The Royal Variety Performance takes the Royal Albert Hall on Friday 20 November 2026, with the official aftershow party held at the Natural History Museum.
The Royal Variety Charity was founded in 1908 to look after people who had spent their working lives in entertainment, and the first Royal Performance was staged for it in 1912, with King George V and Queen Mary in the box. It has run almost every year since, moving between the Palladium, the Hammersmith Apollo and the Royal Albert Hall, where it marked its hundredth in 2012. The King is its patron, and a member of the Royal Family attends each year.
The money is the reason the evening exists rather than a courtesy attached to it. It keeps Brinsworth House, the charity’s care home for people from the profession, and funds grants and mental health support for performers and crew who are out of work or unwell. That is why the bill is assembled from whoever is at the top of British entertainment in a given year rather than from whoever is selling tickets.
The 2026 performance is at the Royal Albert Hall on Friday 20 November, with the charity’s aftershow party the same night at the Natural History Museum. The two-venue shape is the part worth knowing beforehand: the Hall empties westward into South Kensington rather than into a hotel ballroom, so the party is a second address rather than an extension of the first. The performance is recorded for television and broadcast in December.