- The Glastonbury 2025 lineup has been announced
- Olivia Rodrigo is among the youngest headliners to ever grace the stage
- But who are the youngest – and oldest – ever festival headliners?
The Glastonbury 2025 lineup has been announced – and those who were lucky enough to bag a ticket are certainly in for a treat.
The famous UK festival – which runs from June 25-29 on Worthy Farm in Somerset – will see the likes of Charli XCX, Gracie Abrams, Doechii, The 1975, Raye and Sir Rod Stewart grace its stages.
Among the headliners this year is Olivia Rodrigo – who, at just 22 years old, has become one of the youngest festival headliners ever.
But who else has made history as the youngest – and oldest – festival headliners ever? Pubity.com takes a look.
Olivia Rodrigo
At 22, Olivia Rodrigo is the second youngest performer to ever headline Glastonbury (although this is a point of contention – but more on that later).
However, she is the youngest performer to have made a name for herself in the 2020s, after shooting to fame with her debut single, Driver’s Licence, in 2021.
Since then, Rodrigo has smashed the US and UK charts with tracks such as Good 4 U and Vampire; and received number one status with her debut album Sour, and its 2023 follow up, Guts.
Billie Eilish
Now 23, Billie Eilish became the youngest ever act to headline both Glastonbury and Coachella in 2022.
Despite only having two albums under her belt at this point, Eilish wowed fans with her amazing set.
The singer has now had all three of her studio albums go to number one; received five number one songs on the Billboard charts; and is the youngest ever two-time Oscar winner.
Eilish scooped up the Best Original Songs gong in 2021 for her James Bond theme, No Time to Die, and again in 2023 for the Barbie movie hit, What Was I Made For?
Ariana Grande
Before her friend Eilish pushed her off the spot, Ariana Grande was the youngest ever headliner at Coachella festival.
The singer took to the main stage in 2019, aged just 25 years old.
Now 31, Grande is taking a step back from her music career to focus on acting – after receiving a slew of nominations for her role as Glinda in the movie-musical, Wicked.
Ash
Controversially, Ash say they are the youngest ever act to headline Glastonbury festival – not Billie Eilish.
The Northern Irish rock trio accidentally found themselves top of the bill in 1997, when Steve Winwood had to pull out of the festival as his truck supposedly got stuck in the mud.
After a string of hits with their album 1977, Ash had bagged themselves the top spot on the Other Stage – but they were then asked to perform on the mighty Pyramid Stage as well.
In 2023, frontman Tim Wheeler recalled, “We headlined the second stage and that was the Friday night and the weather got so bad over the weekend that by the time Sunday rolled around, the headliners [Steve Winwood] couldn’t get on site.
“We’d stayed around to party and hang out so we got a knock on our tour bus door and asked, ‘Can you guys headline?’.”
Wheeler went on, ““We had to sober up pretty quickly! We were absolutely wasted… we were like, ‘Oh c***, we have to get our stuff together’.
“With Billie Eilish, they had to say that she was the youngest ever solo female performer, because myself and Mark [Hamilton, bass] were still younger than her when we headlined.”
Wheeler and Hamilton were both 19 when they headlined the Pyramid Stage.
… and the oldest? Sir Paul McCartney
While he broke many, many records as a youngest, Sir Paul McCartney is the oldest ever headline act at Glastonbury.
The former Beatle delighted fans when he took to the stage in 2022, aged 80.
Interestingly, McCartney’s headline set was 55 years to the day since The Beatles performed to 400 million on the world’s first ever global TV broadcast.
The band was Britain’s entry in the Our World TV show, and performed All You Need is Love to 24 countries on June 25 1967, live from the famed Abbey Road Studios.
