Bruce Dickinson with Iron Maiden at San Antonio's Alamodome on 29 September, the last US date of 2026.
Bruce Dickinson with Iron Maiden at San Antonio's Alamodome on 29 September, the last US date of 2026.
Sixteen more shows. Iron Maiden had planned to stay off the road in 2027; instead the band has added a third and final North American leg to its 50th anniversary Run For Your Lives tour, opening at the Tacoma Dome on 14 April and closing at the Boardwalk Rock festival in Ocean City, Maryland, on 16 May. Bullet for My Valentine and The Raven Age support on the headline dates.
The announcement came on 16 October, 17 days after Iron Maiden closed their 2026 US run in front of more than 40,000 people in San Antonio. General on-sale opened on 23 October at 10am local time.
The 16 Dates, in Order
The run moves down the West Coast, across Texas and Florida, up the East Coast and out to two festivals, according to the dates published by Loudwire:
- 14 April: Tacoma, Washington, Tacoma Dome
- 16 April: Vancouver, British Columbia, Rogers Arena
- 18 April: Portland, Oregon, Moda Center
- 20 April: Wheatland, California, Toyota Amphitheatre
- 22 April: Chula Vista, California, North Island Credit Union Amphitheatre
- 24 April: San Bernardino, California, Glen Helen Amphitheater
- 26 April: Phoenix, Arizona, Talking Stick Resort Amphitheatre
- 28 April: Dallas, Texas, Dos Equis Pavilion
- 1 May: Tampa, Florida, Benchmark International Arena
- 2 May: West Palm Beach, Florida, iTHINK Financial Amphitheatre
- 5 May: Atlanta, Georgia, Lakewood Amphitheatre
- 7 May: Raleigh, North Carolina, Coastal Credit Union Music Park at Walnut Creek
- 9 May: Hartford, Connecticut, The Meadows Music Theatre
- 11 May: Belmont Park, New York, UBS Arena
- 14 May: Columbus, Ohio, Sonic Temple festival
- 16 May: Ocean City, Maryland, Boardwalk Rock festival
Fourteen of the 16 are headline shows with both support acts. The last two are festival slots, where Iron Maiden headline but share the bill.
Why the Band Changed Its Plan
Bassist and founder Steve Harris explained the reversal in the announcement. “As many of our fans know, Maiden were planning on taking a break from live performances in 2027, but we’ve been enjoying this last leg in the USA and Canada so much that we all had a chat and decided we should take the show to parts we missed, particularly the North West and South East,” he said. “It just seems fair to our many fans there who have given us tremendous support for so many years. We can’t get everywhere but we can try!”
The routing follows that logic. According to Consequence, the leg reaches markets the band did not play on the 2026 North American tour, including Vancouver, Dallas and Atlanta. Harris also explained the two festival dates: “We have always enjoyed playing the many great festivals that are in Europe and wanted to experience a couple more in the USA which we will do at the end of the tour in Columbus and Maryland. At festivals you are not just playing to your own fans so it’s always a challenge and we all love a challenge!”
What the 2026 Leg Delivered
Manager Rod Smallwood put numbers to the demand. He said the first North American leg drew “huge sell-out crowds of all ages”, with some of the biggest shows the band has ever played on the continent, and that Iron Maiden “played to many more people per show than ever before and headlined our first stadium shows in the USA.”
He also pointed to the catalogue’s unusual commercial shape. Iron Maiden have sold out arenas across North America since 1983, apart from a short period in the 1990s, “despite an almost total lack of mainstream radio support and never even having a track reach the Billboard Hot 100”, Smallwood said. The band, a 2026 Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee according to Variety, built that run on touring and word of mouth rather than singles.
The 2026 US leg ended on Tuesday 29 September at the Alamodome in San Antonio, where Ultimate Classic Rock counted more than 40,000 fans and called it the biggest San Antonio concert of the band’s half-century career. Anthrax and Megadeth opened that night.
How the San Antonio Night Ran
The bill ran in three parts. Anthrax opened with a five-song set, helped by a last-minute stand-in: drummer Charlie Benante was ill, so Mike Heller, of Raven and formerly Fear Factory, took the stool, according to the review. Megadeth followed with nine songs, with “The Conjuring” and “Tornado of Souls” drawing the loudest responses. Both acts were part of the 2026 package; neither is listed for the 2027 leg, which brings in Bullet for My Valentine and The Raven Age instead.
Iron Maiden’s arrival was signalled by UFO’s “Doctor Doctor” over the speakers, and the band came on to a crowd whose enthusiasm, the review said, is nearly impossible to match. Dickinson, in a leather jacket and skintight jeans, was singled out for his vibrato and breath control at 68, while Harris drove the rhythm and the three guitarists traded solos.
The night ended with a promise that now has dates attached. Before leaving the stage, Dickinson told the Alamodome, “We will be back.” Seventeen days later, the 2027 leg was announced, although its Texas stop is Dallas on 28 April rather than San Antonio.
The Set That Closed San Antonio
The 17-song set drew only on the first nine studio albums, from Iron Maiden in 1980 to Fear of the Dark in 1992. The band opened with three songs from Killers, “Murders in the Rue Morgue”, “Wrathchild” and the title track, a nod to the early era and to the late singer Paul Di’Anno. The main set ran:
- Murders in the Rue Morgue
- Wrathchild
- Killers
- Phantom of the Opera
- The Number of the Beast
- Infinite Dreams
- Powerslave
- 2 Minutes to Midnight
- Rime of the Ancient Mariner
- Run to the Hills
- Seventh Son of a Seventh Son
- The Trooper
- Hallowed Be Thy Name
- Iron Maiden
The encore was “Aces High”, “Fear of the Dark” and “Wasted Years”. Deep cuts such as “Infinite Dreams” and “Seventh Son of a Seventh Son” drew responses as loud as the familiar songs, according to the review.
The staging has changed on this tour. When Run For Your Lives launched in May 2025, digital screens replaced the band’s long-running physical props and backdrops, which some fans disliked. The San Antonio review judged that the visuals met the band’s usual standard, with nautical imagery during “Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, while two oversized versions of the mascot Eddie still appeared on stage.
The Line-Up Taking the Tour Into 2027
Bruce Dickinson, 68, leads the band with Harris on bass and guitarists Dave Murray, Adrian Smith and Janick Gers. Simon Dawson is on drums, having replaced Nicko McBrain after McBrain retired from touring in 2024. The review noted that fast songs such as “Run to the Hills” and “The Trooper” now run slightly slower than in the 1980s, a small trade for a band still filling stadiums.
Bullet for My Valentine and The Raven Age support on every headline date of the 2027 leg. Sonic Temple in Columbus, on 14 May, already lists Iron Maiden as a headliner, and Boardwalk Rock closes the run two days later.
Where the Run Sits Among This Year’s Big Tour Moves
Extending a tour into a year a band had kept free is a clear demand signal. Rockcharts.news tracked a related move when System of a Down went from one Rose Bowl date to three in four days. The difference here is scale over time: Iron Maiden are not adding nights in one city but a month of shows across two countries.
Trooper VIP packages are available through the band’s website alongside standard tickets. For a tour that began in May 2025, the 16 May date in Ocean City now stands as the last scheduled night of the 50th anniversary run.
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