Things to Do in Wichita, Kansas

The Wichita River Festival has been held in the Downtown and Old Town areas of the city since 1972. It has featured events, musical entertainment, sporting events, traveling exhibits, cultural and historical activities, plays, interactive children's events, a flea market, river events, a parade, block parties, a food court, fireworks, and souvenirs for the roughly 370,000+ patrons who attend each year.  In 2011, the festival was moved from May to June because of rain during previous festivals. The Wichita River Festival has seen immense growth, with record numbers in 2016 and again in 2018. Much of that growth is attributed to attractive musical acts at the festival.The upcoming 2023 Wichita River Festival is slated to start on June 4, 2023.

Wichita customarily holds major parades for the River Festival, Christmas season (shortly after Thanksgiving), Veterans Day, Juneteenth, and St. Patrick's Day.

The annual Wichita Black Arts Festival, held in the spring, celebrates the arts, crafts, and creativity of Wichita's large African-American community. It usually takes place in Central-Northeast Wichita. A Juneteenth event and parade also are common annual events.

The annual Wichita Asian Festival, usually held at Century II in October, displays the native arts, crafts, cultural performances and foods of Wichita's large, diverse Asian community from the Middle East, Central and South Asia, Southeast Asia and East Asia. The event includes many varied performances of Asian music, dance, acrobatics and martial arts, talent pageant, and vendors of Asian arts and crafts. Dozens of food vendors serve the cuisine of most Asian nations.

The International Student Association at Wichita State University presents an annual international cultural exhibition and food festival, on the campus at WSU, providing an inexpensive sampling of global culture and cuisine to the general public.

One or more large Renaissance fairs occur annually, including the "RenFair" in conjunction with the "Kingdom of Calontir" of the SCA (Society for Creative Anachronism). The fairs vary in length from one day to a week, typically at Sedgwick County Park or Newman University.

The Wichita Public Library's Academy Awards Shorts program is reportedly the oldest annual, complete, free public screening outside of Hollywood of the full array of short films nominated for an Academy Award ("Oscar"). In late winter, shortly before the Academy Awards ceremonies, the films—including all nominated documentary, live action, and animated shorts—are presented, free, at the Library and in local theaters and other venues around Wichita. Wichita's former Congressman, Motion Picture Association President Dan Glickman, has served as Honorary Chair of the event, and some of the filmmakers have attended and visited with the audiences.

The Tallgrass Film Festival has been held in downtown Wichita since 2003. It draws over 100 independent feature and short films from all over the world for three days each October. Notable people from the entertainment industry have attended the festival. 

Aviation-related events are common in the Wichita area, including air shows, fly-ins, air races, aviation conferences, exhibitions, and trade shows. The city's two main air shows, which are generally held in alternating years, are the city-sponsored civilian Wichita Flight Festival  (originally the "Kansas Flight Festival") and the military-sponsored McConnell Air Force Base Open House and Airshow.  Both are large regional air shows with famous acts and multimillion-dollar aircraft displays (including many Wichita-built aircraft). In addition, numerous local, regional, and national aviation organizations host fly-ins, conferences, exhibitions, and trade shows in the Wichita area on irregular schedules.

A wide range of car shows are also common in Wichita,  including the Blacktop Nationals, the Automobilia show (claiming over 1,000 vehicles on display), and the Riverfest Classic Car Show,  each of which fill much of downtown Wichita.  Wichita is also home to the large Cars for Charities Rod & Custom Car Show (started in 1957 as the Darryl Starbird Show), one of the longest-running indoor car shows in the nation.

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