The 12 Best Places to Celebrate the Lunar New Year in the U.S.

Why not usher in the Year of the Dragon in style?

Lunar New Year is a sacred time for many Asian cultures. February 10 marks the beginning of the Year of the Dragon, a time that promises growth, success, and abundance. From lucrative gifts stuffed into tiny red envelopes to colorful traditional dances and meals symbolizing good luck—we're talking pork dishes, dumplings, heaving bowls of sticky rice—there's no one way to ring in the new year. If you want to get in on the fun, here's a roundup of the 12 most exciting celebrations around the country to help you kick off the year with the utmost good fortune.

lunar new year the seaport new york city
The Seaport

When is Lunar New Year 2024?

 Lunar New Year falls on February 10, 2024. Festivities usually last for 15 days, leaving you plenty of time to get in on the action close to home. The Chinese zodiac is organized in a 12-year cycle, and each year is represented by a different animal: rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig. This year, we're celebrating the Year of the Dragon.

Check out the cities below to find a Lunar New Year bash near you.

New York City

Lunar New Year in New York City and its five boroughs has the distinct honor of boasting not just one Chinatown, but several. Travelers and tourists can easily access Manhattan’s Chinatown, where the Firecracker Ceremony and Cultural Festival lights up the night on February 10, followed by the Lunar New Year Parade and Festival later in the month on February 25. The New York Chinese Cultural Center will be hosting a day of lion dance performances, calligraphy, and crafts at The Seaport on February 17. Over in Flushing, Queens, celebrate with Remember (running through February 18), an exhibition that highlights the importance of memory to the immigrant experience.

Seattle

Seattle’s diverse and rapidly growing Asian-American population means an embarrassment of cultural riches this time of year. Kick off celebrations at Lucky Envelope Brewing, which will be unveiling its special Dragonfruit Wheat in honor of the holiday (February 10). Later that day, the city’s indoor night market will feature an AAPI small business pop-up as well as a performance from Mak Fai Lion Dance. On February 24, Chinatown will host a (free!) Lunar New Year Celebration, with vendors, music, and dancing. The annual Food Walk will get you all the dumplings and sticky rice snacks you crave from over 40 participating local restaurants.

Philadelphia

The City of Brotherly love goes all out for the Lunar New Year, with an impressive showing of cultural activities around town. To start, the Philadelphia Museum of Art is hosting a Family Festival on February 11, where guests can learn about a number of Chinese crafts, like sugar painting, Taishun puppet-making, and woodblock printing. While at the museum, make sure you pay a visit to the Galleries of Chinese Art, home to more than 7,000 items from furniture and costumes to jade and sculptures. Philly’s Chinatown will host two parades led by the Philadelphia Suns: a nighttime version on February 9, followed by a daytime version on February 11.

New Orleans

From February 16 to18, the place to be in in New Orleans is the Mary Queen of Vietnam Church for Tet Fest, the city’s free celebration of the Vietnamese New Year. Between the lion dances and the live music and the acrobatic stunts and the raffles, you can fill up on classics like sticky rice cakes, banh mi, and pho. At dusk, close out your celebrations of Vietnam’s biggest holiday with the firework show and dragon dance. The Year of the Dragon is a bold one, and you’re in for a joyful (and delicious) time.

san francisco lunar new year chinatown
Jeff Whyte/Shutterstock

San Francisco

Chinese Lunar New Year celebrations in San Francisco go strong for nearly one month straight. There are loads of events, from the Basketball Jamboree on February 17 right up through the city’s official Chinese New Year Parade on February 24—one of the biggest, most iconic illuminated nighttime parades in the country and the largest Lunar New Year celebration in the Western world, with about half a million people joining the festivities downtown. On top of the firecrackers, pageants, and vibrantly colored, painstakingly ornate dancing lions, you can chow down on Chinese food from the city that made Americans fall in love with it in the first place.

Las Vegas

It should surprise no one that the pageantry, spectacle, and general sensory overload of the Lunar New Year has found a thriving home in Las Vegas. To celebrate 2024’s Year of the Dragon, the Bellagio Conservatory & Botanical Gardens (free to visit!) filled its entire 14,000-square-foot space with an abundance of cherry blossom trees, bamboo plants, and gold coins. The display, whose theme is "Infinite Prosperity," will be on display through March 2. The Venetian boasts equally impressive art installations in its atrium, while Resorts World Las Vegas is hosting a number of dragon and lion dances during festivities running from February 10 to 24.

alhambra lunar new year
Alhambra Chamber of Commerce

Los Angeles

If you will be in Los Angeles on Sunday, February 18, you will want to be at the one-day-only Lunar New Year Festival in the heart of the Chinese community in Alhambra. You’ll be able to catch lion dances, kung fu demonstrations, taiko drummers, fan dancers, and more—not to mention a smorgasbord of food and activities.

Chicago

Chicago plans to celebrate Year of the Dragon with event after event after event. Asian Pop-up Cinema is hosting free Lunar New Year screenings of The Monk and The Gun (February 15) and 100 Yards (February 17). Then there's the Chinatown parade on February 18, a procession of lion dances, colorful floats, and music. While there, hit up traditional dim sum spots and bakeries for treats like crab dumplings at Cai or buns at Chi Quon Bakery, the oldest bakery in Chinatown.

Boston

Boston is home to the country’s third-largest Chinatown, and it shows. On February 18, the Chinese New Year Parade kicks off at 10am in Phillips Square, while the Pao Arts Center's Lunar New Year Party—featuring live music and themed cocktails from Shojo Boston—will take place on February 13. For a more hands-on experience, stop by the Museum of Fine Arts on February 15. Along with the usual opportunity to check out an enormous collection of Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese artwork, you'll also be able to try your hand at some Chinese brush painting.

washington dc lunar new year parade
John Sonderman/Flickr

Washington, D.C.

DC’s beloved Smithsonian American Art Museum is hosting a Lunar New Year Family Celebration on February 10, featuring K-pop performances, lion dances, traditional Chinese and Korean art demonstrations, photo booths, and face painting. This year, the city’s annual Lunar New Year Parade will take place on Sunday, February 11, and will end with a dynamic firecracker show in the middle of H Street.

San Jose

In San Jose, California, the open-air Lunar New Year-Tet Festival 2024 will take place from February 16 to 18, highlighting different regions of Vietnam through cultural music, songs, dance, food and traditional performances. The Vietnamese community in San Jose is among the largest in the country, and tens of thousands of people are expected to show out for this year’s festivities.

Houston

Houston turns out for Lunar New Year. Over two days (February 17 and 18), the city’s various Asian American groups converge to celebrate a new year of progress with demos of Korean and Vietnamese folk dances, lion dances and martial arts performances, and vendors serving everything from baked goods to bubble tea. With more than a decade to its name—spanning as many as 80 lion and dragon performers, nearly a million red firecrackers, and 40,000 annual attendees—this event is not one to miss.
 

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Joseph Hernandez is an editor with a penchant for the nerdy, twee, and hygge. On any given day, you can find him hanging out with his hedgehog, a bottle of Champagne, or both.

Kastalia Medrano is a New York-based journalist and avid traveler. Follow her @kastaliamedrano.