Global Citizen is the world's largest movement of action takers and impact makers dedicated to ending extreme poverty NOW. The voices of millions of Global Citizens around the world are driving lasting change by taking action every day.

We post, tweet, message, vote, sign, and call to inspire those who can make things happen to act — government leaders, businesses, philanthropists, artists, and citizens — together improving lives. 

By downloading our app, Global Citizens learn about the causes of extreme poverty, take action on those issues, and earn rewards with tickets to events, products, subscriptions, and more.

Over the last 14 years, Global Citizen has helped deploy more than $50 billion in commitments made through its platform and events, impacting 1.3 billion lives worldwide. These milestones prove that while Global Citizen’s mission to defeat poverty and defend the planet is ambitious, progress can be tangibly achieved when people campaign collectively, act strategically, and demand bold action from our leaders.

You can learn more about our impact here: https://www.globalcitizen.org/en/impact/

Global Citizen Festival is an annual music festival where fans take actions toward ending extreme poverty in order to earn free tickets. Our festivals bring together Global Citizens, artists, activists, world leaders, philanthropists, corporate leaders, and more, with one collective mission: end extreme poverty now. It’s a moment both to celebrate all we have achieved together, and all we continue to achieve together. 

The inaugural Global Citizen Festival took place on September 29, 2012, with 60,000 people in attendance on the Great Lawn in New York’s iconic Central Park. The festival featured live performances by Neil Young with Crazy Horse, Foo Fighters, The Black Keys, Band of Horses, K’Naan and more. Since then, artists like Rihanna, Beyoncé, JAY-Z, Pearl Jam, Stevie Wonder, Coldplay, Billie Eilish, and many more have performed on Global Citizen Festival stages around the world. 

Global Citizen Festival is timed to coincide with the UN General Assembly to leverage opportunities to get policy and financial commitments from government, corporate, and philanthropic leaders to defeat poverty and defend the planet. Tickets to Global Citizen Festival are awarded through points earned by completing journeys on our platform to fight extreme poverty, such as signing petitions, calling your political representatives, volunteering, and more.

The line up for the 2026 Global Citizen Festival will include Ms. Lauryn Hill & Wyclef Jean celebrating the 30th anniversary of Fugees’ seminal album ‘The Score,’ Lenny Kravitz, John Legend, Lainey Wilson, Shaboozey, and TOMORROW X TOGETHER. Taking place on Central Park’s Great Lawn on Saturday, September 26, the festival will be hosted by Hugh Jackman, and feature appearances by Rachel Brosnahan and Gayle King, with more to be announced in the coming weeks.

This year, we are working towards three main campaigns goals:

Goal 1: Create opportunities for2 million children to go to school 

Every child deserves the chance to learn, dream, and build a bright future, yet millions of children around the world still lack access to schools, medicine, and nutritious meals. This year's Global Citizen Festival campaign is calling on the governments of Denmark, Ireland, Japan, Spain, and Norway, as well as businesses and philanthropists, to collectively contribute $100 million to provide 2 million children with access to education, sports, school meals and healthcare through the FIFA Global Citizen Education Fund, Gavi, Education Cannot Wait, GPEI and the Child Nutrition Fund.

Goal 2: Support 1.5 million smallholder farmers who feed the world 

The rural farmers feeding their communities are often at risk of going hungry themselves. Millions of smallholder farmers around the world still lack the seeds, tools and financing they need to grow more crops, earn a reliable income and support their families and communities. That’s why the 2026 Global Citizen Festival is asking the governments of Spain, Norway, Ireland and Kenya, along with businesses and philanthropists, to collectively contribute $100 million to strengthen food security for 1.5 million smallholder farmers across Africa and the Brazilian Amazon through IFAD and Amazônia+21’s Rural+Green Fund.

Goal 3: Turn the lights on for 2.5 Million Homes 

Access to electricity changes everything – it means students can study after sunset, health clinics can keep lifesaving medicines cold, and families can safely light their homes and prepare meals. Continuing the momentum of Global Citizen's Scaling Up Renewables in Africa campaign, which helped secure over €15.5 billion in funding, this year’s Global Citizen Festival campaign will help expand clean energy and microgrids across vulnerable small island nations and Indigenous communities in the Indo-Pacific region. Working alongside Pacific leaders from Fiji, Palau and Tuvalu, Global Citizen is calling on the Australian government to help mobilize the $1.5 billion needed to help Pacific nations withstand volatile fuel prices.

