Things to do in Montréal this February 2026

Welcome to Montréal!

To enjoy the best the city has to offer during your stay in February, please don't think of yourself as a tourist, but as one of us. Whether you're here for a few days, a few weeks or a few years, we're counting on you to enjoy Montréal in a spirit of respect, responsibility and celebration!

Wintry activities, attractions and tours

The easiest way to visit dozens of Montréal attractions, museums and more at a discount is by getting your own key to the city: Passeport MTL, whose special winter edition will help you experience the best of the magical season.

We hope you make yourself at home in Montréal’s incredible hotels — there’s an accommodation option for everyone, from landmark hotels to family friendly hotels and boutique hotels galore. 

In Old Montréal, walk the cobblestone streets to the St. Lawrence River and visit the iconic Notre-Dame Basilica of Montréal — see the gorgeous multimedia AURA Experience, a wonderful way to feel the grandeur of this landmark.

Downtown holds one of the city’s most lovely churches, the Church of St. Andrew and St. Paul, where you can admire the beautiful stained glass during services or during the regular organ concerts.

In the Old Port of Montréal, after shooting a selfie at the glimmering BONJOUR structure, see views of the city and the river from the Grand Quay of the Port of Montréal, where you’ll find a cruise ship dock, marine history displays, green spaces and a stunning attraction: the Port of Montréal Tower. Nearby, treat yourself to bird’s-eye views on La Grande Roue de Montréal observation wheel. 

Visit the esplanade of Place Ville Marie, where the massive art installation The Ring glimmers above you. Or take a break for entertainment and a snack at Esplanade Tranquille at the corner of Clark and Sainte-Catherine Street. 

One of the best ways to discover the city is with expert guides on Montréal tours: bundle up and set your own agenda with private walking tours at your own pace. See the city like a local with MTL Detours, take a day trip outside the city with N-tours or call upon the experts at Guidatour. For an unparalleled taste of the city, savour one of the expert two- or three-hour walking tours given by Local Montréal Food Tours — they range from Mile End to Old Montréal.

If you’re wondering why Montréal has so many colourful murals, hear more about them and their artists on a street art tour with Spade & Palacio, including the murals from the last MURAL Festival. For an electric bike tour of the murals (weather permitting), look to Fitz Montréal — their tours cover anything from downtown Montréal to Jean-Talon Market. To enjoy Montréal after dark (also weather permitting), head out on the Montréal by Night Loop on GrayLine’s double decker bus! Enjoy the ambiance and watch as the city’s most vibrant districts come to life after dusk.
You can also devise your own self-guided art tour (or follow one of their expertly curated ones) thanks to Art Public Montréal, a fountain of information on Montréal’s hundreds of public artworks that are viewable for free year-round. Explore their selection of podcasts, too, for the inside scoop.

Winter sports and relaxation

Watch the Milano Cortina Winter Olympics together at the Maison de Radio-Canada from February 6 to 22: there’ll be live reporting on a giant screen, guided tours of the Maison, meet-and-greets with ex-Olympians and lots of interactive activities. 

On February 23, come see your favourite Canadiens players show off their talent in various skills challenges during the Canadiens Skills Competition presented by RONA, at Bell Centre. Get dazzled by speed as the players battle for fastest skater supremacy. Witness the players’ pinpoint precision in the accuracy shooting event. Prepare to be wowed by your favourite players' strength as they compete for the hardest shot honour.

Cheer on the Montréal Canadiens as the NHL season rages on with lots of nail-biting matches happening on home turf at the Bell Centre. See the whole month’s schedule here! If you can’t make the games in person, watch all the hockey, soccer, football, basketball, MMA and more at Montréal’s sports bars. 

Dive in from February 26 to March 1, as the World Aquatics Diving World Cup takes over the historic Olympic Pool. Featuring the international best in the sport.

The Grand Chelem Baseball Centre, located downtown, invites you to step up to the plate. Whether you’re an elite player or a casual hitter, Grand Chelem offers baseball and softball training for all levels and any age. 

February art and exhibitions

The cold season is in full effect in museums and galleries around town, so get the full low-down in our seasonal exhibition overview.

At PHI, take in Manuel Mathieu: Unity in Darkness, an art exhibition that interrogates the invisible forces that shape our world and affect our individual and collective lives, and Keiken: Sensory Oversoul, in its North American debut: this show features two major immersive and participatory installation works that will undoubtedly blow your mind. Both exhibitions run throughout the month. 

Visit the Montréal Museum of Fine Arts to enjoy the Kent Monkman exhibition titled History is Painted by the Victors, among others. Through his subversive lens, this major Canadian artist and member of ocêkwi sîpiy (Fisher River Cree Nation) revisits history painting to challenge colonial narratives and offer new perspectives on the past and our present. His iconic and monumental paintings are full of humour, poignant commentary, and simply not to be missed.

