Dominica Carnival is also referred to as Carnival Mad Dominik and is the main carnival celebration in Dominica. Dominica not to be confused with the Dominica Republic is a small island in the eastern Caribbean Sea. It is close to the French islands of Guadeloupe and Marie-Galante to the north and Martinique to the south. The country is two hundred and ninety (290) square miles and has a population of around seventy-one thousand people. While the country is not that large it is one of the main tourist’s attractions in the Caribbean and has one of the best carnivals.

This article will give you some insight into the carnival and show you why Dominica carnival should be on your bucket list of carnivals in the Caribbean to visit for 2025.

Dominica Carnival 2025 Dates

The carnival takes places for the whole of February and a part of March. The carnival itself will be on March 3-4, 2025. The real celebrations begin on J’ouvert morning and continues until Carnival Tuesday, which is similar to Trinidad Carnival. The carnival finishes with a burial ritual on Ash Wednesday. The carnival consists of calypso shows and pageants.

Booking Your Flight

We know with all travel it is best to book your flight early, however, this is one of the cheaper tourist destinations.

Hotel Accommodation

In planning your trip to Dominica we advise that you choose your accommodation as early as possible. However, as we explained earlier prices are not as expensive to travel to Dominica in comparison to Jamaica and Trinidad. Nonetheless, prices tend to spike due to the demand for rooms around carnival time. Therefore from as early as possible sort out your accommodations. Some popular hotels you can stay at are the Wanderlust Caribbean Adventure Travel Boutique Hotel, Secret Bay and the Champs hotel restaurant and bar.

Transportation

Dominica has a bus service, however it mainly consists of private minibus operators. The bus system is not suitable for night travel so if you want to be moving around at night it is not the best mode of transportation. While taxis are available our advice is to rent a car to be able to comfortably move around. Rental cars are available in downtown Roseau and by the island’s two airports.

Dominica Carnival 2025 Events & Fetes List

Below is the list of events and the dates for Dominica Carnival 2025, we were able to pull this information from Dominica festivals social media. Click the images below to see thee list of events.

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Choosing a Carnival Band

I will admit we were surprised with the quality of costumes for this year’s carnival, the bands went all out this year. However, as this is carnival is not the same magnitude compared to Trinidad Carnival, you can expect fewer bands, the good thing about that is that you will not suffer from decision over load.

As usual the type of carnival costume you pick will determine the price, we have a breakdown of the costumes offered this year. The male costumes are a standard price however, the female costumes are broken down as follows.

Backline costumes: These are usually the more toned down versions of the costumes. This is the simpler type of costume, with less feathers, smaller headpiece, this is usually the cheapest costume in a band.

Midline costumes: This is an option some bands offer, which is the middle ground between frontline and backline. The price also reflects this middle ground.

Frontline costumes: These are more lavish costumes, with much bigger headpieces and/or extravagant wings/big bunch of feathers. They will be the most expensive costumes.

Male Costumes: These usually include short pants, t-shirt, accessories/jewelry. Some bands include wings and a headpiece while in others it is optional.

Some of the bands have websites setup where you can view and purchase your costumes before arriving in the island. You can arrange to get your costumes a while before the carnival depending on the band. However, we realise a lot of the costumes are selling out quickly with many of the frontline costumes being sold out already. We have one of the bands we think is a good pick for this carnival on our website, you can see their costumes by clicking on the link.

This is our guide to Dominica Carnival 2025, if you have any further questions feel free to contact us via the numbers on our website. We can be reached via WhatsApp if you need to chat and ask some questions, or you can leave a comment below.