Expo City Dubai’s Winter City unveils Winter City Expo City Dubai 2026, its ambitious edition yet and a Disney+ collaboration.
There is a joy when a place you love becomes noticeably better. Winter City Expo City Dubai 2026 has been doing that to residents for five years running. December arrives. Al Wasl Dome becomes the most beautiful backdrop in the city. Snow falls in the desert, and thousands of families decide this is where the holiday season begins.
Related Stories
This December, it is bringing Frozen, Toy Story, Home Alone and Marvel along for the ride.
Running from December 11 through 31, the fifth edition of Winter City unfolds during Al Wasl Season. It centers on a collaboration with Disney+ under the theme Once Upon a Holiday. This approach weaves a narrative spine throughout the event, not just a list of attractions.
The theme honors storytelling traditions that have inspired generations of imagination. With Winter City Expo City Dubai 2026 as a milestone, the event weaves Disney magic into everyday moments. Spectators will discover immersive experiences, performances, and family-friendly activities built around the holiday narrative.
Related Stories
What Disney+ Actually Brings to the Dome
The collaboration is not cosmetic. Dedicated themed zones inspired by Disney, Pixar, Marvel Studios and 20th Century Studios will be built into the Winter City experience, meaning families can move between worlds rather than simply walking through a single festive space.
Frozen, the film that made Let It Go an inescapable part of every family’s vocabulary for about four years, gets its own zone. Toy Story brings Woody, Buzz and the gang into a setting that will almost certainly cause adults to feel emotions they were not expecting. Home Alone, which has been making parents feel simultaneously nostalgic and mildly concerned since 1990, makes its debut in the lineup. Marvel Studios rounds out a collection that spans every age bracket with reasonable accuracy.
Related Stories
The attractions that made the previous four editions beloved are not going anywhere. Snow falls under Al Wasl Dome. Letters to Santa are still going. Meet-and-greets with Santa and Mrs Claus remain complimentary. The projections across the dome continue to be the kind of thing that makes Dubai residents momentarily forget they live in a desert.
What the People Behind It Are Saying
Amna Abulhoul, Executive Creative Director for Events and Experiences at Expo City Dubai, described the team’s aim precisely. Winter City Expo City Dubai 2026 shows how families arrive as adults and leave as children. The Disney+ layer adds the dimension of stepping into stories rather than simply watching them.
Every family will experience Winter City differently, she said. They might arrive for a favourite story and find something entirely new along the way. That is the spirit behind Once Upon a Holiday.
In Winter City Expo City Dubai 2026, we do not just want our visitors to watch the story.
We want them to be part of it.
Tamim Fares, Director of Disney+ Middle East, made the platform’s angle equally clear. Disney+ has always positioned itself around the idea of shared stories across generations. Moving that experience physically into a space that families can inhabit together is a natural extension of that positioning, and the scale of Al Wasl Dome gives it room to breathe in a way that a streaming platform obviously cannot.
This Edition Feels Different
Winter City has grown significantly since its first edition. Each year has added something — more projection technology, more activations, more reasons to visit more than once. The Disney+ partnership is the largest conceptual leap the event has taken, moving from a consistently excellent winter destination to something that carries genuine international brand weight alongside its own identity.
December in Dubai has never been short of options. Global Village is open. Ice rinks appear across the city. Hotel lobbies compete for the most dramatic Christmas tree real estate. But Winter City has consistently offered something the others do not: a sense of occasion built around a specific place that is genuinely extraordinary.
Adding Elsa to that equation seems, on reflection, entirely logical.
Dates: December 11th to 31st, Expo City Dubai.
