish cultural societies are step two.
We have also intentionally left out indoor solo piping competitions hosted by individual schools and colleges, mini- band contests, and most one-off concerts. That layer of the calendar moves too fast for a static page like this one to stay current. The pipes|drums events feed and Bagpipe News both keep up better than we can.
The dates above were verified in late April 2026. If you are reading this much later and the dates look off, treat the official site links as the source of truth, not us.
Highland games, contests, concerts, pipe-band gatherings -- if you know one we missed or got wrong, tell us. We refresh this page periodically.
Date-rot is the curse of an events page. Suggestions like yours are how we keep this list current.