These are the best things to do in Miami this weekend

This dreamy outdoor music series returns with a pop-up at Miami Beach Botanical Garden, set among the Garden's collection of rare tropical flora. Enjoy the synth-washed music of Miami Vice, as interpreted by a live band. Following the performance, DJ Danny Kokomo of Jacuzzi Boys will play a late-night dance set featuring the 1980s tracks that made Miami. Drinks will be available at the bar by Tequila Town, along with Neopolitan-style pizza by Stanzioni. Guests are encouraged to dress up in their Miami Vice best and bring a blanket or lawn chairs to set up by the garden stage. 

Coconut Grove’s annual tree lighting ceremony transforms Fuller Street into a Polar Express-themed winter village on Sunday, November 30. The evening kicks off at 6pm with Santa's grand arrival in a decked-out golf cart parade, followed by live music, caroling and choral performances, a holiday blessing and a “Let It Snow” snowfall across Fuller Street as the tree makes its sparkling debut. The pajama-friendly wonderland also features Santa photo ops and holiday treats and crafts for all ages. 3035 Fuller Street

Miracle Bar makes its Carousel Club debut at Gulfstream Park this holiday season, and the racetrack’s open-air playground is the perfect backdrop for all the kitschy, Christmas-themed chaos. Running from November 21 through December 28, the beloved annual pop-up gives Carousel Club a full festive makeover: think twinkling tunnel entrances, over-the-top lawn displays and cozy cocktail mugs everywhere you look, all set against Carousel’s neon bar, trackside views and massive tented lounge.

This year's refreshed cocktail lineup channels the winter-meets-tropical vibes, with old and new favorites like the Christmapolitan, Snowball Old-Fashioned, Coconut Hot Chocolate and Koala LaLaLa. (And yes, Carousel’s bartenders commit to the holiday-core aesthetic, too.) With its oversized décor, wide-open footprint and trove of picture-perfect corners, Carousel Club is a sweet new home for the latest rendition of the long-running Miracle experience, which is free to attend. Check their website for a calendar of special events, like an Ugly Sweater Party on December 12.

ZeyZey in Little River looks like it could be a friend’s bohemian bungalow—if your friend had their own natural wine gazebo, custom sound system and vinyl listening room, shipping container cocktail bar and mainstage for live performances. This weekend, they've curated another lineup of fun concerts and parties, including the legendary Lil' Louis, a prolific producer and pioneer of the Chicago house music scene, playing alongside Rich Medina on Sunday, November 30.

Christmas gets a freaky twist at this holiday carnival in Hialeah. Expect all the usual rides, midway games and festive displays, plus entry to Ripley’s exhibition of strange and unusual oddities and artifacts. New sideshows roll out weekly, too, like contortionists, sword swallowers, foot archers and the Shortest Woman in the World. Other experiences include the shimmering Fairyland Journey pathway and Dinner at Santa's, a cozy sit-down meal at Santa’s North Pole home.

Have a bratty girls' night out at Club XCX, a Charli-themed dance party at Gramps in Wynwood. DJs will be playing a high-energy mix of hyperpop hits from Charli xcx, Slayyyter, Troye Sivan, Rihanna, Shygirl, Addison Rae, The Dare, Lady Gaga, Kesha, Lorde, Madonna, Tinashe, Ariana Grande and more. The party kicks off at 10pm and goes until late.

If you’ve ever wanted to live inside a Mariah Carey Christmas special, this is your moment. Mariah Carey’s Holiday Bar is landing at Ray's Hometown Bar in Miami Beach, promising a “Mariahfied cocktail experience” that’s part pop-up, part wonderland and entirely extra (in the best possible way). Expect wall-to-wall holiday décor dripping with glitter and nostalgia, festive photo ops and recreated backdrops from her most iconic album covers. Every 30 minutes, the unmistakable opening notes of “All I Want for Christmas Is You” will cue the room into collective holiday euphoria.

The menu keeps the theme alive with festive small bites and seasonal cocktails made with Carey’s own Black Irish cream liqueur. For fans who want to take the experience home, there’s exclusive merch, vinyl copies of her holiday albums and even her newest LP, Here For It All. You can even write to the star herself at the “Letters to Mariah” station. 

