Score Concert Tickets 33% Cheaper if You Buy Them at the Right Time

Even with months left in 2022, music fans are already looking forward to (and likely saving up for) concerts in 2023. Beloved rockers Bruce Springsteen and The E Street Band will hit the road for the first time in six years, kicking off an international tour in Barcelona, Spain, in April 2024. And Canadian singer Celine Dion is restarting her Courage World Tour in Prague, Czech Republic, in February 2023, nearly three years after hitting pause. But when is the best time to buy these concert tickets?

To find out, FinanceBuzz collected data from seatdata.io for 22,340 tickets and 9,254 transactions completed on the secondary market for concerts performed by 14 recording artists or bands — including Billie Eilish, Elton John, Garth Brooks, The Eagles, Still Woozy, and Tame Impala — between April and May of this year. And it seems like scoring great deals on concert tickets is a waiting game, as you’ll see below.

If you’re willing to risk waiting until the last minute, you could snag concert tickets at a significant discount. According to FinanceBuzz’s data, tickets are an average of 33 percent cheaper than the overall average ticket price when purchased on the day of the event.

FinanceBuzz reports ticket prices are:

• $162.48 (33.03 percent below average) the day of the show
• $192.22 (20.77 percent below average) the week of the show
• $239.43 (1.32 percent below average) a week before
• $231.94 (4.40 percent below average) two weeks before
• $240.83 (0.75 percent below average) three weeks before
• $259.45 (6.94 percent above average) one to two months before
• $253.06 (4.30 percent above average) two to three months before
• $275.82 (13.69 percent above average) three-plus months before

That said, the availability of concert tickets may vary. Nearly half of all tickets are sold either three or more months before the show or during the week of, according to the data. Meanwhile, less than 7 percent of tickets are sold the day of the show.

For music festivals, FinanceBuzz recommends waiting until 13 days beforehand, when tickets average 30 percent below the overall average.

According to The Ascent, resellers often list tickets on Stubhub weeks or even months before the event, but if the tickets don’t sell as the concert date looms, those resellers will often lower their asking prices. The Ascent concludes that prospective concertgoers might be able to land major savings on tickets if they wait until the event is just a few days away.

In a post about the timing of ticket purchases, the ticket marketplace app Gametime reports the same findings. “As the date of the event gets closer, ticket holders who are intent on selling tickets they don’t plan to use will become more eager to unload their tickets and lower the prices,” Gametime explains. “Folks who have exercised patience and waited until the last day or two before an event will usually be able to find great deals and pay much less than the original price.”