Reading & Leeds 2026 festival just announced some of the biggest headliners you can imagine

With Glastonbury taking its traditional gap year in 2026, you could feel every major festival limbering up, polishing the lasers, whispering rumours, and dangling cryptic teasers like bait. But Reading & Leeds have stepped out first and loudest, with a lineup that feels engineered in a lab for maximum cultural combustion.

Charli XCX, Dave, RAYE, Fontaines D.C., Florence + The Machine and Chase & Status will top the bill next August Bank Holiday, a headliner list that covers every corner of modern music. It’s not nostalgic. It’s not heritage. It’s current: six acts who’ve spent the last few years bending trends, breaking charts, or turning the internet on its head.

Charli XCX arrives off the back of BRAT, the fluorescent-green pop juggernaut that rewired an entire year of culture; she’s promised her slot will be her only UK festival show of 2026, which all but guarantees crowds spilling into the next postcode. Dave returns after The Boy Who Played The Harp became his third consecutive No.1, a reminder that he’s one of the few artists who can make festival exclusives feel like breaking news.

RAYE, meanwhile, is in full ascendancy mode. Album two is expected next year, tickets for her arena tour are evaporating in real time, and the jump from dance tents at 16 to headliner feels like the kind of modern pop folklore the crowd will happily celebrate.

Florence + The Machine bring Everybody Scream, a record that confirmed (again) that Florence Welch can headline absolutely anything she wants; and Fontaines D.C. roll in fresh from a Finsbury Park triumph and the kind of fourth-album confidence that makes you expect new material the second they walk onstage. Chase & Status complete the headline picture with a guaranteed full-body, full-volume set, further demonstrating the eclectic mix of artists on offer.

Once you look deeper, the rest of the line-up delivers too. Skepta’s back. Kneecap are ready to write headlines. Sombr, Role Model, Jade, Josh Baker, Geese, Kettama, Skye Newman, Adéla, and KEO are all playing, as well as Chris Stussy for Reading.

Plus, for the first time, Leeds gets a Thursday main-stage kickoff, with Kasabian opening the whole thing, a move that quietly confirms Reading and Leeds isn't just filling Glastonbury’s gap year.

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