DALLAS – With the 2025 State Fair of Texas coming to an end, the official attendance numbers are in. About 400,000 fewer people visited this year.
State Fair of Texas Attendance 
By the numbers:
The attendance numbers were likely not what organizers had hoped for this year.
About 2 million people visited the fair. That’s about 400,000 less than in 2024 and the lowest attendance since 2018.
That, of course, excludes 2020 when the fair only had drive-thru attractions because of the pandemic.
The most popular day this year was no surprise – the day of the Texas-OU game. Nearly 200,000 people visited that day alone.
What they’re saying:
“We welcomed more than 2 million fairgoers out to the State Fair of Texas this year. We always plan the fair for around somewhere in between 2 million and 2.5 million, so we’re within that range,” said Karissa Condoianis, a spokeswoman for the State Fair of Texas. “You know, there’s a lot of things going on in the world right now and so we expect also that that is going to have an impact on the attendance at the fair.”
There was a lot of speculation online this season that the lack of attendance was due to high prices.
Fair officials said vendors set their own prices, but they do plan to talk with them about prices during the off-season.
If you ask longtime concessionaire Abel Gonzales about the low turnout, he’ll tell you an answer that’s quite simple.
“It has been so hot this year. People don’t understand. The heat is almost like rain sometimes. It’ll keep crowds away. We didn’t get fall until the very last day,” he said. “I might do a rain dance, start praying a little bit earlier for this perfect weather and hope we’ll have a good year next year.”
Fair Leftovers Donated
On Monday, many of the fair’s food vendors will donate their leftover supplies to local pantries and shelters.
“In 2015, I heard from several of our vendors that they didn’t know what to do with their leftover food after the state fair, so State Fair Cares was born,” Condoianis said.
Typically, the vendors donate thousands of pounds of food.
The Source: The information in this story comes from the State Fair of Texas and interviews with the fair spokeswoman and a fair vendor.