Carnaval de Nice: Complete 2025 Insider Guide

This is a complete guide to the 2025 Carnaval de Nice and Lou Queernaval, written by a local insider. Below is all the information you’ll need, including the schedule, locations, ticketing, history, and insider information.

Carnaval de Nice är en extravagant karneval med gigantiska flottörer i en satirisk anda.

Attending the Carnaval de Nice is a great excuse to visit the French Riviera. Every February, the city of Nice and more than 200,000 spectators celebrate with this glitzy world-famous event. It’s the largest winter event on the Riviera and a must-see.

The Carnaval draws its inspiration from traditional themes as well as and political and social events, with a healthy dose of satire — everything is exaggerated. Each year is a different theme.

The streets are full day and night with stalls selling gifts: Provencal items, lavender, brightly colored fabrics, and food.

The Amazing Carnaval des historia Nice

The earliest record of the Carnaval de Nice goes back to the Middle Ages. The year 1294, to be exact, where the Count of Provence created the “joyous days of carnival,” making the Carnaval de Nice the very-first carnival celebration.

Originally a pagan festival, “Carne levare, levamen” (“remove the flesh”) – the most common definition of Carnival – takes place before the Lent period, during the fat days (Mardi-gras). It is the last party before a period of abstinence and lean cooking, which therefore justifies all the excesses. 

En kommitté skapades 1873, och 1876 ägde den första blomsterparaden rum på strandpromenaden Promenade des Anglais. Alphonse Karr kom på konceptet för det första slaget om blommor 1876. Den här franske författaren av tyskt ursprung, passionerad för blommor och bor i Nice, ville ha en föreställning där folk kunde kasta doftbuketter i ansiktet.

In 1876, Alphonse Karr and Andriot Saëtone created the first battle of flowers on the Promenade des Anglais. The masquerades, satire floats, and competitions followed.

Det var under Belle-Epoque som Nice karnevalen nådde sin höjdpunkt: det var då den största karnevalen i världen.

One of the Carnival’s longest traditions is the ‘Berner Lou Paillassou’, which symbolizes the erasing of worries from the past year by tossing a puppet up into the air with a bedsheet (recent years used puppets of Donald Trump, Jacques Chirac and Gérard Depardieu.)

Carnaval de Nice: 2025 Program & Events

This year’s theme is “King of the Oceans”.

(Och ja, vi tycker att det är sexistiskt att det alltid börjar med "King of". Vi hoppas att de tar bort detta i framtiden.)

There are four main events. All the parades take place in the same small loop (there’s a map at the bottom of this page) around the ‘Jardin Albert 1er’ gardens. Here’s the map: The floats start from Place Masséna . On the square, visual entertainment will be relayed on giant screens.

Below are details about all the parades and events, and their timing. Make sure to reserve tickets for the ticketed events well in advance, as they sell out each year. It’s also a good idea to reserve your hotel and make restaurant reservations months in advance, before the best spots get booked up.

The Big Carnaval Parade: ‘Parada Nissarda’

This is de stor dagparad. Ungefär 20 flottor, 50 gigantiska dockor (med ett nytt tema varje år) och många musikaliska band från hela världen paraderar ner för Nices gator, i en färgstark och festlig atmosfär. Floats och en (ärligt talat, sexistisk och olämplig för barn) burleskparad, ackompanjeras av inslag av animation, gatukonst och internationella musikgrupper.

• Den stora paraden äger rum på öppningsdagen (lördag) klockan 14:30. Se det officiella schemat och få krysstär här.

The Carnaval’s Parade of Lights

Carnaval de Nices Parade of Lights-evenemang är en oöverträffad visuell visning. På kvällen kan du komma och se karnevalsflotterna lysa upp och kasta otroliga rörliga ljus i hjärtat av Nice till rytmen av musikaliska band och visuell underhållning.

• The Carnaval’s Parade of Lights takes place on Tuesdays and Saturdays at 8:30pm, and lasts about 90 minutes. See the official schedule & get tickets here.

The Carnival’s Battle-of-Flowers Parades

A carnival queen (elected by the festival committee) and her runners-up open each flower battle on her chariot. French and foreign musical groups join the parade and create the musical atmosphere.

Models, lavishly made up and dressed in gleaming costumes of feathers, sequins and rhinestones, throw bouquets of flowers (around 100,000 flowers, to be exact) to the public. The float decorations are made by hand, using petals of thousands of flowers, glued one by one, in the night and the morning before each “battle”. Beautiful, but like the burlesque show, it’s slightly sexist (all the models are female) and cut flowers come with a high environmental cost.