The Global Citizen Festival NYC is taking place on Saturday, Sept. 26, 2026, in NYC’s Central Park on the Great Lawn. The gates at Central Park will open at 2 p.m. and the show will start at 4 p.m. 

Please note, the gates will close around 8 p.m. and the show will end around 10 p.m. — so get to the Great Lawn early to enjoy the full show!

There are four main changes to Global Citizen Festival this year:

1. Loyalty Program

Meet our new Global Citizen Loyalty program with brand new Global Citizen Loyalty levels! Your Global Citizen Loyalty level is determined by how many active days you log over the past 30 days. Every day you take action on the app counts as an active day. As you level up in Global Citizen Loyalty, you unlock more benefits and more chances to enter to win tickets for Global Citizen Festival. Here's what each level includes:

• Supporter (2 Active Days) — Access to the Rewards in the Points Shop with one entry to win tickets to Global Citizen Festival
• Explorer (5 Active Days) — Up to 5 entries for Global Citizen Festival
• Champion (10 Active Days) — Unlimited entries for Global Citizen Festival and access to premium rewards, plus more benefits
• Legend (20 Active Days) — Unlimited rewards entries for Global Citizen Festival, with your first entry counting as two to increase your chances of winning as well as access to premium rewards, additional benefits and the most bonus points than for any other level.

While you may not be able to hit unlimited entries initially, keep taking action so you can hit Champion or Legend level by the next draw to enter an unlimited amount of times – increasing your chances to win. Use Boosts in the Global Citizen App to log extra active days, reaching your next level even faster.

Check out our full Loyalty FAQs if you have more questions about the program!

2. App: Journey and Sprints

You may have noticed a shift from individual actions on our app to Journeys and Sprints on our app. Journeys and Sprints are our way of taking action, designed to help you grow the knowledge and understanding to make the actions you take effective as possible. To earn points, you will need to complete Journeys and Sprints. Here’s how this all works:

1. First, become a Global Citizen by downloading the Global Citizen app or by visiting our website and registering to be a Global Citizen.
2. Once you join Global Citizen, you can begin taking action on our app by completing Journeys and Sprints.
3. You can find Journeys and Sprints in the Global Citizen App under the ‘Discover Tab’ and clicking either on the 'Journeys’ or 'Sprints' button. Here, you can choose which Journey or Sprint you’d like to start next. 
4. You’ll then complete each Journey or Sprint by taking steps such as signing petitions, reading articles, sharing messages on social media, writing letters to politicians, volunteering in your community, and much more. 
5. With every Journey or Sprint you complete, you’ll earn points that you can redeem for a chance to win rewards in the Global Citizen Points Shop, including Global Festival Tickets.

3. Instant Win: Donation Tickets 

We’re so excited to introduce a new way for Global Citizens to get GA tickets to Global Citizen Festival this year, Instant Win: Donation Tickets! Here’s how this process works:

1. Complete Journeys and Sprints on Global Citizen’s platform to earn points
2. Use 300 of your points to claim a code INSTANTLY, while supplies last.
3. Redeem your code on Ticketmaster and make a $25 charitable donation (per ticket, plus fees) to instantly secure your Festival ticket. You can select one or two tickets during this step.
4. Your Tickets will be directly sent in your Ticketmaster account.

All donations will give back to New York City. Funds raised will go to City Parks Foundation to support their free programming and community engagement initiatives in parks across all five boroughs, as well as to organizations helping those experiencing homelessness across the city.

Please note: tickets available through this option are limited. If you weren’t one of the first people to receive a code from us starting on August 13, we will have more Instant Win: Donation Tickets available on August 25, September 8, and September 15. Stay tuned for more information!

You can only claim one pair of tickets per time period.

4. Digital Ticketing

This year, tickets will be digital and found in your Ticketmaster account. Digital ticketing will ensure faster entry into the park, safer and more secure tickets, and easier ticket transfer to friends and family. 

When you receive your tickets, please save them to your phone’s wallet before you head to the park, as there is no Wi-Fi available at the park. Learn how to add to your phone's digital wallet here.

Please do not print your tickets, as the barcode is dynamic and you will not be able to enter with a printed ticket.