Australia's coolest science festival returns to Tasmania for another mind-blowing year in 2025
You won't find many festivals where you can plunge into icy Arctic waters, speed-date scientists, drink booze with death experts, or debate the science of sex – but that's just a taster of the program at Beaker Street Festival. Returning to Tasmania in August 2025, Australia's quirkiest science and arts festival is ready to blow your mind with more than 70 wild and wacky events, all focused around themes of death, pleasure and humanity.
This year, the festivities will unfold during National Science Week – from Saturday, August 9 to Sunday, August 17 – with activations spanning from the Tasmania Museum and Gallery, City Hall and The Old Mercury Building, to lively pubs, bars and restaurants dotting the Hobart waterfront and CBD.
Forget boring school science experiments or dull university lectures – this year's Beaker Street program is one of its biggest and boldest yet. The festival's signature stage at Hobart City Hall will return with headline talks and raucous debates. You can learn about the science of better sex in Come Again? An Evening of Sex and Science, look for love in Melbourne's cult nerd-dating show Human Love Quest: Your Chemical Romance!, question AI in What's Your p(Doom)?, see Dr Karl in a headline solo show, and test your knowledge in the festival's flagship Beaker Street Game Show.
It's a rite of passage for anyone visiting Antarctica to brave the cold with a polar plunge. Beaker Street Festival will once again bring this freezing 'hot trend' to the Hobart waterfront, aka Australia's Gateway to Antarctica, so you too can freeze in the name of science. Don't worry, a steamy sauna will be waiting to defrost you post-plunge.
Back by popular demand, Beaker Street's Roving Scientist Bar will take over Hope and Anchor – Australia's oldest continuously licensed pub – for three lively nights of speed dating, science-style. Meanwhile, the Tasmanian Museum and Gallery will be the heart of the festival's free program, featuring After Dark sessions, where you can explore the galleries and exhibitions late at night, including the 9th annual Science Photography Prize.
As we mentioned before, this really is just a taster of the Beaker Street Festival program. Budding scientists and curious travellers can also dine beneath the starry night sky, play hide and seek with pink-glowing possums, witness the wonders of the Aurora Australis, harvest mushrooms in a historic tunnel, and tour a cutting-edge seaweed farm. Ready to geek out? You can peruse the full program here.
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