Things to Do in Manchester

Creative Tourist

Last Updated 4 April 2018

Spend a day in the city and it rapidly becomes apparent just how much it has reinvented its industrial past into a new, trendsetting present – and an ambitious future. There’s plenty of things to do in Manchester too, from award-winning theatre and exhibitions to an exciting food and drink offer and thriving literature and music scenes.

Discover our top picks

Theatre 16 November–1 December 2018, from £10.00

The Maids at HOME

Written by Jean Genet and directed by the internationally renowned Lily Sykes, The Maids is a play of masks and mirrors, dreams and fantasies, inspired by the infamous Papin sisters.

Cinema 2–23 November 2018, from £5

Peterloo at HOME

Written and directed by Mike Leigh, Peterloo is an epic portrayal of the events surrounding the infamous 1819 Peterloo Massacre. We speak to the director about how he brought the story to screen and his relationship to Manchester.

Exhibitions 10 November 2018–6 January 2019, FREE

John Walter: CAPSID at HOME

A virus walks into a bar… and does what? CAPSID, John Walter’s major solo exhibition at HOME Manchester, sets out to update the discussion around HIV, how viruses work and the cultural transmission of ideas.

Photo of the festive display outside the Corn Exchange

Families 9 November–23 December 2018, FREE

Manchester Christmas Markets

The Manchester Christmas Markets are one of the biggest and busiest Christmas markets in Europe. Happening across Manchester city centre from 9 November to 20 December. Pick up stocking-fillers stuff yourself with German sausage and wash down with lashings of glühwein.

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Music 16 November 2018, from £12.5

Stephan | Walton | Howells | Shostakovich at The Bridgewater Hall

To mark 100 years since the Armistice, the BBC Philharmonic reflects on war. Following a work by Rudi Stephan, who died on the Eastern Front, there’s Herbert Howells’s tribute to a fellow composer killed at war, Walton’s haunting Viola Concerto and Shostakovich’s Ninth, written as the Second World War drew to a close.

Music 16 November 2018, from £18

Manchester Collective: Pierrot Lunaire at RNCM

Intimate, immersive and utterly thrilling, Manchester Collective’s concerts consistently bowl audiences over. At RNCM they will deconstruct Pierrot Lunaire and delve deeper into the inner world of the female protagonist. BBC 6’s Elizabeth Alker will be a calm voice of guidance before the madness ensues.

Festivals 13 December 2017–20 January 2019,

HOME at Christmas

HOME celebrates the most special time of the year with a chock-full Christmas season of cultural shenanigans – more fun than you can shake a candy cane at.

Festivals 4–21 July 2019, from £12.00

MIF19 – Manchester International Festival

Manchester International Festival announces that Yoko Ono, Idris Elba and Skepta are among the artists set to feature in the 2019 programme.

Music 30 November 2018–26 January 2019, from £10.00

The Producers – A Mel Brooks Musical at the Royal Exchange

Adapted from the cult film by Mel Brooks, The Royal Exchange are set to delight with their Christmas musical – The Producers.

Literature 26 November 2018, from £5.00

Joe Dunthorne and Luke Kennard at Martin Harris Centre

Joe Dunthorne’s first novel, Submarine, was adapted for film by Richard Ayoade, his second, Wild Abandon, won the 2012 Encore Award, and his third, The Adulterants, came out this spring. He chats to Luke Kennard, author of The Transition, about writing biting satires and critically acclaimed poetry.