28 things you absolutely NEED to do to make the most out of July in Vienna

We are not ones to complain, but we’ll admit summer in Vienna can be a hot and sticky affair. And not in the good way. If you don’t have the time or the energy to go to the Donau or a pool, try having a real urban summer moment. Because what’s better than having a summer moment in one of the best summer cities? – Why? Check out our article on why Vienna is an awesome summer city!

Suggested scenario: visit your own/one of your friends’ terrace, roof or balcony, get in your sunbathing gear, slurp on some Radler out of a can, cool yourself off with a spray bottle and let your gaze wander over the city. Does it for us, everytime. Every. God. Damn. Time.

Vienna looooves its wine and during this time of the year, a big part of the city can be found up on the wine hills surrounding the city, throwing back bottles of the liquid of the Gods and cooling in the shade of well tangled vines.

For beginners, head out to the 19th district’s area of Grinzing and pick from the many nice Heurige gardens aligning the streets. There, you can sit and enjoy the local, self-produced wine, that you must pair with some unpretentious but tasty Schmankerl (a snack made of cold cuts, cheese and spreads). Some Heuriger have a hot buffet to choose some limited but carefully selected Austrian dishes.

For a more authentic and non-touristy wine expedition, head out to Stammersdorf where you can follow our tipsy-tips for a full experience.

The fun doesn’t stop here: the areas around Vienna are packed with Heurige, so anytime you want to be surrounded by grape vines, check out our guide to the wine growing and Heurige-hosting regions around Vienna.

And in case you want to brush up your Heurige-Know-How before heading out to one of them, we’ve got some facts about Heurige we bet you didn’t know.

During July and August, you may start to see shops putting up signs stating they’ll be back in September and you may start to notice a lot of your emails bouncing back with holiday auto-replies. This is Vienna’s infamous ‘Sommerloch in action.

In tackling the Sommerloch, we highy recommend respecting the Sommerloch. Take it easy, don’t bother people with unnecessary emails, don’t expect people to react quickly to anything, and don’t take local news too seriously (they have to write about something other than the weather).

Summer is a great time to get cultured! What could be better than reading in the sun or cooling off in an air-conditioned museum hall!

To find cool exhibitions and performances that are happening in Vienna right now, check out Arts Section!

It doesn’t take much to spend an amazing evening at the Donaukanal. And we suggest you spend a bit of time down there by the waterside during June and July and August. Just as much time as you can spare because it feels good. Make sure to follow our list of the DOs and DON’Ts, so you have a good experience.

Summer time is open air cinema time! We have put together the ultimate guide to Vienna’s open air cinemas for you! So don’t forget to get some popcorn and enjoy watching movies under the starry sky.

If you’re going to endure a sticky Vienna summer, you might as well do it while also getting in shape, getting bendy, finding your inner peace while soaking up the sun and fresh(ish?) air, and taking in amazing views by signing up to some outdoor yoga classes!

Practically everyone will be watching the European Football Championship this week. Seriously, whether you’re the type to paint your face with your team’s colors, or you’re just there for the snack spread, these viewing parties are the place to be. Here are some places we recommend for catching the game:

Rathausplatz
Rathausplatz 1010
June 17, 21 and 25
July 9, 10 and 14

Hauptbahnhof Wien
Forecourt North Vienna Main Station

Donauinsel (Donaubräu)
Donauturmplatz 1, 1220

Feuerdorf Prater
Prater
Parzelle 94e, 1020

Der Garten
Spenadlwiese 1, 1020

Strandbar Herrmann
Herrmannpark (Donaukanal-Urania), 1030

Salettl Summer Lounge
Alserstraße 4, 1090

Ulrich
St.-Ulrichs-Platz 1, 1070

We don’t want to bum you out, but summer IS short and it tends to fly by quickly. So we suggest you seize the day/ live in the moment/ YOLO/ ‘insert your own platitude’ and go to one of those noisy, sweaty open-air parties. It’s going to be good and you know it. Here are some of the ones that we suggest:

Check out VIN VOYAGE at the Pratersauna Strand Klub on July 20th for a day of wine, dancing, and summer beach vibes!

Badeschiff is hosting weekly Swing the Boat parties almost every Sunday’s in July. This cool event is exactly what it sounds: a swing party on a boat!

DU TANZT MICH MAL open air in Porto Pollo is a daytime rave taking place on July 6th.

METAStadt Open Air on July 17th with Khruangbin and Parcels is for those who prefer their summer parties with an indie twist.

Like every summer, there’s the event ‘Reading in the Park’ happening, where young kids from three to ten years are invited to immerse themselves in the exciting world of books. They can read, play, paint and also borrow books at these park events, as part of the daily play and leisure programme on offer. It will take place in various parks all over Vienna, so be sure to check out the info page for details.

When?
July 1 – August 8 and August 19 – 29, 2024
Monday – Thursday 2:00pm – 6:00pm
(cancellations possible in case of rain)

Every first Monday of the month, WUK turns itself into a bike flea market where everyone who needs to buy a bike, or wants to get rid of their old one (or buy some accessories) can do so.

This little event series called Musik am Fluss is pretty self-explanatory, but in case you still don’t understand the concept: it’s a series of concerts happening near rivers in Vienna. Oh, and it’s also totally free!

