Stag Do Statistics 2027

How much have stag weekends changed over the years? Are groups booking earlier or leaving everything until the last minute? Which destinations are becoming more popular and what activities are people choosing?

We've analysed our booking data, covering more than 300,000 stag party travellers between 2012 and 2026.

From the rise of Albufeira to the declining popularity of traditional nightclubs, here are some of the biggest stag do statistics and trends heading into 2027.

Stags Plan Late

We’ve always known guys aren’t as quick as our hen do customers, but this is only increasing with time. Stag groups enquiring with TheStagCompany took 81 days between enquiring and going on their stag do. This is under 3 months.

In contrast, the average hen party took 205 days from initial enquiry to the date they travel.

An astonishing one in four stag do’s are booked ‘last minute’, which means less than four weeks before the departure date.

To be precise, it’s 25.2% of our stag do bookings were made within this short departure window. This was 10% back in 2019, highlighting a growing trend of last minute bookings. Between 2012 and 2022, the number of last minute bookings varied between 7.9% and 11.6%, really highlighting the last minute change of the past couple of years.

Abroad Is Booming

During the lockdown years, we inevitably saw a growth in staycations, however this has fully switched to abroad stag weekends, with 54.8% of stag weekends taking place abroad. 2024 was the first ever year where we saw the majority of stag weekends abroad, with 50.3%, highlighting a gradual increase over time as well.

If you were to go back to 2012, stag weekends abroad only made up 17% of bookings, as the big UK cities dominated search demand, with Bournemouth, Brighton and Newcastle being the top sellers at that point.

The Loss Of Bournemouth

Bournemouth was the top selling destination for 8 of 10 years between 2010 and 2019, however in 2026, it was the 13th top selling destination. This is a gradual decrease we’ve seen over the past 5 years, with the move to abroad destinations and the increase in Liverpool as a UK alternative.

Top Selling Destinations

In 2024, Prague was the top selling destination, while in 2025 it was overtaken by Benidorm. In 2025, Benidorm accounted for 8.8% of every stag do booking, followed by Prague (7.7%), Liverpool (7.2%), Budapest (6.1%) and Amsterdam (4.6%).

What we couldn’t have predicted was the growth in Albufeira as a stag destination. In 2026, 10.1% of every booking was to Albufeira, up from sixth place in 2025, when it accounted for 4.9% of bookings. The booking volume doubled year on year.

The destinations seeing the greatest growth going into 2027 is Albufeira, Krakow, Edinburgh and surprisingly London.

London historically has been a destination that only performed with hen parties, but maybe that’s all about to change. Having said that, it’s still outside the top 10 selling destinations. Krakow grew from the 12th top seller in 2025 to the 6th in 2026.

The biggest decrease in popularity has been Dublin, dropping from 9th to the 14th top selling destination.

Stags Want A Classy Stay

Go back to 2016 and the majority of stag groups were looking to stay in a hostel, as cheap as possible, whether that was in the UK or abroad. However, this is starting to change, with 37.3% of stag groups opting for hotels on the higher price range. In 2012, that figure was only 13.9%.

Stag Group Size

The median group size for a stag do is 12 people. However, 21.9% of stag groups in 2026 had 17 or more people, against 12.8% in 2012. This is even an increase on 2025, where it was 19.1% of every booking being 17 or more people.

Gaming Bars Are More Than A Fad

When the first gaming bar launched, we weren’t sure whether to partner up, as we couldn’t tell if this was a short term trend or a sign of what’s to come. We seriously underestimated the popularity and growth of these venues, with people wanting more to do when visiting a bar than just drinking alcohol.

28.5% of UK stag do bookings in 2026 included a gaming bar, from augmented darts to shuffleboard. This is up from 7.3% in 2019, which was the first year we started offering them.

Bar Crawls Are Still King

A bar crawl has long been a popular activity for a stag weekend, largely as you hand over responsibility of directing the group from venue to venue to a guide. 25.5% of every stag do booking in 2026 contained a bar crawl, making it one of our top selling activities.

Nightclubs Decreasing In Popularity

Between 2019 and 2025, nightclubs went from being included in 28.5% of bookings down to 8.9% and this has dropped further in 2026 to 7.2%.

This is even more drastic when we just look at UK bookings, where it has fallen to 3.5% of bookings (still in 10.3% of abroad bookings).

Rob Hill, CEO of TheStagCompany, stated that “groups simply don’t want to stay all night in a nightclub anymore and are looking for alternative evening activities, such as comedy shows. This also means the stag do is taking place earlier in the day. Alcohol hasn’t completely gone from the bookings, but we see earlier drinking activities, like a bottomless brunch between 3-5pm on the up”.

Which Month Is The Most Popular For A Stag Do

May is the most heavily booked month for the stag weekend, with 18.7% of stag do’s taking place during this month in 2026. The most popular month for bookings was, as always, January, matching the travel industry, where people get motivated and begin planning the stag do.

13.4% of stag do’s were booked in January, followed by 13% in March, however those March bookings included a huge amount of last minute enquiries.

Outdoor Activities On The Rebound

We have seen outdoor activities steadily decrease over the past decade, but we saw a rebound in 2026, going from 33.2% of bookings, up to 39.9%. This includes paintballing, that went from being included in 6.6% of bookings, up to 8.6% in a single year, while quad biking went from 9.4% to 12.6%.