Red Sea Guitar Festival Eilat: Visitor Guide

The Red Sea Guitar Festival is Eilat’s dedicated guitar music event — an annual Red Sea waterfront celebration of guitar across genres, from rock and blues to acoustic and world music. Held each year in February or March, the festival draws Israeli guitar artists and international guests to Eilat’s Gulf of Aqaba stage settings, with the Jordanian and Saudi mountains providing a backdrop that few other music festivals can match.

This guide covers what the festival is, how it works, how to buy tickets, and how to plan an Eilat visit around the guitar festival dates.

What the festival is

The Red Sea Guitar Festival was founded by Eilat’s Municipal Tourism Corporation to give guitar — as a singular instrument — its own dedicated festival programme in a city already known for its Red Sea Jazz Festival and Eilat Chamber Music Festival. The guitar festival broadens the Eilat music calendar into the winter–spring shoulder season, placing concerts during February or March when Eilat’s weather is at its most pleasant for outdoor events.

The festival features Israeli guitar artists and bands as headliners, with international guest guitarists in some editions. The programme covers multiple guitar styles in the same festival frame: rock, blues, acoustic fingerstyle, and world-influenced guitar — rather than a single genre event.

Ronnie Hoss has served as artistic director, shaping the festival’s profile as a guitar-focused programme with genuine performance depth rather than a general rock music event. By 2026 the festival had reached its sixth or later edition, confirming its status as an established annual event on the Eilat cultural calendar.

Dates and timing

The festival takes place annually in February or March. Exact dates are confirmed each year by the organisers and listed on eilat.city and carnifest.com — the two most reliable sources for confirmed current-year dates.

The February–March timing is deliberate. Eilat delivers:

• Daytime temperatures of 27–30°C
• Red Sea water temperature of 22–24°C — excellent for snorkelling
• Clear skies in the vast majority of years (the Negev climate makes outdoor concerts a reliable proposition in these months)
• Shoulder-season hotel pricing — significantly better value than the July–August peak, with good availability compared to holiday weeks

Check eilat.city or carnifest.com for current-year dates well before booking travel — the exact festival weekend is typically announced 2–4 months ahead.

Venues and format

Concerts take place on Eilat’s Red Sea waterfront — the North Beach strip along the Gulf of Aqaba. Open-air stages and amphitheatre-style venues facing the water give the festival its signature setting. Evening concerts draw the lights of the Jordanian and Saudi Hijaz mountains reflected across the Gulf.

The North Beach hotel strip is within easy walking distance of the main stages. Moving between venues on foot is the standard approach — no shuttle or transport is needed between the North Beach zone accommodation and the concerts.

Evening concerts typically run from early evening through to later in the night. The festival usually spans several evenings, with multi-night pass holders attending consecutive concerts over the festival weekend.

Tickets

Tickets are sold through:

• IsraTicket (israelticket.co.il)
• Leaan (leaan.co.il)
• Eilat Municipal Tourism Corporation channels (eilat.city)

Historical price ranges for single-evening tickets have been approximately ₪80–200. Multi-night passes offer better per-night value for visitors attending multiple evenings. The organisers set exact pricing each year — always verify at the official sources; the historical range is a reference only.

Headline evenings tend to sell faster than opening nights. If you have a preferred night (typically the last or main headline evening), buy that evening’s ticket first.

February and March in Eilat

The guitar festival takes place during Eilat’s best months for non-peak visitors.

Temperatures: 27–30°C daytime, dropping to 14–16°C at night. Warm enough for midday swimming and snorkelling; comfortable with a light jacket for late-evening concerts outdoors.

Red Sea water: 22–24°C in February, rising toward 25°C by late March — excellent conditions for snorkelling and diving.

Crowds: Significantly lower than the July–August peak. Israeli school holidays do not fall in February or early March (outside Purim week), so Eilat’s beach zone and dining strip operate without summer pressure.

Hotel value: The February–March shoulder season produces Eilat’s best combination of good availability and reasonable pricing outside the lowest winter weeks.

Activities to combine with festival evenings:

• Coral Beach Nature Reserve: Eilat’s world-class protected fringing reef, accessible directly from the shore. February water clarity is typically excellent — good visibility for snorkelling even without a guide. Entry at the nature reserve gate. See the Eilat diving and snorkelling guide for logistics.
• Dolphin Reef: Snorkelling with free-ranging bottlenose dolphins in a bay setting. Book in advance — session numbers are limited.
• Red Canyon: A 3 km trail through dramatic red sandstone formations, 30 minutes north of Eilat. A comfortable half-day excursion combined with a drive through the Arava Desert. See the Red Canyon Eilat guide.
• Timna Park: The ancient copper mining landscape with King Solomon’s Pillars, the Mushroom Rock, and Chariot Rock — 25 km north of Eilat. A half-day from the city.
• Diving: The Eilat reef wall is one of Israel’s most accessible dive sites, with multiple dive centres operating from the North Beach area. See the Eilat diving and snorkelling guide for depth, visibility, and recommended operators.

Getting to Eilat

By air: Ramon Airport (HRL), 18 km north of Eilat, handles domestic Israeli flights. El Al, Arkia, and Israir all serve the Ben Gurion–Ramon route (45–55 minutes). Book return flights alongside your hotel — popular departure times sell out during festival weekends.

By bus: Egged operates direct services from Tel Aviv’s Southern Bus Terminal (approximately 4.5 hours) and from Jerusalem’s Central Bus Station (approximately 3 hours). The Route 40 drive through the Negev is one of Israel’s great desert routes.

By car: Approximately 3–3.5 hours from Tel Aviv via Route 40. A hire car gives flexibility for Negev day trips alongside festival evenings. Parking in the North Beach hotel zone fills quickly on festival evenings — plan to arrive before concerts begin.

The Eilat music festival calendar

The guitar festival is the third leg of Eilat’s annual music festival trilogy:

• June — Fattal Rock Festival Eilat: 3-night Israeli rock weekend at Fattal Hotels’ beachfront; hotel package access; Gulf of Aqaba waterfront stages.
• November — Red Sea Jazz Festival Eilat: 70,000 attendees across four open-air nights; Israel’s largest jazz event.
• December — Eilat Chamber Music Festival: Five days of classical chamber music in intimate indoor venues.
• February or March — Red Sea Guitar Festival: Guitar-focused programme across genres on the Red Sea waterfront.

Together these festivals — rock in June, jazz in November, classical in December, guitar in February or March — make Eilat one of Israel’s most consistently music-active cities across the full calendar year.

For the full Israeli festival calendar — including spring and summer events in Jerusalem, the Negev, and Tel Aviv — see the Israel music festivals guide.

Combining the festival with wider Eilat

• Eilat travel guide: the full city overview, accommodation zones, beach guide, and logistics — Eilat travel guide.
• Eilat diving and snorkelling: reef zones, dive centres, snorkelling conditions, and Coral Beach logistics — Eilat diving and snorkelling guide.
• Israel in February: the full February visitor picture across Israel — Israel in February guide.
• Israel in March: spring wildflowers, Purim, and the warming Eilat Red Sea — Israel in March guide.
• Israel music festivals: the full Israeli festival calendar from spring to autumn — Israel music festivals guide.