Technology
Web Summit is a technology conference held every November in Lisbon, at the MEO Arena and the FIL exhibition halls in Parque das Nações. Startups, investors, corporate teams and press meet over four days, most of them in conversations that last a few minutes.
Next edition
9 – 12 November 2026
Lisbon, Portugal
Free account · Your first two events are on us
Exhibiting as a team? See the Team offerPhoto: Svetlana Gumerova / Unsplash
Source · checked on 26 October 2026
Next edition
9 – 12 November 2026
Venue
Lisbon, PortugalMEO Arena · FIL, Parque das Nações
Frequency
Every year · November
Organiser
Web Summit
Official website
Dates come from the source shown and may change: confirm them on the official website before you book.
71,386
attendees
157
countries represented
2,725
startups
1,857
investors
Figures for the 2025 edition, as published by the organiser. Source
Founders looking for investors and customers, investors scouting deals, corporate innovation teams, and a large crowd of attendees who are all, in one way or another, selling something. Many startups exhibit for a single day of the event, so the stand changes hands while the conversations do not stop.
Volume and speed. A good day on a Web Summit stand is dozens of short exchanges, often with people who are walking to the next talk. Business cards are rare, and a LinkedIn connection made on the spot tells you nothing a week later about why you talked.
Put a QR code on the stand and on your phone's lock screen, so a contact can leave their details in the aisle as well as at the stand. Ask one qualification question only (investor, customer or partner) and keep the rest for the follow-up. If you exhibit for one day, plan a campaign that covers the whole week anyway: the side events and the nights are where many of the useful conversations happen.
Web Summit started in Dublin in 2009 as a small gathering of a few hundred people from the Irish tech scene. It moved to Lisbon in 2016 and has been held there every November since, in the MEO Arena and the halls of the FIL in Parque das Nações. The organisers now run sister events elsewhere, but Lisbon remains the main one, and the one most exhibitors mean when they say "Web Summit".
The format is unusual for a trade show. Most startups do not book a stand for the whole week: they exhibit on one day, in a programme that rotates the floor, and spend the other days in talks, investor meetings and side events. Large companies take the bigger stands and partner spaces. Attendees range from founders and investors to marketers, students and public officials, so a stand sees very different profiles in the same hour.
Decide early what you are there for, because it changes everything else. A startup looking for investors needs a short list of funds and a way to book meetings; a company looking for customers needs a stand day that matches the audience it wants, and a form that sorts buyers from the curious. Write that one qualification question first, then build the rest of the plan around it.
Lisbon fills up in November. Book accommodation near a metro line that reaches Oriente, and plan for the team to cross the city at night for side events. If several people go, give each of them their own link to the campaign before you leave, so the contacts they make apart are attributed from the start.
Conversations are short and often happen while people walk. Keep the QR code visible from the aisle, on the stand and on each person's phone, and let the contact fill the form on their own phone: it takes less time than spelling an email address in a noisy hall. When someone hands you a card, photograph it in trade show mode and add one line about what they need. That line is what makes the follow-up possible a week later.
Note the side events in the campaign as well. A contact met at a dinner on Tuesday belongs in the same register as the one met on the stand on Wednesday.
Web Summit contacts go cold fast: everyone comes home with dozens of new connections. Send the follow-up within a few days, mention what you talked about, and give one clear next step, a call, a demo or a deck. Contacts who answered "investor" and "customer" should not get the same email; sort them with the answer to your qualification question before anything leaves.
The dates that matter, worked back from the opening day.
Shortlist who you want to meet
List the accounts and profiles you are going for. Your qualification questions follow from that list.
Open your event campaign
One campaign for the show: its own register, your questions, your follow-up delay.
Print the QR poster
A5 for the counter, A4 for the wall, and NFC cards for the team if you use them.
Brief the team
Each person gets their own link. Show them trade show mode and the visitor tablet.
Opening day
Every contact lands in one register, even when the hall Wi-Fi drops.
The follow-up leaves
Your follow-up email goes out on its own, while the stand is still fresh in mind.
A QR code on the stand or an NFC card in your hand: the contact fills in your form on their own phone, with your qualification questions.
In trade show mode, photograph a business card or a badge, add a note and a temperature, and move on. It works with no signal.
A visitor tablet on the counter takes the details of whoever is waiting while you are busy, and resets for the next person.
Exhibiting at Web Summit?
Set up your lead capture in minutes: a QR code for your stand, trade show mode on your phone, and the follow-up email ready to leave.
Lisbon Airport (Humberto Delgado) is about 15 minutes away: the red metro line runs straight from the airport to Oriente.
The venue sits next to Oriente station, served by the metro and by regional and long-distance trains.
Web Summit 2026 is announced from 9 to 12 November 2026, in Lisbon, Portugal. Dates come from the source shown and may change: confirm them on the official website before you book.
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