Maryland residents face difficulties purchasing Renaissance Festival tickets

Crownsville, Md. - Many people are experiencing difficulties as they try to purchase Maryland Renaissance Festival tickets.

What we know:

One Maryland family said they came up empty-handed after hours of waiting for tickets. And they’re not alone.

The Maryland Renaissance Festival takes place in Crownsville, and it kicks off on Saturday, Aug. 23. 

FOX 5’s Tisha Lewis spoke with a father who has brought his son to the festival to celebrate the child’s birthday every year, but this year when his wife logged on to buy tickets, they saw a notice saying there was a line for the 2025 Maryland Renaissance Festival Ticket Sale—but that’s not all.

They were apparently number 82,582 in line with more than 40,000 people still ahead of them, and the screen said the estimated wait time was more than an hour. The wait was ultimately several hours.

Louis Ruonavar said the family waited from 11 a.m. to around 3 p.m. before having to log off. He said in previous years he’s paid $25 a ticket, but this year the ticket-buying process has been arduous, and he suspects bots are to blame.

"People that were buying tickets were seeing tickets pop up on Stubhub for anywhere between $50 to $135 a piece and it just alarmed me because it makes me think that someone is bot-farming a digital cue to scalp tickets," Ruonavar said. 

Louis Ruonavar is not alone in this thinking. 

A video posted on TikTok shows a user also complaining about the festival’s ticket-buying drama and third parties re-selling the tickets for double or more than the original amount. 

What they're saying:

FOX 5 reached out to festival organizers, who responded saying, "the popularity of the Maryland Renaissance Festival has resulted in customers purchasing tickets as early as possible to get the dates they would like to attend."

"The festival has a capacity and only sells to that amount for each day it is open to reduce traffic and overcrowding at the event," a spokesperson said. "The 85,900 is the total number of devices that have been used to secure a place and, by subtracting the number that it says are in front of her (Ruonavar), that indicates that over 46,700 customers, many of whom have bought multiple tickets for families, have been served." 

The Ruonavar family wants the festival to return to its pre-COVID process where attendees purchased tickets on site.