My 5 Favorite Colorado Beer Festivals
- ColoradoBeerFestivals
- Oct 13, 2025
- 4 min read
It’s not shocking that there are a lot of craft breweries in Colorado, and with a lot of craft breweries comes a lot of competition! Brewers tend to be a proud bunch, but they enjoy the friendly competition that the industry provides. That’s where beer festivals come in! Not all festivals have a beer competition, but they all provide a way for beer drinkers to try many different breweries and styles of beer and compare to see which they like the best. There are many Colorado beer festivals, but in this blog, I want to focus on my 5 favorites and what makes them my favorites!
Colorado Brewers Rendezvous
Location – Salida, CO @ Riverside Park
Time of Year – Typically July (Summer)
Number of Breweries – 50+ all Colorado
Price (GA, ticket prices vary year to year) – Approximately $70
This festival, hosted by the Colorado Brewers Guild, has to be my favorite beer festival in Colorado. The festival is located in the beautiful Riverside Park, where the Arkansas River runs right beside, making the whole thing a scenic marvel. Because of its remoteness and beauty, you will find that many of the brewers themselves love to participate in this wonderful fest, rather than sending their staff to man the booth. The brewers put their best foot forward for this fest, ensuring they bring their favorite beers. If you haven’t been to Salida, CO, this is also a great excuse to visit the charming small mountain town. Many wonderful restaurants, shops, bars, and trails make the visit very worthwhile. If you must pick just one beer festival out of the list, I would strongly recommend this one.
Collab Fest
Location – Westminster, CO @ The Westin Westminster
Time of Year – Typically April (Spring)
Number of Breweries – 150+ mostly Colorado
Price (GA, ticket prices vary year to year) – Approximately $75
Another Colorado beer festival put together by the Colorado Brewers Guild, Collab Fest is an impressively large beer festival with a bit of a fun twist. For this beer festival, breweries collaborate with each other throughout the year to come up with unique recipes (sometimes quite bizarre) that they serve together at the festival. There is a lot of enthusiasm around this festival amongst the brewers because it promotes what makes the beer industry special, and that is that it is a community of people sharing in something that they love. If you want a large festival where you will try beers that you will probably never get a chance to try every again, this is probably the one for you.
The Great American Beer Festival
Location – Denver, CO @ the Colorado Convention Center
Time of Year – Typically October (Fall)
Number of Breweries – 300 – 500 from all over the country/world
Price (GA, one session, ticket prices vary year to year) – Approximately $90
Please see my other blog by clicking below for more information in regard to this Colorado beer festival.
The Feast of St. Arnold
Location – Colorado Springs, CO @ Chapel of Our Saviour
Time of Year – Typically June (Summer)
Number of Breweries – Approximately 20, mostly CO Springs breweris
Price (GA, ticket prices vary year to year) – Approximately $50
The Feast of St. Arnold beer festival honors the patron saint of beer, St. Arnold, who famously encouraged people to drink beer rather than contaminated water during the Dark Ages because it was cleaner to drink. Every year, the proceeds of this festival go to the non-profit organization Westside Cares, which provides help to those in need within the community. This beer festival is a medium-sized festival, with most of the breweries coming from within Colorado Springs. The brewers at this festival compete to brew the best beer that would have been true to style for the time period that St. Arnold was alive. If you are lucky, you can see St. Arnold himself walking around the festival enjoying a beer or two.
Weldwerks Invitational Festival
Location – Greeley, CO @ Weldwerks
Time of Year – Most recently took place in February
Number of Breweries – 50+ from all over the country
Price (GA, ticket prices vary year to year) – Approximately $85
This Colorado craft beer festival, hosted by Weldwerks, hasn’t consistently operated every year, but it is definitely worth checking out if you get the chance. Weldwerks is famously known for its hazy IPAs as well as its barrel-aged and pastry stouts. Beers like these typically appeal to a broader audience, so this festival attracts a large crowd. Breweries participating in this festival tend to bring beers on the juicier (fruity) or bigger (high ABV) side and like to show off the depth of flavors that they can achieve through the techniques they have learned through their careers. This is a fun festival in a location that you may not visit otherwise. If you attend, plan on booking a hotel room in the area because you might not be walking straight when you leave this one.
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