Arena Market: Philippines

The Beatles decided to retire from touring altogether after an unpleasant episode in Manila in 1966, but plenty of others have made the trip since.

The Philippines saw gigs by Coldplay and Dua Lipa in 2024, as well as Filipino-American singer Olivia Rodrigo’s biggest show to date, and more than 2.1m fans attended 154 concerts in the archipelagic country last year. Typically, international acts focus in and around the capital. Metro Manila itself is a vast sprawl of 16 cities on the shore of Manila Bay, with a combined population of 14.8m and the city of Manila at its heart.

The Philippines has the world’s biggest indoor arena in the 55,000-cap Philippine Arena in Bulacan, about an hour north of Manila – commissioned by Iglesia ni Cristo (the Church of Christ) for its Centennial Celebration in 2014. Coldplay brought their Music of the Spheres tour to the venue in January 2024 and sold a record 96,000+ tickets across two nights. Lipa and Rodrigo also played there – the latter in a “Pinoy Pride” tank top and “Miss So Filipina” sash – while girl group BINI became the first local act to both headline and sell out a show at the arena in February.

The Philippines has the world’s biggest indoor arena in the 55,000-cap Philippine Arena in Bulacan

The Smart Araneta Coliseum in Quezon City, known as The Big Dome, is another of the key facilities, with a capacity of around 16,500, though it has held more. The Uniprom Inc. venue, site of 1975’s Thrilla in Manila, the final bout between Muhammad Ali and Joe Frazier, received a new four-storey glass atrium in 2012 and got new seats and snack booths for the 2023 FIBA Basketball World Cup. In the second half of this year, it will host P-pop boy band SB19, the Anisama World anime music festival, Kitchie Nadal, Kai, Smashing Pumpkins, and Tyler, the Creator.

Also in Metro Manila, SM Prime Holdings’ SM Mall of Asia Arena (MOA) sits within the SM Mall of Asia complex, one of the biggest shopping centres in the world, in Bay City, Pasay. Around 50% larger than Araneta in terms of square footage, MOA has a full-house capacity of 20,000. Nineties US boy band 98° played two nights in May, Australian Christian band Planetshakers are there for four nights in July, and Black Eyed Peas come in August.

Filipino legend Regine Velasquez is the only homegrown artist to stage two consecutive solo concerts at the arena, for her R3.0 album in 2017, and she has performed there more times than any other artist.