In tandem with the holiday season, Jungle Island's enchanting festival of lights returns for a fourth year with a new production featuring more than 37 monumental, handcrafted silk lantern scenes created by a global team of artisans, graphic designers, seamstresses and more. This year, Luminosa takes visitors on a vibrant trail of themed vignettes representing different ecosystems, from the Amazon rainforest to African savannahs, complete with cutting-edge animatronics, holograms and interactive storytelling. The popular Holiday Village also makes a return this year (through January 4), featuring Christmas trees, holiday treats like churro donut holes and coquito, a seasonal bazaar and a 30-foot Christmas tree centerpiece. 

The NYC-imported Smorgasburg, Miami's largest outdoor food market, returns to its Wynwood outpost for a new season featuring over 40 vendors (including 10 new concepts) and more shaded areas for noshing. Graze from a variety of local street foods, international fare, healthy options and inventive creations from the likes of Acai Way, Korean Kitchen, Kabuki Soba, The Lazy Oyster, La Picaña Grill, Lechona Truck, Tio Paella, Puro Chocolate, Cool & Creamy Truck and more. Hours are noon to 8pm every Saturday and Sunday. Keep an eye out for special programming throughout the season, from the Ube + Philippines Festival to Art Basel parties and more.

A much-anticipated precursor to the holiday season in Miami, NightGarden returns in November for its seventh season at Fairchild Tropical Botanical Garden, promising even more psychedelic scenery, family-friendly activities and interactive artwork than ever before. Running from November 7 through January 11, NightGarden invites guests to frolic around a neon-lit wonderland of tropical trails lined with holographic sculptures, secret sunken ponds and hidden fairy worlds. Expect several enticing new activations this year, including the Tree of Life, a monumental centerpiece with lights and projections activated by guest touch. You'll also find new immersive domes with themed photo backdrops, a Secret Garden Laser Light Show, movie nights and more.

Get your festive carnival fix at Tropical Park during Christmas Wonderland, a local holiday production that's grown into the largest of its kind in the U.S. Now in its third year, this 14-acre spectacle features six immersive holiday worlds, 50-plus rides, dazzling light shows and nightly entertainment like fireworks shows, acrobatic acts and even Santa as a human cannonball.

Of course, the grounds are lined with photo-worthy moments, starting with the Wonder Portal, an LED archway that leads into Tinsel Trail, a half-mile of synchronized lighting displays, installations and whimsical backdrops. At the heart of the midway, the IG’loo 360-Dome surrounds guests in a 3D-mapped immersive visual experience.

The midway is also where you'll find the fair's main food and drink offerings, including plenty of local food trucks and seasonal brews from Cervecería La Tropical.

You'll be hard-pressed to find a more festive bar year-round than JohnMartin's in Coral Gables. The Irish-style pub strikes just the right balance of cozy and contemporary with its penny tile mosaic flooring, black steel frame windows and moody lighting, ideal for sipping something dark and sudsy. For the holidays, JohnMartin's goes the extra mile, decking its halls with twinkling lights, festive décor and a lineup of boozy cocktails that channel the cheer of the season. The pop-up runs from November 14 through December 28, with DJs and other festive programming sprinkled in along the way.

Few brunches in Miami rise to the level of an "event," but the Sunday brunch at Novikov is assuredly one of them. After a brief sabbatical, this buzzing sunlit feast makes a return to its luxurious perch along the Downtown Miami waterfront, featuring two hours of unlimited grazing from an extensive Market Table spread. Choose from a raw bar, endless sushi and sashimi, a salad bar, dim sum and robata-grilled favorites, plus a decadent dessert bar and signature brunch cocktails. Premium add-ons take the party to another level, including a honey truffle king crab leg, wagyu ribeye and roasted peking duck. Of course, it wouldn't be one of Miami's hottest brunch propositions without a live DJ spinning beats that pair perfectly with Novikov's bayfront views and a glass (or two) of bubbles.

