Woodbridge has not announced its 2026 Lights On. The last two ran on the final Thursday and Friday of November, and the lights contract starts 24 November.
Woodbridge has not announced a date for its 2026 Christmas lights switch-on. We checked every organisation involved on 4 September 2026 and none of them has published anything. This page carries what is actually known, what the pattern says, and it will be updated the day the date appears.
That honest answer is more useful than the one search engines will hand you, because three different Woodbridge pages about the lights are live right now and two of them are for previous years.
Nothing published, and we checked all four
The event is run by Woodbridge Festival of Art and Music with Woodbridge Town Council, celebrating lights installed by Choose Woodbridge. On 4 September 2026:
- Woodbridge Town Council’s news page ran to 28 August 2026 and the most recent item was about Merchant Navy Day.
- Choose Woodbridge’s events listing carried four events, all in September 2026.
- Woodbridge Festival’s own events page listed nothing after 30 August 2026.
- East Suffolk Council’s news feed had nothing festive, its latest item dated 28 August 2026.
The two stale pages to be careful of
choosewoodbridge.co.uk/activities-events/winter-lights-on has no year in its address
and reads as if it were current. It is the 2023 event: Sunday 10 December, 4pm to
9pm, music and projections on the Tide Mill.
choosewoodbridge.co.uk/activities-events/woodbridge-christmas-lights-switch-on-event
is the 2025 event, with Geno Washington named as the person switching the lights
on. Both are perfectly good records of what happened. Neither tells you anything about
2026.
What the pattern says
The switch-on is a two evening event, on the last Thursday and Friday of November.
2024: Thursday 28 November, 4.30pm to 8pm, lights on at 6pm by the Town Mayor and the local MP, with projections, a lantern parade, Santa’s sleigh, rides and late night shopping. Friday 29 November carried the Woodbridge Light Art Advent Calendar projected onto the Tide Mill. The Christmas Street Market followed on Sunday 1 December.
2025: Thursday 27 and Friday 28 November. The published running order was: (Woodbridge Festival)
| Thursday 27 November 2025 | |
|---|---|
| 4pm to 8pm | Events on the Thoroughfare and Market Hill |
| 4.30pm to 5.15pm | Lantern workshops in Shire Hall |
| 4.30pm | Company of Four carol singers, Market Hill |
| 6pm | Lights switch-on, then procession from Market Hill to the Thoroughfare |
| 7.45pm | Geno Washington and The YoYos, live on Market Hill |
| 10pm | Close |
| Friday 28 November 2025 | |
|---|---|
| 4pm to 8pm | Events at Whisstocks Place |
| 5pm | Lights switched on by Barrie Hayter of 5th Woodbridge Sea Scouts |
| 5.30pm to 7.30pm | Audio visual show, over 250 contributions by local artists |
| 10.30pm | Close |
Applied to 2026, the last Thursday and Friday of November are Thursday 26 and Friday 27 November 2026. Treat that as our reading of a two year pattern, not as an announcement. Nobody has said it.
The one hard 2026 date that does exist
The lights themselves are on a contract, and that contract has published dates.
Woodbridge Town Council put the work out as a Request for Quotation, Woodbridge Christmas Lights Project, published on Contracts Finder on 6 June 2025 with a value of £5,000 and a closing time of noon on 10 July 2025. The contract ran from 24 November 2025 to 12 January 2026. Correspondence went to John Risby at Choose Woodbridge CIC, and tenders to the Town Clerk at Shire Hall, Market Hill. (Contracts Finder)
So the lights go up in the last week of November and must be down by the second week of January. That window is why the switch-on never moves earlier into November, and it is the most reliable thing on this page.
The Christmas Street Fair is a separate day
Do not confuse the two. The street fair is a daytime market on the Thoroughfare, on the first Sunday in December.
- 2024: Sunday 1 December
- 2025: Sunday 7 December, 10am to 4pm, more than 100 stalls (East Anglian Daily Times)
The first Sunday of December 2026 is Sunday 6 December. Again, that is the pattern rather than an announcement.
Parking, and the thing that makes free parking day matter less than you think
East Suffolk Council normally gives each town one free parking day timed to its switch-on. In 2024 Woodbridge got Thursday 28 November, the day of the switch-on, and the council announced the full list of thirteen towns on 20 November that year. (Suffolk News) Nothing has been announced for 2026.
Here is the part that gets overlooked. Charges in East Suffolk car parks run 8am to 6pm. The 2025 lights went on at 6pm. So on any normal year, if you arrive at five you pay for one hour and the rest of the evening is free anyway. Free parking day is worth having for the afternoon and for the street fair, not for the switch-on itself.
Woodbridge has six council car parks. Hamblin Road and Oak Lane are the short stay pair nearest Market Hill and both give a free 30 minutes. Deben, Lime Kiln Quay and Theatre Street do not, and The Station does. Full tariffs, permit rules and the car park that issued 339 penalty notices in a year are on our parking page.
Blue Badge holders get no concession in East Suffolk car parks.
The town centre closes to traffic for the procession from Market Hill to the Thoroughfare. No traffic order for 2026 has been published. Check roadworks and travel before you drive in.
What to watch, and when
Expect the date from Woodbridge Festival or Choose Woodbridge in October, the running order in November, and East Suffolk’s free parking list in the third week of November. We will update this page as each lands.
Felixstowe, unusually, is already fixed: its lights go on at 5pm on Saturday 28 November.
Checked 4 September 2026.
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