The Fantasy Festival in Esbjerg celebrates the magnificent fantasy genre and brings together young and old in a celebration of magic on the third weekend of September.
At the heart of the festival lies a deep love for the fantasy genre, which inspires a joy of reading and sparks creativity.
Fantasy is a magical genre that opens portals to worlds filled with adventure, mythical creatures, and epic battles between good and evil. Here, dragons can soar across the night sky, wizards cast powerful spells, and heroes embark on quests that transform both themselves and their worlds.
It’s a genre that doesn’t just challenge our imagination—it stirs our deepest emotions and awakens our greatest dreams. Fantasy can take you to distant realms, while also raising questions about courage, love, and strength—questions we recognize from our own world. It’s a powerful genre for mirroring taboos and difficult topics from our everyday lives, making them easier to grasp.
At the Fantasy Festival, we explore this remarkable genre in all its forms—from books and films to games and art. Here, you can be enchanted and inspired on your own magical journey, and experience everything from exciting talks, panel debates, and workshops to fantasy films at Nordisk Film Biografer Esbjerg, film music concerts at Musikhuset Esbjerg, and the unique adventure event Fantasy Quest Esbjerg.
Since its beginning in 2015, the festival has grown from 572 visitors to welcoming around 15,000 attendees in 2024—and we can’t wait to meet you.
Welcome to a magical world, where anything is possible!
Fantasy Quest Esbjerg
Come and take part in our magical adventure trail, Fantasy Quest Esbjerg, where you are the hero. Along with family and friends, you’ll need to solve a series of riddles and challenges across Esbjerg to save the entire world.
We’re unleashing the villains in 2025
After a dramatic meeting in the fictional villains’ trade union, they sent a request to the Fantasy Festival’s project group:
They want to be on the poster!
And they will be. Because without villains, most fantasy stories would be dull, bloodless, and lacking in conflict. Our beloved heroes need villains—and we need them to be cool, vibrant, strange, wild, different, and truly evil. So that the stakes are real.
That’s why we’re thrilled to announce the theme for 2025: Villains.
See you in Esbjerg – the place where the magic is unleashed!
Guests of Honour
Every year, we invite some of the world’s greatest fantasy authors as our Guests of Honour. Come join us at the Fantasy Festival and meet them.
