Experience The Open 2026 in Southport

Welcome to Southport’s Journey Magazine.

The following article originally appeared in the latest edition of Southport’s Journey Magazine and has been adapted for our website to help more readers discover the stories that matter. Download Southport’s Journey Magazine here.

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The Open 2026!

Royal Birkdale hosts The Open. Southport hosts the world.

and the town is ready and waiting…

There is no official announcement. No switch is flicked. Instead, the signs appear quietly. Fresh flowers outside cafés. Paint touched up where winter has left its mark. Shop windows carefully arranged. Flags begin to appear and conversations in coffee shops turn towards tee times, visitors and the week ahead. It is a feeling more than a moment, and if you’ve lived here long enough, you know exactly when it begins.

I still find it extraordinary that this relatively small stretch of the North West becomes the centre of the sporting world. While the world’s greatest golfers prepare for one of the game’s biggest championships, thousands of visitors are doing something much simpler. They’re typing, “Things to do in Southport.” “Best cafés near Royal Birkdale.” “Where should we eat?” For a few days, our hometown becomes somebody else’s exciting new discovery.

The return of The Open is more than one of golf’s greatest championships. It is one of the biggest events our town will host.

This year’s championship marks the eleventh time Royal Birkdale has welcomed The Open, reinforcing its place among the most celebrated venues in world golf. It is also the first time the championship has returned since 2017, when Jordan Spieth lifted the Claret Jug after one of the most memorable final rounds in modern Open Championship history. With more than 300,000 visitors expected across the week, Southport will once again find itself on television screens and front pages around the world.

Yet perhaps the most interesting story is not inside the ropes.

For many visitors, this is a holiday, a bucket list trip or the chance to watch history unfold. For local businesses, it is something they have quietly prepared for over many months.

Extra staff are on shift. Kitchens have stocked up. Independent cafés are ready for the morning rush.

Restaurants are extending opening hours, shops are welcoming new customers, and countless businesses hope that a first visit this week becomes a return visit in the years ahead.

There is something quietly special about that.

The Open shines its spotlight on Royal Birkdale, but the light stretches much further. It reaches Lord Street, Birkdale Village, Churchtown, our parks, independent shops, galleries and cafés. It encourages people to wander beyond the course and discover a town with a story that continues long after the final putt has dropped.

Perhaps that is what makes hosting The Open feel so significant.

It reminds us to see Southport through fresh eyes.

Sometimes it takes visitors travelling hundreds, even thousands, of miles to notice the beauty we have become accustomed to. The Victorian elegance of Lord Street. A walk through the dunes. An afternoon by Marine Lake. A conversation over coffee in Birkdale Village. The creativity growing inside venues like The Warehouse Arts Centre. These are the moments that rarely make the television coverage, yet they shape how people remember our town.

In a few days, the grandstands will come down, the crowds will leave and Southport will settle back into its familiar rhythm.

Few towns are given the opportunity to welcome the world quite like this. From our coastline and dunes to Birkdale Village, Churchtown and the sweeping boulevard of Lord Street, there is a quiet pride in hoping people leave with more than a ticket stub or a photograph of the famous clubhouse. We hope they leave talking about the warm welcome, the places they stumbled across, and a town that surprised them in all the right ways. The greatest compliment Southport can receive isn’t that someone enjoyed The Open. It’s hearing them say, “We can’t wait to come back.”

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