Yi Peng 2026 in Chiang Mai: The Lanna Festival of Lights, 23 to 25 November

For three nights around the full moon of 23 to 25 November 2026, Chiang Mai hangs lanterns over every gate, sets clay lamps along the moat and the temple courtyards, floats its krathongs on the Ping and, on two nights only, sends paper lanterns into the sky. Yi Peng is the Lanna festival of lights, the north's own, and the week it falls is the most beautiful and the fullest of the Chiang Mai year.

This guide separates what is free and on your doorstep from what needs a ticket and a transfer, because the two are confused in almost everything written about the festival. The mass lantern releases in the photographs happen at licensed grounds outside the city, with tickets; inside the city there have been none for years. The rest, the lamps, the temples, the parade and the river, costs nothing. We cover the dates and the three nights, where to go, the lantern rules the province set on 7 October, the flights, and the two releases worth knowing about.

What Yi Peng Is

In the Lanna calendar, two months ahead of the central Thai one, this full moon falls in the second month: yi is two, peng is the full moon. The festival is an offering of light to the Buddha at the end of the rains. Houses and temples raise pratu pa, gateway arches of banana stem, coconut leaf and sugar cane; khom khwaen, the pleated Lanna lanterns, hang in strings over the streets; phang prateep, small clay cups of oil with a cotton wick, are set in rows along the moat wall, the temple balustrades and the thresholds of homes. The khom loi, the sky lantern, is the part the world knows, released to carry away misfortune; the daytime khom khwan, the smoke lantern, is older still. In the temples the Tang Tham Luang, the great sermon of the Vessantara Jataka, is chanted through the nights, and the city’s own sapao, boat-shaped lantern-krathongs, are built for a contest.

Chiang Mai keeps two names for the two main days: the small krathong day, 24 November, the full moon itself, and the big krathong day, 25 November, when the grand parade of illuminated floats competes for the royal trophy. In 2024 Japan’s night-view council listed the festival, with Bangkok’s Wat Arun, as World Night View Heritage.

The Three Nights

From about 20 Nov

The lanterns go up around the old city and the moat, and the temples begin lighting their lamps at dusk.

Mon 23 Nov

Opening night. The ceremony, the lantern contest and the pageants at the new main venue, Ton Lamyai Market park on the river. Lamps in the temples and on the old walls; in past years a lamp procession has walked Ratchadamnoen Road to Wat Chedi Luang in the early evening.

Tue 24 Nov, full moon

The small krathong day and Loy Krathong. Krathongs on the Ping from Nawarat Bridge to the Iron Bridge; the old city at its fullest; sky lanterns at the permitted grounds from 7 PM to 1 AM; smoke lanterns only from 10 AM to noon. The first night of the ticketed releases.

Wed 25 Nov

The big krathong day. The grand krathong parade from Tha Phae Gate to the river, time to be announced by the municipality (about 6:30 PM in 2025); the second lantern night, 7 PM to 1 AM, and the second night of the ticketed releases.

Sky Lanterns: The Rules in 2026

Two nights, six hours each. The provincial order allows sky lanterns, lit lanterns and fireworks on 24 and 25 November only, between 7 PM and 1 AM. Smoke lanterns are allowed only on 24 November, from 10 AM to noon, and not at all on the 25th.

Permitted areas only. Anyone releasing lanterns applies to the district office through the province’s Bampen app and signs up to its safety conditions; the release can then happen only at the approved place and time. Around the airport a safety zone reaches 4.6 km to each side of the runway and 18.5 km beyond each end, which takes in most of Mueang district and parts of Hang Dong, Saraphi, Mae Rim and San Sai: no lanterns, kites, balloons or drones inside it. The old city is inside it.

Standard lanterns. Lanterns must meet the Thai community product standard, burn for no more than seven minutes, and carry no firecrackers. The licensed grounds supply their own.

The law. Releasing a lantern outside the permitted times and places is an offence under the Air Navigation Act, with prison terms attached, and the city is patrolled on both nights. If you want a lantern in the sky, buy a ticket to a release.

Flights, and Getting Around

Chiang Mai airport cancels and retimes flights on the two lantern nights every year, more than a hundred of them in 2025, and publishes the list in the first days of November. Fly in on the 23rd or in the morning, avoid evening departures on the 24th and 25th, and check with your airline the week before.

In town, the festival is walked. The roads around Tha Phae Gate and the riverside close in the evenings, and traffic across the city locks up from 5 PM. Stay inside or just outside the moat, cross the old city on foot, and use the red songthaews for anything further; book a car with a driver for the ticketed grounds if your ticket does not include the transfer. The first night is the easiest for moving around, the full moon the hardest.

Loy Krathong, the Same Night

The full moon of 24 November is also Loy Krathong, and Chiang Mai floats its krathongs on the Ping River between Nawarat Bridge and the Iron Bridge, with the municipality’s own release in front of its offices. Buy a krathong of banana trunk and leaves from the stalls on the bank, light the candle and the incense, and set it on the water from the staffed lanes. If you are in Bangkok that night instead, our Loy Krathong guide has the capital’s venues.

How to Take Part Respectfully

The lamps are offerings, not decoration: step around them, do not move them for a photograph, and keep children away from the open flames. Dress for a temple in the temples. Lanterns that come down land on roofs, fields and forest, which is why the province keeps the releases to two nights and licensed grounds; release only where you are allowed to, and only the lanterns the ground supplies. The processions and the chanting are religious; watch from the kerb, and let the monks and the elders pass.