Edinburgh Fringe Festival
A digital stage for the world’s largest arts festival
Elevating a global arts festival
The Edinburgh Fringe Festival, renowned as the world’s largest arts event, stands as a global cultural phenomenon. In 2024, this extraordinary festival spanned 25 days, featuring over 51,446 scheduled performances of 3,317 unique shows across 262 venues. With participants from 58 countries, the event attracts millions of festival-goers and annually sells upwards of 2.8 million tickets, making it one of the most attended festivals worldwide.
Driving value and engagement for Edinburgh Fringe
Given the scale and diversity of Edinburgh Fringe, delivering a seamless, engaging experience for attendees has become increasingly critical.
However, Edinburgh Fringe’s previous app faced significant challenges, ultimately being decommissioned due to poor user experience, instability, and negative feedback from festival-goers. Unable to handle the festival’s immense size and demand, the old app failed to meet user expectations. This prompted the Edinburgh Fringe team to seek a new solution—one that would provide a stable, engaging, and scalable experience for both attendees and organisers.
In partnership with equ, Edinburgh Fringe launched a new app that has, over the past two seasons, transformed how audiences interact with the festival. Building on the success of equ’s FRINGE WORLD app, the Edinburgh Fringe app integrates deeply with the festival’s infrastructure, offering a tailored solution that addresses the event’s complexity and vast scale. With over 200,000 downloads to date, the app has become essential for both festival-goers and organisers, delivering an optimised experience that aligns with Edinburgh Fringe’s expansive offerings and logistical needs.
Collaborative development across continents
The journey to bring the Edinburgh Fringe app to life required a collaborative and innovative approach between equ and the Edinburgh Fringe team. Despite the geographic and time zone differences between Perth and Edinburgh, equ harnessed online tools and remote workshops to facilitate fluid communication and drive project progress. Virtual sessions allowed for continuous feedback and iterative design, enabling both teams to stay aligned on the project’s goals and adapt quickly to any changes. This agile and highly collaborative process was essential to shaping a product that meets the precise needs of the Edinburgh Fringe’s vast audience and complex logistics
Custom-built API and full-system integration
A significant part of the Edinburgh Fringe app’s success stems from the development of a dedicated API, which equ designed to link seamlessly with Edinburgh Fringe’s existing systems. This API enables real-time connections across ticketing, event management, and artist management platforms, ensuring that every app user receives up-to-the-minute information and a smooth experience across all festival activities. This full integration with Edinburgh Fringe’s infrastructure supports everything from dynamic event listings and ticket availability to artist schedules, making sure that attendees have access to the latest details at any moment.
Feature-rich to meet festival needs
Designed with the end user in mind, the Edinburgh Fringe app’s robust feature set addresses the full festival experience.
Onboarding and personalised recommendations A seamless onboarding experience allows users to set preferences for genres, show frequency, and additional requirements, enabling the app to suggest shows that align with individual tastes.
Intelligent search and discovery Users can filter events by genre, time, or location, and “Shake to Search” offers spontaneous show recommendations. For location-based exploration, the integrated map displays nearby shows and venues, an invaluable tool for visitors unfamiliar with Edinburgh’s layout.
Offline mode Following feedback from the first season, equ introduced offline functionality to support uninterrupted access, especially in response to Edinburgh’s connectivity issues during the festival. With high visitor numbers and thick, medieval walls impacting signal, this feature ensures access to event information, ticketing, and maps even in low-signal areas.
Integrated ticketing and planner Users can add multiple events to their cart for a single checkout, with tickets accessible offline via QR codes. A personal planner allows users to save shows by date, and sync these with personal calendars to stay organised.
Real-time event details and reviews Event listings include show descriptions, dates, venues, and user reviews, providing comprehensive details that help users make informed choices.
Driving value and engagement for Edinburgh Fringe
The Edinburgh Fringe app has been instrumental in expanding the festival’s reach and revenue, with 30% of all tickets purchased being made through the app, underscoring its role as a powerful sales channel. App users also show higher spending habits, with an average spend approximately 30% greater than that of website users, leading to increased revenue per user. Additionally, user retention has surpassed expectations, with 70% of app users returning for a second season, demonstrating the app’s lasting value for festival-goers and its effectiveness as a customer engagement tool.
The app’s high download numbers, now surpassing 200,000, reflect its strong adoption among festival-goers who frequently engage with its features throughout the festival season. On average, users perform 52 searches per season, underscoring the app’s role as an essential tool for event discovery and planning. The popular “Shake to Search” feature further enhances the user experience, with an average of 7.5 shakes per user, encouraging spontaneous exploration and discovery of shows across the festival.
A growing partnership
The Edinburgh Fringe app exemplifies our commitment to delivering high-impact, user-focused digital products for the arts and cultural sector. Based on the success of this app, equ has been appointed to develop Edinburgh Fringe’s website, set to launch in the first quarter of 2025. New features will continue to be introduced in the coming years, ensuring the app evolves alongside festival needs, supporting an increasingly dynamic and engaging
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