The WUK courtyard is gearing up for 12 cool open-air gigs, mixing up everything from Cyborg Folk to Noise Pop. You’ll catch a wide range of sounds with artists like Manu Mayr from the Viennese Jazzwerkstatt, the fierce feminist punk band Szene Putzn, and the wild electronic duo Cilantro. It’s set to be a killer lineup with something for everyone’s ears.

Everyone is celebrating summer in Vienna, and Belvedere 21 is no different, hosting a cool, artsy event on the first Friday of July. There’ll be movie screenings, live music, and art exhibitions featuring works by Sonia Leimer, Tamuna Sirbiladze, and Angelika Loderer. So, swing by and chill out in the sculpture garden.

Friday Nightskating is back for the season! Ring-a-ding-ding (that’s your bike bell resounding amongst hundreds of others on the night skate). This is a recurring summer event in Vienna that is a whole lot of fun!

Plus: All the routes are different every time, so you might discover some places you’ve never been to before in Vienna.

Once again, we return to Heeresgeschichtliches to step back in time. The first weekend of July will be packed with mock battles, old-timey market vibes, and some seriously cool costume action. Just follow the people in medieval armour from the bus stop, and you’ll get there.

You know what we say? We say it’s time to leave Vienna (shocker!), head to St. Pölten, and vibe at the Domplatz Open-Air. Fever Ray will play their mysterious electronic music, Arlo Parks will drop some real bops, HVOB will get us dancing, and Salamirecorder & the Hi-Fi Phonos will bring a fun mix of Punk and Pop to the stage.

Vienna’s dance festival of all dance festivals, ImPulsTanz, is back and they’ve sure got a lot of workshops and performances lined up that are worth doing your happy dance about. So get your dancing pants on and get yourself tickets for one of the shows / register for one of the classes. Check out the full Impulstanz programme here.

Vienna’s fantastic arts and culture scene will be on display as part of the city-wide Kultursommer festival. With a diverse (and huge) programme, there’s something to see for everyone – and we mean everyone! If you’re a culture vulture and you know what’s good for you then be sure to check out the programme.

The MAK and ImPulsTanz Festival are teaming up to present ‘WILLIAM FORSYTHE: Choreographic Objects,’ an exhibition that features works merging dance and visual arts. It’s a must-see for those fascinated by the fusion of dynamic movement and creative expression.

The ö-tONE literature festival will take place within the Museumsquartier for over a month, starting in the middle of July. The festival will shine a light on several Austrian contemporary literature writers and show the great diversity of authors in our small, cute country. Readings will take place on eight selected dates throughout summer. For detailed info on the festival programme, check out the website.

Four national and international female fronted acts will perform at Arena to show that there are more than enough talented women to rock the festival stages. Even the local crew behind the stage is all female. So if you’re in the mood for some female-driven festival fun, go get your tickets right now!

Another great night at METAStadt Open Air, this time featuring two artists with a retro vibe: Khruangbin, a Houston-based trio known for their eclectic blend of Thai Funk, Psychedelia, and Soul, and Parcels, an Australian band now based in Berlin, that delivers a mix of Electropop, Disco, and Funk.

‘Tis the season to be… outdoors, and in light of this fantastic news, the Silent Disco event series of Vienna is making the necessary arrangements. Ditching the red brick walls of the WUK and taking the headbanging headphone party to the wall-less, roof-less outdoor venue of Strandbar Herrmann.

If you don’t know the drill, you put on a pair of headphones, choose from two different channels on which two different DJs are feeding their mixes, and dance along with the music like nobody’s watching.

We always get excited when concerts and open-air happenings are taking place at Karlsplatz! Nothing makes us more aware that we live in a hip urban city that has a long history of getting drunk and dancing wild to concerts. And our favourite four-day festival that has us doing exactly that described above is the poppety-Popfest! This festival is the number one to be at if you want to get deep and intimate with the local music scene, with big to up-and-coming local bands taking to the stage every year. Check out the detailed programme for this year.

This reading happening at the JO&JOE rooftop works a little bit different than your usual readings, because the presented texts will come from the audience (yes, that includes you). Excerpts from a novel, chat histories, the diary you kept in elementary school – everything goes. The audience (yup, you again) will then decide whether they liked the text itself or the recital of it better. And so either the person on stage or the one who brought the text (you guessed it, that could be you) will receive a glass of spritzer as reward. Definitely sounds like an evening of good fun!

It’s that time again when the beloved city’s beer brewery, Ottakringer Brauerei, comes to life for summer, as they’ve set up the Ottakringer Bierfest.

Most importantly, if you ask us, there will be lots of beer flowing – different kinds of beer produced in their brewery, to be specific.

To check out what will be happening, have a look at the programme for more details.

Ah, the joys of living in Vienna! There is something quite unique going on every summer in this city’s heart, right at the Rathausplatz. From July to September a great variety of concerts ranging from classic ballets, operas and Jazz to Pop and dance will be shown on a huge screen in front of the Rathaus. For free, we might add.

There’s a huge screen installed in front of the beautiful town hall, with enough seats to accommodate a small village from Vorarlberg. The films begin at sundown. However, from 11am onwards, there are a plethora of food stands featuring cuisine from around the globe. We feel like you can find nearly anything from every corner of this world there. It’s a culinary heaven!

So enjoy sitting in the shade, have a Spritzer and wait for the film to begin. Throughout the summer, most films will be played twice. Most nights, there are also live performances of some sort before the screenings. Check out the full programme.