Newcastle New Year’s Eve Fireworks 2025-26: Howaymanay, Quayside Spectacular & Epic Home Displays

Newcastle’s New Year’s Eve 2025–26 plans are actually looking pretty special. You’ve got a brand-new city-centre party called Howaymanay, fireworks over the Tyne at 6pm and midnight, and all the usual Geordie nightlife doing what it does best. 

But if the idea of crowds, queues and queuing in the rain makes you feel like staying in your slippers, there’s also the extremely solid option of skipping town altogether and putting on your own New Year’s Eve fireworks display at home – with a little help from us at Epic Fireworks.

Let’s break down what Newcastle’s doing this year, how it compares to staying home, and how to get the best of both worlds.

At a Glance: What Newcastle Is Doing for New Year’s Eve 2025–26

Here’s the headline for this year:

• Free 6pm fireworks on Newcastle Quayside – a family-friendly early-evening display, with no tickets needed.

• Howaymanay – a new ticket-only party village on the Quayside from about 8:30pm, with live music, roaming performers, food stalls and bars.

• Midnight fireworks finale over the River Tyne – a big, city-centre display to welcome in 2026, forming the climax of the Howaymanay celebrations.

Together, Newcastle City Council, NE1 and NewcastleGateshead are pitching this as a “very Newcastle New Year’s Eve celebration” – essentially, Newcastle’s answer to Hogmanay, but with more Geordie accents and the Tyne Bridge in the background. 

Howaymanay: Newcastle’s New Quayside Party

For 2025, Newcastle is launching Howaymanay – a fresh take on the city’s New Year’s Eve that’s meant to become a new local tradition.

According to Newcastle City Council, Howaymanay will:

• Take place on the Quayside, with the river and bridges as the backdrop

• Run from around 8:30pm until after midnight

• Be ticket-only, with tickets set at £6 per person to keep it relatively affordable

• Feature live bands, DJs, roving performers and food and drink stalls, turning the Quayside into a proper party village

• End with a “magnificent firework finale” at midnight, lighting up the bridges and skyline.

Tickets are limited in capacity, and NE1 stresses that you’ll need to book in advance – there’s no wandering down at ten to midnight and hoping for the best.

The Free 6pm Family Fireworks on the Quayside

If midnight is a bit of a stretch – kids, pets, early shift, or simply “absolutely not staying up that late” – Newcastle has you covered with a free 6pm display.

The plan for this year:

• Location: Newcastle Quayside

• Time: 6:00pm sharp

• Cost: Free, no tickets required – you just turn up

Children under 16 need to be accompanied by an adult, but otherwise it’s an open event – a pretty classic “wrap up warm, head to the river, watch the sky explode above the bridges” scenario.

A Quick Look Back: Lasers, Weather and Why 2025 Matters

Part of what makes this year interesting is how Newcastle has arrived here.

• From 2021 to 2023, Newcastle ran Laser Light City – a series of laser shows designed by BAFTA-winning artist Seb Lee-Delisle, drawing crowds of around 30,000 without traditional fireworks.

• For New Year’s Eve 2024, the council announced a return to two fireworks displays on the Quayside – 6pm and midnight.

• Then the weather stepped in. Severe storms and high winds across the UK saw Newcastle’s planned Quayside fireworks cancelled for safety reasons, along with displays in other coastal and northern cities.

So 2025–26 is being pitched as a bit of a comeback year:

All of which is great – but it’s also a reminder that big public events are at the mercy of the weather. If the forecast is looking wild, organisers will – quite sensibly – pull the plug rather than risk things flying into the wrong places.

So if you’re committing to the Quayside, keep an eye on official channels in the days leading up to New Year’s Eve, just in case Mother Nature decides to be spicy again.

Why You Might Choose a Home Fireworks Display Instead

There’s nothing wrong with wanting to see in the New Year on your own turf. In fact, there are some pretty strong arguments for it:

• No travel faff – no last trains, no surge-priced taxis, no soggy walks up from the Quayside.

• Your own loos, your own fridge, your own sofa – enough said.

• Better for kids – they can do midnight (or 9pm “fake midnight”) in pyjamas and be in bed shortly after.

• Better for some pets – you can be on hand to comfort them and plan shorter bursts of noise, or quiet displays.

• Total control over the show – it actually starts on time, runs how you want it to, and you’re guaranteed a front-row view.

And unlike grabbing a random, low quality supermarket fireworks box, a properly planned home display can feel every bit as exciting as a small town display – especially if you get your gear from the right place.

Which, funnily enough, brings us neatly to…

Who We Are: Epic Fireworks in a Nutshell

At Epic Fireworks, we’re not a seasonal aisle side-hustle. Fireworks are the day job.

From our base in South Yorkshire, we run:

• The UK’s biggest online fireworks shop, delivering across the country all year round.

• The largest selection of consumer fireworks in the UK, including 1.3G rockets, single-ignition barrages, compound cakes, fountains, mines, garden fireworks, quiet fireworks and more.

• The biggest fireworks showroom in Britain, with 300+ products in stock and a 30-tonne storage licence to keep them all ready for the busy season.

We’ve been lighting up skies since the late 1980s, and we’ve built our reputation on:

• Powerful 1.3G fireworks – the most potent consumer fireworks you can legally buy in the UK and up to 5 times more powerful than what the supermarket has to offer.

• “Half price or less” deals – our bulk buying direct from the factories lets us offer serious discounts compared to typical RRPs.

• A very British mix of straight-talking advice, decent prices and slightly obsessive pyro-nerdery.

• Free nationwide delivery on orders over £295 (some remote areas excluded)

In short: if you want your Newcastle home display to look like you know what you're doing and you spent more than you actually did, we've got you!

Ready-Made New Year’s Eve Display Kits (So You Don’t Have to Overthink It)

New Year’s Eve is already busy enough without you trying to design a sky-choreography masterpiece from scratch.

That’s why we put together ready-made New Year’s Eve packs – professionally curated combinations of barrages, rockets, and supporting pieces arranged into a logical firing order.

You get:

• A balanced display – warm-up, mid-show and finale all handled

• Clear instructions – so you know what to light and when

• Options for different budgets and display sizes – whether you’re in a tight Tyneside terrace or out towards Ponteland with more space than sense

The idea is simple: you get the look and feel of a professional-style show, without needing a degree in pyrotechnic choreography.

Newcastle NYE 2025–26: Town, Home, or a Bit of Both?

To wrap it all up:

• Newcastle is going big for New Year’s Eve 2025–26.

• Free 6pm family fireworks on the Quayside.

• Howaymanay from 8:30pm – a ticket-only party village with live music, food and roaming performers.

• A midnight firework finale over the Tyne to welcome in 2026.
  

It’s all part of a push to give Newcastle its own signature city-centre New Year celebration, building on the Laser Light City years and bouncing back from last year’s weather-related cancellations.

But if you’d rather skip the crowds, stay warm and still have a sky full of colour, you can put on a proper home fireworks display using Epic Fireworks – the UK’s biggest online fireworks supplier.

Whether you end up on the Quayside shouting “HOWAY 2026!” with thousands of others, or in your back garden lighting a carefully planned Epic display as the clock strikes twelve, the important thing is this:

Don’t leave your New Year’s Eve to chance – or to a sad box of supermarket fountains.

If you want a Newcastle NYE that definitely goes off with a bang?

Light it yourself.

We’ll bring the boom.