What Do the 10 Longest Concert Tours Have in Common? Their Stadiums, Mapped

From Aerosmith to Roger Waters, there are only several artists who performed tours that spanned 150+ shows. What else do these artists and their very long tours have in common?

There are only so many concert venues in the world, so these artists played many of the same venues—some more than once. So let’s take a look at 10 of the longest concert tours and then which of their 820+ stadiums they have in common, giving you a glimpse into the world of epic musical tours.

View Common Stadiums of the 10 Largest Concert Tours in a full screen map

Ten of the Longest Concert Tours

Before we can get to the 823 different stadiums where the artists of the 10 longest concert tours played, let’s first take a look which concert tours even played the most shows.

Each of the 10 longest tours played 150+ shows. Aside from Bob Dylan’s Never Ending Tour (which is not included on the map due to it being ongoing), Bruce Springsteen performed 384 shows for his 1988 Tunnel of Love Express tour, making it the second longest in history. Beyond this, only Elton John and his 2018-2023 Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour has hit 300 shows.

The top tours aside, two Metallica tours surpassed 150 shows: the 1991-1993 Wherever We May Roam tour (234 shows) and the more recent Death Magnetic tour (180).

Speaking of the Wherever We May Roam tour, it’s one of two of the top 10 that began in 1991. In fact, the ’90s as a whole is when most of these tours took place:

• 1990: Janet Jackson’s Rhythm Nation tour (194 shows)
• 1991: Metallica’s Wherever We May Roam (234) & Guns N’ Roses’ Use Your Illusion tour (194)
• 1993: Aerosmith’s Get a Grip tour (231)

After the ’90s, there were three extra-long in the 2010s: Roger Waters’s The Wall Live tour, Ed Sheeran’s ÷ Tour, and Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road tour.

Now we can move on to the common stadiums of these really, really, really long tours.

Most Common Stadiums of the Longest Tours

With an understanding of the longest concert tours, it’s time to crowd dive into the stadiums they have in common. The following list represents the top venues that have hosted the most number of shows played by the artists with the largest concert tours.

• Madison Square Garden – 27 shows
• The O 2 Arena – 18
• Palais Omnisports de Paris-Bercy – 16
• Rosemont Horizon – 15
• Nassau Coliseum – 15
• Capital Centre – 15
• The Palace of Auburn Hills – 13
• Rod Laver Arena – 13
• Wembley Stadium – 12
• Tacoma Dome – 12
• Richfield Coliseum – 12

The most commonly played stadium is Madison Square Garden. This New York City venue holds up to 20,000 concert-goers and tops the list. MSG, as it’s sometimes called, was home to 27 different concerts from the longest tour list. Not every artist on the list played this NYC venue—while some have played more than once.

In 2018, Elton John said that The Garden was his “favorite venue in the whole wide world,” so it’s no surprise that eight of the 27 shows were performed by him throughout his “Farewell Yellow Brick Road” tour. Bruce Springsteen seemed equally enamored with the venue with five shows coming from his “Tunnel of Love Express.” Three tours: Guns N’ Roses’ “Use Your Illusion,” Pink Floyd’s “Momentary Lapse of Reason,” and Roger Waters’ “The Wall Live” also played The Garden three times each during their respective tours. On the other hand, neither Ed Sheeran during his “÷ Tour” nor Metallica on their “Wherever We May Roam” tour played at The Garden.

Madison Square Garden is followed by The O2 Arena in London with 18 shows. A whopping 10 of those once again came from Elton John and six from Roger Waters’ “The Wall Live” tour.

Click around on the map to discover which other long-touring artists have played at these venues. Then, check out the highest-attended concerts. Or, if you have more of an interest in sports, head on over to our map of former, current, and future MLB stadiums.