Official global TED Conference leaves Vancouver after 11 years, returning to U.S. | Daily Hive

The world's official TED Conference leaves Vancouver after 11 years for return to California

TED Theatre for the TED Conference at Vancouver Convention Centre. (TED)

All good things eventually come to an end, and the official annual TED Conference held in Vancouver — along with its benefits to the local hospitality sector and its role in raising the city’s global profile — is no exception.

Last week, TED’s 2026 conference was the organization’s 11th and final flagship event staged at the Vancouver Convention Centre — a continuous run that first began in 2014, with the exception of the pandemic years of 2020 and 2021.

During this period, TED had two global headquarters office locations in New York City and Vancouver.

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In a previous statement, the organization states that its years in Vancouver have been “remarkable” and that they are “profoundly grateful for the partnership and warmth that made TED thrive in Canada. That city will always hold a special place in TED’s story,” noting that Vancouver defined a “generation of TED moments.”

When TED first moved to Vancouver in 2014, the conference on technology, entertainment, and design was marking its 30th anniversary.

Vancouver Convention Centre TED Conference

TED Conference held at the West Building of the Vancouver Convention Centre. (Vancouver Convention Centre)

ted conference theatre vancouver convention centre 2025

TED Theatre at the Vancouver Convention Centre for the 2025 TED Conference. (TED)

During its years-long residency in the city, beginning with the inaugural Vancouver conference, TED created a custom-designed modular theatre specifically built to fit into the 53,000-sq.-ft. West Ballroom of the convention centre’s West Building.

Each year, the 1,200-seat theatre was assembled, dismantled, and placed in local storage before being reassembled for the following year’s conference in the spring.

The theatre, with amphitheatre-style seating in a half-circle shape configuration, was originally designed by New York City-based Rockwell Group and uses 8,000 structural timber pieces. The theatre is known to have a strong smell of pine as it was built of locally harvested Douglas Fir trees. The timber pieces were assembled as individual boxes.

ted theatre ted conference vancouver convention centre

TED Theatre for the TED Conference at Vancouver Convention Centre. (TED)

Installation process for the TED Theatre at the Vancouver Convention Centre for the TED 2025 Conference. (TED)

As the most prestigious event of all TED events around the world, the TED Conference was highly exclusive, with passes to attend it starting in the thousands of dollars. It attracted attendees from around the world.

While in-person attendance is limited, the ideas shared during the conference are meant to be spread globally. Videos of the talks are subsequently uploaded online, with many going on to reach millions — sometimes billions — of viewers online.

Each year’s TED conference features roughly 70 to 80 speakers — people with global influence, original ideas, strong storytelling, relevance across multiple fields, Nobel laureates, startup founds, artists, activists, and lesser-known researchers who often go on to gain major recognition. Their talks typically last under 18 minutes.

The speakers at the TED Conference in Vancouver have spanned a mix of globally influential figures across technology, science, politics, and culture: tech leaders like Elon Musk, Bill Gates, Sam Altman, and Eric Schmidt discuss innovation and artificial intelligence; thinkers such as Steven Pinker, Richard Dawkins, and Amy Cuddy focus on research and human behaviour; global voices like Malala Yousafzai, Al Gore, Sanna Marin, Van Jones, and Garry Kasparov address policy and social issues; while cultural figures like Hannah Gadsby, America Ferrera, Keke Palmer, Bryce Dallas Howard, and Serena Williams bring personal perspectives, with additional influence from business and media figures like Jack Dorsey and guidance from TED head curator Chris Anderson.

Anderson, long associated as the public face of TED, ended his longtime role as the conference’s head curator following the 2026 TED Conference.

TED Theatre at the Vancouver Convention Centre for the 2025 TED Conference. (TED)

Prior to its Vancouver run, the TED Conference was held annually in Long Beach, California.

Starting in 2027, the event will return to its California roots, with the conference moving to the San Diego Convention Center.

According to the organization, the relocation decision — made after a two-year consideration process — was both symbolic and strategic, with San Diego emerging as a hub for biotech, entertainment, and media innovation. Moreover, San Diego’s waterfront convention centre also offers an expanded footprint, creating new opportunities for fresh programming formats and new participation models.

TED estimates that its Vancouver operations in 2024 and 2025 generated a total regional economic impact of over US$16 million annually.

Although TED’s time in Vancouver has come to an end, the city has secured the annual Web Summit conference, which debuted in May 2025 following the relocation of Toronto’s Collision Conference. The inaugural four-day event, also based at Vancouver Convention Centre, attracted nearly 16,000 attendees from 117 countries and featured 1,108 startups — a record for a first-year Web Summit event — along with 681 investors and 550 media professionals.

Web Summit will return to Vancouver for its second year from May 11 to 14, 2026. The conference is also confirmed to return in 2027 under a three-year agreement; it is currently unclear whether it will continue beyond that year.

Destination Vancouver anticipates that Web Summit will generate economic spinoffs of C$172 million in direct spending and C$279 million in overall economic impact for British Columbia over its first three years.

Vancouver’s next big convention is the 76th FIFA Congress, which will be held on April 30, 2026. Over 1,600 delegates — bringing together representatives from 211 nations — will converge on the Vancouver Convention Centre to discuss relevant topics about FIFA’s tournaments, including picking the FIFA Women’s World Cup host countries for 2031 and 2035. It is expected to generate about C$5 million in local economic spinoffs.

The FIFA Congress comes just weeks before the start of the 2026 FIFA World Cup, with Vancouver’s BC Place Stadium set to host seven matches.

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