Winter Wonderland is back at The Ben Hotel, transforming the swanky West Palm Beach waterfront lawn into a glittering holiday playground with twinkling trees, Aspen-style chalets and, of course, a 50-by-66-foot rink made of the real stuff. Around the rink, expect plenty of festive distractions: chalet vendors slinging gifts and sweets; a holiday bar for hot chocolate, s’mores, grown-up toddies and the debut of a Holiday Tree Forest created in partnership with local nonprofits, including Habitat for Humanity and the Boys & Girls Clubs of Palm Beach County. There will also be themed events like Live Music Saturdays and Santa Sundays, ornament-making workshops and an opening-day curling exhibition (yes, Palm Beach now has curling athletes and, no, the tropics do not care about your winter stereotypes). Skating runs daily from November 1 through January 4 from 10am to 9pm. Entry is free unless you’re lacing up, in which case tickets start at $25 for adults and $10 for kids 11 and under.

Art, sexuality and cultural taboos converge at the Museum of Sex with the debut of its latest exhibition, Hard Art: Unruly Selections from the Beth Rudin DeWoody Collection. Explore decades of boundary-pushing works spanning the 1930s to today, pulled from the private collection of one of the world’s most dynamic collectors. From playful to profound and, at times, deemed too provocative for public display, the featured works include a wide range of media that challenges convention and invites conversation. Curated with the goal of amplifying underrepresented voices and celebrating uncensored expression, artists on view include Marco Brambilla, Jimmy DeSana, Bunny Yeager, John Kayser and others.

Tinez Farms' Pinterest-perfect pumpkin patch provides the ideal fallscape for all your seasonal photos. Aside from the multi-sized and colored gourds and hay bales, there's an animal barnyard and petting zoo, pumpkin patch, Tinez yard games, climbing, swings, zip lines, a bounce house, animal interactions and a tubing slide to help get you into the autumnal spirit. You can also opt to add on a train, pony, donkey or horse ride to your experience, or even bottle feed a baby goat. While you're there, peruse the farm's Home & Garden Market, where you'll find things like indoor and outdoor plants and pots, accessories and seasonal decor.

Elliot & Erick Jiménez: El Monte is the Cuban twin photography duo’s first solo museum exhibition, marking their leap from award-winning image makers for the likes of Prada, Tiffany’s, Bad Bunny and Selena Gomez to multi-disciplinary artists on an institutional stage. Inspired by the Afro-Caribbean spiritual tradition of Lucumí and Lydia Cabrera’s seminal text El Monte, the show centers on a womb-like, chapel-meets-forest installation alongside photographs and sculptural works that explore spirituality, ancestry and identity. 

Art meets science at "Leonardo da Vinci – 500 Years of Genius," a sweeping exhibition presented by Frost Science and produced by Grande Experiences in collaboration with Rome's Museo Leonardo da Vinci. On view through April 5th, 2026, the show explores da Vinci's multidisciplinary legacy with interactive displays, rare artifacts and life-size replicas of his machines, alongside immersive projections of iconic works like The Last Supper and Mona Lisa. Explore 16 themed sections, from anatomy and flight to engineering and optics, plus hands-on installations like the Vitruvian Man interactive station and the Mona Lisa Revealed exhibit, featuring the world’s only exact 360-degree replica of the painting.

Miami's biggest night for improv comedy happens every Saturday at Villain Theater in the heart of Little Haiti. Enjoy original, spontaneous live performances from some of the fiercest improvisers across South Florida. Shout out a suggestion and become a part of the action as the theater's talented cast of actors spins hysterical yarns over the course of two Second City-style improv shows. Mingle and sip beers in the lobby lounge in between sets: A ticket grants you access to both the 8:30 and 10pm showtimes.

The Coconut Grove Farmers Market is probably Miami’s most well-known. Every Saturday, Homestead's Glaser Organic Farms transforms an unoccupied corner of Coconut Grove into a full-fledged produce market with dozens of fruit and vegetable stands, a raw bar featuring prepared foods and salads and coolers filled with cold-pressed juices and nut mylks. There’s even velvety vegan ice cream for sale and several rows of picnic tables where you can sit and enjoy your bounty. Along its periphery, you’ll find other local vendors selling honey, homemade soaps, handmade jewelry and other artisanal items. And the setup and breakdown are so fascinating to watch! Much like the circus leaving town, everyone quickly dismantles their tents and packs up just after sunset, leaving no trace of the bustling day on the empty gravel lot.