Largest gathering of people over several days

What to remember

At the Triveni Sangam in Prayagraj, Uttar Pradesh, the 2025 Maha Kumbh Mela ran from 13 January to 26 February, over 45 days. Across the whole Hindu pilgrimage, 670,000,000 participants were counted, enough to make it the largest gathering of people on record. On 29 January alone, 76 million took part.

The Kumbh Mela follows a cycle tied to Jupiter's orbit around the Sun. The 2025 edition completed a 12-year cycle, and was officially termed a Maha Kumbh Mela, and astrological calculations gave it a constellation alignment seen once in 144 years. The site of each Kumbh Mela is set by the alignment of Jupiter, the Sun and the Moon.

For such gatherings, some figures are only rough estimates, and different gatherings use different ways of counting those present. Data released on 26 February said more than 660 million people had taken a dip in the river.