The battles (Bataille de Fleurs) began in 1856, specifically aimed to entertain the foreign visitors who were beginning to flock to the south of France. The parade gives tribute to the local flower producers. It highlights the diversity of flowers in the French Riviera as over 80% of the flowers are locally produced, but they’re grown in glass houses out-of-season, using pesticides, so it’s not exactly eco-friendly.

• The Battle-of-Flowers parade takes place on the first Sunday at 3pm, then every following Saturday and Wednesday at 2:30pm, and lasts about 90 minutes. See the official schedule & get tickets here.

The Gay Parade: Lou Queernaval

The first gay carnival in France, Lou Queernaval is a popular event that’s free and open to all. It’s committed to promoting the values of sharing, inclusion and living together.

Evenemanget börjar med en utstuderad öppningsshow på stora scenen kl 21.00, följt av paraden med drag queens, sexiga män utan bar överkropp och, viktigast av allt, färgglad maskerad. Förvänta dig massor av fjädrar, smink, paljetter, extravaganta kostymer, färgglada trupper och konstiga varelser som sätter igång karnevalen.

Notera: "Lou" översätts till "the" i Nissart, Nices regionala dialekt.

• Queernaval-paraden äger rum den första fredagen (som är i den andra veckan) från 20:00 till cirka 22:30. See the official schedule & get tickets here eller checka ut den officiella Instagram eller Facebook sida.

Finale: Incineration of the King & Fireworks

Sedan 1882 har en gigantisk "kung" stått på den kungliga flottan för att signalera början av festligheterna, ett viktigt ögonblick under Carnaval de Nice. Under hela karnevalen stannar kungen kvar på Place Masséna, där alla parader börjar och övervakar händelserna. På karnevalens sista kväll sätts en brinnande bild av kungen på en liten båt i Bay of Angels och skjuts ut till havet när fyrverkerier exploderar ovanför honom.

Tens of thousands of revelers gather in Place Massena to escort the Carnival King to the sea. Loud music plays and there is dancing in the streets. Silly String and confetti fly everywhere.

The giant King Carnaval puppet is then set on fire, followed by an impressive fireworks display set to music over the Baie des Anges . Legend has it that by burning the King, he will then rise again next year from the ashes to reign once again during the carnival.

• Avslutningsceremonin och fyrverkerierna kommer att äga rum den sista söndagen kl. 21.00 och inkluderar "Förbränning av kungen" / stora finalen, med visuella animationer som sänds på stora skärmar. See the official schedule & get tickets here.

A note about this event: Så mycket som vi vill att alla ska ha kul på Carnaval de Nice, så tycker vi inte att ljudet från fyrverkerier är bra, eftersom fireworks are harmful to human health and very destructive to birds and wildlife. In Italy, they have made their fireworks silent and have set them to classical music. We hope that everywhere else will soon follow suit.

As people who care about the environment, we think this part of the event is outdated and should no longer be a part of the itinerary. The fire contributes to climate change and is very polluting, the confetti and silly string poisons and chokes sea life and birds, and the fireworks are extremely damaging to wildlife and the environment. We urge you to also speak out about these issues.

Carnaval de Nice: Reglerna

The following items are not allowed within the event’s perimeters: 

Wheelchairs and strollers/pushchairs are allowed.

There are no lockers available at the event and anything that is confiscated will not be returned. 

Karta över platsen för Carnaval de Nice

Carnaval de Nice 2025 Event Details

Event typ: Carnival / Festival

Frekvens: Årlig

Datum: February 12 to March 2, 2025

Time: Föreställningar kl. 14.30 och 20.30; see the 2025 schedule here.

Kosta: Many of the events are free (including Lou Queernaval), but you’ll still need to get a (free) ticket, and there are charges for the parades. Parades cost between €5 and €40 (children under 5 are free).

Biljetter: When available (usually in the winter), you can book tickets here. Tickets can also be purchased in-person at the ticket office on the Promenade du Paillon, near the mirrored water feature (see map below), everyday from 10am to 6pm. A separate ticket office on the Quai des Etats (see map below) will be open several hours before each parade too.

For the best view of this perfume-filled, colorful extravaganza, buy a ticket for a seat in the stands or for the designated standing area along the road.

Hemsida: Officiell webbplats för Carnaval de Nice

Sociala media: Facebook – Twitter – Instagram – Youtube – #nicecarnaval

Plats: All parades do a loop around the ‘Jardin Albert 1er’ gardens

Transport: Kolla in vår guide till Nices transportalternativ.

Similar Events: Check out our komplett Monaco & Franska Rivieran evenemangskalender.