Freeform Festival (Melbourne, Australia) 2026

About

Freeform Festival returns to Melbourne on Saturday 3 October 2026, taking over the Sidney Myer Music Bowl for a full day of electronic music. The event spreads across four outdoor stages and runs as a single-day gathering built around international and Australian dance acts. Organisers frame the programme around the idea of sound without borders, pairing club-facing selectors with a curated production setup.

The 2026 line-up is led by Barry Can’t Swim, who plays a DJ set, alongside Interplanetary Criminal and Richie Hawtin. The wider bill brings house and techno figures including Ron Trent, Ben UFO, Freddy K, Avalon Emerson, Call Super, GiGi FM and Ash Lauryn, plus Two Shell, D. Dan, Ogazón and Bella Claxton. Local names such as Memphis LK, Mikalah Watego, Ned Bennett, Storm Mollison, 2LUBLY, Rakhi, Twiena, Crÿbaby, Hasvat Informant and Swim round out the roster. The three headliners also appear at sibling events Overtone on the Gold Coast and Mode in Sydney across the same weekend.

Freeform is one of the more talked-about additions to the Australian music festival calendar, having debuted in 2025 with a bill that featured Four Tet, Floating Points and Skee Mask. Promoters Mode and Crown Ruler run the series, a city-based, single-day counterpart to the larger camping festivals. Tickets for 2026 are sold through Moshtix, with early access buyers given first pick before the general on-sale. The Sidney Myer Music Bowl sits in Kings Domain on Linlithgow Avenue, a short walk from Flinders Street Station and served by St Kilda Road trams.