At the Musée d’art contemporain de Montréal in Place Ville Marie, catch the current exhibition In Praise of the Missing Image throughout the month. Part of the 19th edition of the MOMENTA Biennale d’art contemporain, it’s a group show that focuses on what escapes visibility, silences and gaps in individual and collective memory.

Go to Pointe-à-Callière, Montréal Archaeology and History Complex in Old Montréal for their current show: Sherlock Holmes is an immersive exhibition that combines history, literature and investigation. Journey back to 19th century London where you’ll explore the author’s sources of inspiration and follow the trail of the master of deduction amid life-size settings.

You’ll also be near the kid-friendly Montréal Science Centre, where you can explore interactive exhibitions that investigate the scientific world, like the permanent exhibition Human: a voyage to the very heart of human evolution through a fully interactive and highly energetic environment.

The McCord Stewart Museum bridges past and present in its exhibitions, which throughout January includes Africa Fashion: a travelling exhibition from the Victoria & Albert Museum in London, and one of the largest ever exhibitions dedicated to the creative energy of designers from across the African continent, from the 1960s to today. There’s also On the Menu – Montréal: A Restaurant Story: witness the evolution of Montréal’s restaurant scene in all its forms since the 1960s.

Visit MEM – Centre des mémoires montréalaises, a cutting-edge museum dedicated to the voices of Montrealers presiding over the corner of Boulevard Saint-Laurent and Rue Sainte-Catherine. Throughout the month you can catch Detours – Urban Experiences, an immersive exhibition that takes you into the world of Montrealers with singular backgrounds.

At the Montréal Planétarium, tickets to any of the shows gets you access to Rouge 2100: A Martian Adventure, an exhibition running throughout the month that offers a journey in five chapters and as many rooms, where we realistically imagine the first steps of a rare humans in 2100 on the fascinating red planet. Don’t miss this opportunity to see an acclaimed show, where the album’s score entwines with breathtaking images of the solar system and striking visual effects. 

Travel back in time as you tour the rooms of Château Ramezay and visit the historical site of Château Dufresne near the Olympic Stadium. The Musée des Hospitalières de l’Hôtel-Dieu de Montréalexplores the history of medical care and its relationship to do-gooding with its temporary exhibition, Medicine and Charity. Stained glass windows, sculptures, paintings, furniture, tapestries, everyday objects related to patient care, and archives will allow visitors to discover the extraordinary richness of French hospital heritage, as well as that of Quebec. 

Not far from the city, climb aboard railway cars, learn about the history of the railroad and explore miniature railways at the Exporail the Canadian Railway Museum.

Discover the vivid history and present of Quebec ceramics at the Musée des métiers d’arts du Québec, and Canadian arts and crafts at large at La Guilde in the Golden Square Mile. Experience a massive immersive art experience in surround-sound and laser light at OASIS Immersion, where Root for Nature extrapolates on biodiversity in all its splendour.

Speaking of immersive experiences, the Fabulous FAB Exhibition is an all-around trippy space spanning three floors in the Centre Eaton de Montréal, where you can experience no less than 20 extraordinary worlds. At PHI, soak up the Horizon of Khufu virtual reality experience for an immersive view of Ancient Egypt and its awe-inspiring pyramids. 

And don’t forget Montréal’s plethora of small, independent art galleries, from Bradley Ertaskiran to Hugues Charbonneau, Galerie B-312, SBC Gallery and Ellephant downtown, Oboro and MAI in the Plateau, Centre Clark and Dazibao in Mile End, Galerie d’Outremont in (you guessed it) Outremont and many, many others in every neighbourhood.

Onstage this February

Montréal’s cultural calendar is packed this season, with entertainment for everyone on the city’s many stages. Among the world-class theatre, dance, opera, circus and more gracing the city’s stages throughout February, don’t miss Stellar: The Organ’s Balancing Act, a mix of circus and organ music. The extraordinary acrobatics at the Maison Symphonique de Montréal will be accompanied by the music of Philip Glass and Hans Zimmer’s Interstellar Suite. 

More circus awaits at TOHU, where Paradisum par Recirquel Cirque Danse, by Bence

Vági, explores the myth of rebirth after the silence of a destroyed world, where the body is the means of communication. It’s happening from February 5 to 8.

and movement is the only common language. 

Catch Playing Shylock at the Segal Centre, starring Saul Rubinek, of Frasier fame. He returns to the stage for this fierce, funny and deeply human new work that explores the fault lines between art, identity and accountability. It runs until February 8. From February 11 to 22 in the Segal Theatre’s Studio, CRASH is a story about family, faith, grief and love set in Montréal.

