Global artists power The O2’s 2025 concert drive

The O2’s purple patch of first-time headliners is being turbo-charged by artists from across the globe, according to the London arena’s boss Steve Sayer.

The 20,000-cap venue hosted more debut headline acts than ever before last year, with 41 artists – including Raye, Charli XCX, Sam Fender and Sleep Token (UK), Karol G (Colombia), Asake (Nigeria), Noah Kahan and Cigarettes After Sex (US), Pendulum (Australia), Arijit Singh and Sid Sriram (India) and IVE (Korea) – among those topping the bill for the first time, representing a 70% increase on 2023.

And 2025 is set to follow in a similar vein, courtesy of the likes of Ateez, Tomorrow X Together (Korea), Zhou Shen (China), JJ Lin (Singapore), Central Cee (UK), Tarkan (Turkey), Tate McRae (Canada), Sabrina Carpenter and Gracie Abrams (US) and Babymetal and Ado (Japan).

“We’re definitely seeing this global ecosystem starting to come together,” Sayer tells IQ. “This year looks strong for first-time headliners and a couple of new countries are represented for the first time. That plays back into that globalisation of music agenda that a lot of us have spoken about in the industry and it certainly sets us up well for this year.”

The O2 sold over 2.6 million tickets in 2024 overall – up 3.5% on 2023’s previous high. Other highlights included multi-night stands from acts such as Liam Gallagher, The Killers and Olivia Rodrigo, and staple events like the BRIT Awards and C2C Festival.

“If we look at the number of shows confirmed… we’re slightly ahead of the same period last year”

“It was a record-breaking year,” contends Sayer, the venue’s SVP and general manager. “We maintained our longstanding position as the world’s busiest live music and entertainment arena, with 200 or so arena performances, and had multi-night runs from global superstars. We were delighted.”

In addition, the venue ended 2024 on a particularly high note with two shows by Paul McCartney, with the second performance on 19 December seeing Ringo Starr joining his former bandmate on stage.

“It was an incredible couple of shows, and that second night when both of the Beatles joined together on stage was an incredible moment,” says Sayer. “We were really proud that we were able to host it and everybody who worked on that event felt it was one of the best shows of the year. We are very grateful to our friends at Marshall Arts for working on that one with us and giving us those two amazing nights. It was definitely a night to remember.”

The BRITs return to the complex on 1 March, followed by long-running country music festival Country to Country, which will be headlined by Lainey Wilson, Dierks Bentley and Cody Johnson from 14-16 March. A 10-night residency by Usher (29 March-7 May) and six nights with Billie Eilish (10-17 July) are also lined up.

“If we look at the number of shows confirmed, or at strong pencil, we’re slightly ahead of the same period last year, so it bodes well for a slightly stronger year,” points out Sayer. “The year is anchored by some big residencies and there’s also a real spotlight on big female pop acts. Alongside Billie, we’ve got Kylie, Katy Perry and some of the new superstars: Sabrina Carpenter, Gracie Abrams and Tate McRae, plus Busted vs McFly doing five shows towards the back end of the year.”

“We’re really proud of the carbon removed shows that were launched last year, and we’d like to secure more of them”

The O2 also made history in February last year by hosting the world’s first carbon-removed arena events at The 1975’s four headline shows, resulting in the extraction and removal of 545.9 tonnes.

“We’ve got to a really good place with our sustainability programme, but we want to take that a stage further,” says Sayer. “We’re really proud of the carbon removed shows that were launched last year and we’d like to secure more of them. That would be part of the solution towards getting The O2 to a net zero position.”

Furthermore, the venue became the first UK arena to achieve ‘Platinum’ Accessibility status with disability charity Attitude is Everything. It also introduced self-serve bars, powered by Amazon’s Just Walk Out technology. It also opened a multi-million-pound VIP members club.

“It was a busy year on lots of fronts, but a really strong year,” concludes Sayer. “It’s all about ensuring that we’re fit for the future. We’ve made a number of investments in the last three to four years and work is underway in relation to how we evolve and improve our backstage and green room areas. We also want to look at how we evolve the guest experience more generally.

“Over and above, the target is to deliver on those 200-plus amazing shows that we get in the building each year and giving everybody – the fans, the bands and the brands – a great experience.”

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