Offlimits Music Festival (Shakira, Jonas Brothers): Dates, Tickets & Venue (Abu Dhabi)

A Saturday night on Yas Island

Four acts, one night, one open-air stage. On November 21, 2026, OFFLIMITS Music Festival returns to Etihad Park on Yas Island, with Shakira and the Jonas Brothers at the top of the bill and Ne-Yo and Myles Smith beside them.

This is a bill built for singing along. Between the four acts you have roughly three decades of radio hits: World Cup anthems, boy-band revival, mid-2000s R&B and one of the breakout British voices of the 2020s. A lot of the crowd knows every word to at least one set.

Who is on the bill

The headliners have catalogues that many people grew up on. Here is what each act brings to the stage, going by their recorded work rather than any announced setlist:

• Shakira: the Colombian star behind “Hips Don’t Lie”, “Whenever, Wherever” and “Waka Waka”, with a stage reputation built on dance as much as voice.
• Jonas Brothers: Kevin, Joe and Nick, whose 2019 reunion single “Sucker” put them back on top of the charts years after “Burnin’ Up”.
• Ne-Yo: the singer-songwriter behind “So Sick”, “Because of You” and “Miss Independent”.
• Myles Smith: the British singer-songwriter whose 2024 song “Stargazing” took him from small rooms to arenas.

Running order and set lengths are the organiser’s to publish. Nothing about them is assumed here.

Etihad Park and the island around it

Etihad Park is an open-air events ground on Yas Island. The island sits on Abu Dhabi’s north-eastern edge and is built almost entirely around entertainment. Your neighbours for the night are the big names of Yas:

• Yas Marina Circuit, the Formula 1 track
• Ferrari World Abu Dhabi, under its red roof
• Yas Waterworld, Warner Bros. World and SeaWorld Yas Island
• Etihad Arena and the restaurants along Yas Bay Waterfront
• Yas Mall, one of the largest shopping centres in the emirate

The upshot is that a concert day here rarely starts at the gate. Many visitors spend the afternoon in a theme park or at the mall. Then they move to the venue as the heat goes out of the day.

Getting to Yas Island

Abu Dhabi has no metro, so the road is how you get here. Yas Island is about a 25 to 30 minute drive from central Abu Dhabi along the E10 and E12. From Zayed International Airport it is closer still, usually around 10 to 15 minutes.

From Dubai the trip runs along the E11 and generally takes a little over an hour. Big concert nights add traffic at both ends. Groups coming from Dubai often share one car or hire a driver rather than face the late-night drive back alone.

Abu Dhabi’s silver taxis are metered, and Uber and Careem both work across the emirate. After a headline set, the wait for a car is the slow part of the night. Plenty of attendees walk a few minutes away from the gates before calling a ride. The free Yas Express buses that link the island’s hotels and attractions are another option for guests staying on Yas.

November in the Gulf

The date sits at the start of the cool season. Late November in Abu Dhabi usually means warm, dry days, often in the high twenties Celsius. Evenings are noticeably softer, and that is the whole reason outdoor concerts cluster in these months.

Warm still means warm in the afternoon, and Etihad Park is an open ground. Concertgoers usually wear light clothing and treat water as part of the ticket. A thin layer is useful for the small hours, when a sea breeze can come off the Gulf.

The island is busy at this time of year. The Formula 1 season finale at Yas Marina Circuit usually lands in late November or early December. Hotel rooms on Yas and around Yas Bay fill fast around both weekends, so many visitors stay in central Abu Dhabi or on Saadiyat Island instead.

Concert-night manners in the UAE

Gates, rules and passes in the UAE work a little differently from Europe or the Americas. Most of it is common sense, but a few points catch first-timers out:

• ID at the gate. UAE events commonly check identification at entry. Residents usually carry their Emirates ID and visitors their passport. The age policy for each event is set out in the organiser’s ticket terms.
• Filming strangers. UAE privacy law is strict about photographing or posting identifiable people without consent. Filming the stage is normal. Close-ups of other fans, then posted online, can be a real legal problem.
• Alcohol. It is served only in licensed areas, and public drunkenness is taken seriously. Most of the crowd treats the ride home as a sober part of the night.
• Dress. Festival clothing is normal inside the venue. People usually cover up a little more for the taxi, the mall or the hotel lobby on the way.
• Paying. Card and phone payments are standard across Yas Island, from venue bars to taxis.

Ticket tiers, gate times and the bag policy all sit with the organiser. OFFLIMITS publishes its dates, venue information and ticket links on the festival’s official site, and the conditions printed on the ticket are what security works from at the door.

Making a weekend of it

A Saturday show sets up a natural two-day trip. Since 2022 the UAE weekend has been Saturday and Sunday, so the morning after belongs to most residents too.

On Yas itself, Sunday options include the theme parks, a cycle or run on the Yas Marina Circuit track on its community evenings, or the beach at Yas Bay. Off the island, the Sheikh Zayed Grand Mosque is about half an hour away by road. Louvre Abu Dhabi sits on Saadiyat Island, a short drive west.

If you have one free daylight window, the Grand Mosque and the Louvre make a good pair. The marble domes in the morning and the Louvre’s latticed roof dome in the afternoon both make more sense after a night of stadium lights than another hour by a pool.