Also until February 8, composer Ana Sokolović presents Clown(s), a seven-scene mix of opera, theatre and chamber music that makes a moving tribute to the human experience as it draws from the worlds of Sand, Fellini, Chaplin and Keaton. It happens at Théâtre Maisonneuve.

On February 11, get lyrical with a classical ballet: Signature, Ballet Divertimento’s annual school performance presented at Cinquième Salle, featuring aspiring young dancers of all ages. 

From February 11 to 21 at Espace Saint-Denis, hail the return of Slava’s Snowshow: applauded around the world, it continues to captivate audiences with its visual poetry and spellbinding universe.

On February 15, the Chinese New Year Canada Gala: Homeland presented by the Phoenix Artistic Troupe of Canada is a performance arts extravaganza at Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier. The gala will feature over 100 professional artists, featuring classical Chinese dance, ballet, music, vocal performance, martial arts, traditional Chinese instruments, drama and visual arts. Highlights include a fusion of Peking Opera with Western classical ballet, original choreographies inspired by Chinese martial arts, and modern interpretations of ethnic minority folk traditions.

From February 17 to 21, Ballets Jazz Montréal presents Jo Strømgren and a show titled La revue finale at Théâtre Maisonneuve. The piece unveils the beauty of those simple, fleeting moments beneath the apparent banality of existence, while probing the mysteries of untold stories.

More incredible dance comes courtesy of Les Ballets Africains on February 22, at Théâtre Maisonneuve as they display their inimitable blend of dance, music and storytelling with spectacular displays of acrobatics and percussion. 

Uwe Scholz’s The Creation, showing from February 26 to March 1 at Salle Wilfrid-Pelletier, is a dance interpretation of Joseph Haydn’s monumental oratorio — a work inspired by the creation of the world as told by the Book of Genesis.

Starting on February 27, Marseille’s world renowned (LA)HORDE ballet collective brings Age of Content to Théâtre Maisonneuve, a thrilling, engaged post-punk performance about the influences of fashion, immersive worlds and club culture in this era of online content and ceaseless self-promotion.

Live music in February

We’ve got the perfect overview of Montréal’s big, can’t-miss concerts of 2026 so you can plan your highlights of the year.

Classical lovers have a world of choice at Place des Arts this month, with concerts ranging from The Flamboyant Barbara Hannigan on February 4 and 5 to The Estonian Philharmonic Chamber Choir on February 15, among other concerts including some Mozart, some Mahler and Tchaikovsky’s Fifth. There are also a lot of great discoveries to make throughout the month at the 5 à 7 musicaux.

At the Bell Centre this month, don’t miss Nine Inch Nails on February 16, and The Offspring with Bad Religion on February 21 

You’ll find all sorts of fun music shows at MTELUS, including Northern Invasion on February 6 and 7, Josh Ross on February 10, Monolink on February 13, Alleycvt on February 14, Miguel on February 17, Gogol Bordello on February 19, Cassian on February 20, Lauren Spencer Smith on February 24, Molotov on February 26, Loud on February 27 and The Barr Brothers on February 28. 

At Théâtre Fairmount in Mile End, catch Alex Cuba on February 3, Habstrakt on February 6, Alex Fredo on February 12, Milk & Bone on February 13, (((o))) on February 19, Redveil on February 27 and Nimimo on February 28.

The world’s best EDM artists come to New City Gas to get you moving, including Space 92, Marie Vaunt and ArioVistus on February 6 and the Igloofest Closing Party on February 7. See the full programming here.

At the SAT this month, don’t miss the awesome Dômesicle winter 2026 series, all happening in the semi-circular Satosphere. See the full programming here.

Want to experience music and entertainment in a sparkling, velvet-clad theatre? Look no further than Caf’Conc, within the Marriott Château Champlain de Montréal. Find the programming here. 

Groove to live soul, disco, jazz, funk, salsa, Cuban music Fridays and more at Le Balcon, where you can have dinner with a show, go dancing, and enjoy a gospel brunch on weekends. On February 28, enjoy a night filled with the nostalgia of the 70s with the special Ultime Soirée Disco Chic.

Hear live jazz nightly at Montréal’s amazing jazz and blues clubs, like Diese Onze and Upstairs Jazz Bar & Grill. And go out dancing late into the night at Montréal’s dance clubs.

Indie venues Casa del Popolo and Sala Rossa have chock-a-block full monthly programs featuring both local and visiting bands, which you can find here. Look here for the many live events at hole-in-the-wall Barfly. Same for Bar Le Ritz PDB, where there’s a show nearly every night. Explore the lineups at Le Ministère and Turbo Haüs, and follow L’Escogriffe on Facebook to stay on top of all their upcoming shows. L’Hémisphère Gauche, up in Little Italy, is packed with music lovers for their nightly shows, as is Quai des Brumes on the Plateau — it never takes a night off.