Edinburgh hosts the Hogmanay New Year's celebration famous for torchlight processions and street parties.
Hogmanay is the Scottish name for New Year's Eve and its surrounding celebrations. Edinburgh's modern festival grew into a large organized event in the late twentieth century, combining concerts, a torchlight procession, fireworks, and a major street party in the city center.
The torchlight procession traditionally moves through central Edinburgh toward an evening finale. The route and arrangements can change between years, but the event commonly features thousands of participants carrying torches. The street celebrations take place near landmarks such as Princes Street, Edinburgh Castle, and the Old Town.
Scottish New Year customs also include first-footing, in which the first person to enter a home after midnight is thought to influence the household's luck. Traditional gifts such as shortbread, whisky, or coal have symbolic meanings. Edinburgh's festival is therefore both a modern public spectacle and part of a broader Scottish New Year tradition.