SUMMARY
Published by the DEPS of the Ministry of Culture in September 2026, this annual survey – based on Crédoc’s ‘Living Conditions and Aspirations’ survey of 3,000 residents in France – providesan overview of the leisure activities of the French population. In 2025, 57 per cent went to the cinema, 61 per cent visited a historic monument, 47 per cent attended a show, 33 per cent visited a museum, 33 per cent visited a library and 20 per cent attended a festival; these figures are down slightly but remain close to those of 2024. Audiences remain socially very diverse: 15–24-year-olds, university graduates, managers and high-income earners go out significantly more often, and residents of major urban centres outnumber those in suburban and rural areas. A key factor in the attractiveness of regions is that 44 per cent of museum visitors and 40 per cent of festival-goers combine their outing with an overnight stay; nevertheless, proximity remains the dominant factor for outings (62 per cent of recent museum visits, 74 per cent of recent festival visits).
The study also analyses two national events: the Fête de la Musique (26 per cent participation, a young and working-class audience, with 44 per cent of participants not having attended a concert that year) and the European Heritage Days (16 per cent, an older and more educated audience, primarily retaining existing visitors). Whilst the Fête de la Musique serves as an introduction to such events, the European Heritage Days reinforce already established habits.
Keywords: attendance, attractiveness, library, cinema, Crédoc, events, Fête de la Musique, visitor numbers, barriers to participation, European Heritage Days, tourist mobility, monument, museum, overnight stay, heritage, cultural participation, proximity, audiences, stay, performing arts, social stratification, admission fees, region, cultural tourism
Illustration: Ministry of Culture
Methodology
The barometer is based onCrédoc’s ‘Living Conditions and Aspirations’ survey, which has been conducted annually since 1978 in three waves each year. For this edition, eleven questions on cultural outings were included in the January 2026 wave, which was administered online to 3,000 people residing in France (metropolitan France and the overseas departments and regions), aged 15 and over. The representativeness of the sample is ensured by the quota method (region, size of conurbation, age, gender, type of housing, socio-professional category), calculated on the basis of the INSEE census, supplemented by a final adjustment to limit any bias associated with the online data collection method.
