Island group · 4 regions
The novena to the Santo Niño opened at the basilica on 9 January. The grand parade filled the Cebu City Sports Center on Sunday 18 January, and the grand finale closed it that evening.
Photo: Ranieljosecastaneda · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
A street festival of masked dancers, held every year on the fourth Sunday of October. The masks give the festival its name: Pista sang Maskara in Hiligaynon. The smiling faces on them are why Bacolod is called the City of Smiles. The city started the festival in 1980, …
Photo: John Albert Pagunsan · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
The province's best known festival: tribal dance, music and a street parade in Kalibo on the third Sunday of January, held in honour of the Santo Nino. The name means to be like Atis, after the Aeta people who first settled Panay. Dancers wear indigenous costumes and carry …
Photo: Bernardo "Berniemack" Arellano III · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
The blood compact of Datu Sikatuna and Miguel López de Legazpi, sworn in 1565, is re-enacted on the shore at Tagbilaran. The 2026 run opened in Talibon on 4 July and carried through the month with the street dance and the agri fair.
The oldest of the Santo Niño festivals, two hours from Boracay by road. It opened on 10 January, the Sadsad Ati-Atihan contest ran on 17 January, and the last day was Sunday 18 January.
Dumaguete's own festival. Sandurot means welcome, and the re-enactment on the boulevard tells how the city took in the peoples who landed here.
Three days for the Santo Niño. The fluvial and foot processions ran on Friday 23 January, Kasadyahan and the religious sadsad on Saturday, and the Ati tribes competition on Sunday 25 January.
Photo: Original: EMMAN A. FORONDA Derivative work: Aristeas · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
A street dancing festival held every 3 to 5 November, and one of the most popular in the region. The dancers paint flowers on their faces, arms, bodies and legs, in the pintados tradition, to show gratitude to people and to their surroundings. The name joins two Spanish …
Photo: Francisco Pajares, Jr. · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
A July celebration of the blood compact between Datu Sikatuna and Miguel López de Legazpi in 1565. The two leaders cut their chests, mixed the blood with wine and drank it, and that sealed the friendship between the Spaniards and the Boholanos. Juan Luna painted the scene. The …
A week of parades and town booths, held in Dumaguete every October. Each town and city in Negros Oriental keeps a booth with its own products and its own sights, and the province calls the week its festival of festivals. A float parade and a street dancing competition …
The 53rd regatta. Paraws, the outrigger sailboats of the Visayas, race off Villa Beach: the slalom on 26 February and the main sail on 1 March.
The island's week of beach sport and music, the successor to LaBoracay. Clean-ups and sustainability run beside the races, the beach games and the sunset sets.
One of the three major festivals of the city, held on the third Sunday of January, the same day as the Sinulog in Cebu City. The other two are the Udyakan sa Kabankalan and the charter anniversary.
The festival of festivals: every town and city of Negros Oriental brings its own festival to Dumaguete for ten days, with booths, street dancing and a food fair.
The city-wide festival, held every 27 December for the patroness of Baybay, Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception. It sets out the history of the city and the two trades most Baybayanons live by, fishing and farming.
A week-long festival at San Jose with street parades, beach shows, plaza concerts, a beauty contest and a trade fair. Governor Evelio Javier started it in 1974. Binirayan comes from biray, the Kinaray-a word for sailboat, and the festival recalls the legend of the ten Bornean datus who …
Photo: Ranieljosecastaneda · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
A festival of roast pig, held on October 15 for Saint Teresa of Avila, the patron saint of the city. Talisay is called the Lechon Capital of Cebu, and its lechon goes by the local name inasal. Carcar is the other town in the province known for it. …
Photo: Francisco M. Pajares, Jr. · Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 4.0
The island's mango festival, and the reason most visitors come in May. It runs the whole month, and it first ran on 22 May 1993, the day Guimaras marks its founding as a province. Locals wear mango-inspired costumes and build mango-themed floats for a parade that makes its …
Cebu City's Christmas season. The lighting of the tree at Fuente Osmeña opens it, and the lanterns stay up into the new year.
A competition of performing groups, with contingents invited from festivals all over the country to dance for cash prizes and trophies. The dancing fills the streets in costume, and the festival is held in honour of the Santo Niño, the Child Jesus. Sangyaw is an old Waray word …
A joint fiesta of Roxas City and the province, held for the feast of the Immaculate Conception, the patroness of the city. The name puts together the city fiesta Sinadya and the provincial thanksgiving Halaran, and it means Joy in Sharing and Thanksgiving. Fireworks, parades, fluvial processions, fairs, …
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