Red Rocks Amphitheatre continued to reach new heights in 2025, notching wins for the best-attended amphitheater in the United States, as well as the second most-attended venue in the U.S. overall.
The rankings come from industry publications Pollstar and Billboard, which annually list the roughly 9,500-seat Morrison venue alongside much larger-capacity spots such as London’s O2 Arena (capacity 20,000) and New York’s Madison Square Garden (19,500). Both of those venues can fit about as many concertgoers as Denver’s Ball Arena.
The 2025 Red Rocks concert season saw more than 1.75 million paid fans attending 236 events, Pollstar Magazine said, making it the best-attended amphitheater for 2025. Billboard Magazine also ranked Red Rocks as the second most-attended venue in the U.S., only behind Madison Square Garden, according to the City of Denver’s Arts & Venues office, which owns and manages Red Rocks.
O2 Arena in London nabbed the first-place attendance spot with 2.5 million fans, Billboard reported, with Madison Square Garden and Madrid’s Movistar Arena landing on 1.8 million fans each.
“Red Rocks’ 1.72 million fans puts it in fourth place, in a virtual tie with The Sphere (Las Vegas) and Santiago’s Movistar Arena with 1.7 million fans,” according to an Arts & Venues statement. “Red Rocks will be visited by another 1.1 million unpaid tourists and others.”
City officials noted that Red Rocks is “the only venue making Billboard’s Top 10 that is outdoors and operational only part of the year, and is the only one with a capacity of fewer than 15,000 seats,” they said.
“It’s thanks to Red Rocks fans that the venue continues to post these fun statistics,” said Tad Bowman, venue director, in the statement. “For only operating part of the year and with a smaller capacity, the Red Rocks crew, our promoting partners and vendors all work pretty hard to get these results.”
That’s particularly notable with the high prices of concert tickets, with most shows at the venue costing a minimum of $50 to $75 per seat, and many more going for $100-plus per seat (to start). Pollstar last week reported, however, that overall grosses and ticket sales dropped this year, “landing 6.1% short of the 2024 worldwide total, but it’s still a massive $8.9 billion and 60.8% higher than 2019’s overall gross, the last full year prior to the pandemic.”
This year’s results add to an already stellar few years for Red Rocks, which has seen its concert season extended from March to November to fulfill demand for shows since 2021. Denver-based promoter AEG Presents Rocky Mountains books most of Red Rocks’ concerts and sells tickets through its AXS service — both owned by Colorado billionaire Philip Anschutz. The City of Denver has also signed multimillion-dollar contracts with AXS to make it the exclusive ticket seller for all city events.
Industry publications have rated Red Rocks highly in recent years, including last year for being the world’s most attended amphitheater, with roughly 1.6 million paid attendees in 2024, and for being the venue of the year in country and EDM publications.