Edinburgh TV Festival Bids Farewell to Scotland After 50 Years
After half a century as the annual gathering where Britain's television industry does its most public business, the Edinburgh TV Festival held its final edition in the Scottish capital this month. Next year, the festival moves to Manchester.
For 50 years, the event has drawn largely London-based executives north for several days of panels, lectures, deal-making and parties. Festival Chair Fatima Salaria gave an emotional farewell speech to the Pentland theatre audience on the Friday morning of the 2026 festival, closing a chapter that began in the 1970s. Advisory Chair Adam Hawkins, speaking ahead of the festival, urged the industry to "embrace change" in its final Scottish outing.
The centrepiece of the festival's schedule each year is the MacTaggart Lecture, a headline address delivered by a senior industry figure. This year YouTube's Europe boss Pedro Pina delivered it, after organisers had originally sought YouTube CEO Neal Mohan. Pina protested three times that YouTube is not a villain intent on toppling TV, hailed a third "golden age" of television, and urged broadcasters to partner with the platform rather than treat it as a threat.
The farewell mood extended beyond the lecture hall. Sky's Phil Edgar-Jones requested a selfie with the audience during the festival. The Thursday night party, though, celebrated 25 years of the music company Audio Network rather than marking the festival's departure from Scotland.
Scotland is not stepping back entirely. Screen Scotland announced plans for a new event in August 2027, spearheaded by Rowan Woods, formerly of the Edinburgh TV Festival.
The Edinburgh TV Festival has long served as a stage for industry revelations. At the 2023 festival, Paramount's UK content chief Ben Frow disclosed that he had secretly resigned in 2022 due to burnout following the pandemic. In 2022, Channel 4's then chief content officer Ian Katz told an Edinburgh audience that "there is something depressing" about the number of UK TV reboots in production. The festival's 2024 edition saw Channel 4 order the comedy "Make That Movie."
The festival's own awards and initiatives have run alongside its headline sessions. Claudia Winkleman received the festival's outstanding achievement award in 2023. The Class Confident Edinburgh initiative, which works to broaden access to the industry, counted the BBC, ITV, Channel 4 and Paramount among its participating organisations as of January 2026.
The 2026 festival also featured its full programme of sessions and shortlists for its Annual TV Awards. That programme, the last to be staged under Edinburgh's name, drew the usual mix of broadcasters, platforms and producers.
Manchester takes over in 2027. The festival's organisers, the industry figures who fill its stages, and the crews who build its sets will make the trip south. Whether the new venue carries the same weight with the executives who have made the August pilgrimage for decades is a question the first Manchester edition will answer.
For now, Edinburgh's run is on tape — fifty years of it, and the last reel full.
