Five Days, 56 Countries: Estonian Defence Week 2026 in Record Numbers

For five days, Tallinn became a meeting point for the international defence and security community – connecting people, ideas, technology and ambition at Estonian Defence Week 2026.

Across five days, Estonian Defence Week welcomed around 4,500 visitors from 56 countries, including 1,834 international participants. This is a notable increase from approximately 4,000 visitors last year. Events were attended by representatives of 1 834 organisations, defence companies, government and military delegations. The programme featured 133 speakers across 68 sessions, panels, workshops, keynotes and sidevents, spanning approximately 77 hours.

Tallinn Defence EXPO hosted 103 exhibitors from 15 countries, while Defence Innovation Day featured 16 startups and technology companies.

The City Resilience Hack brought together 118 participants in 36 teams competing for a prize pool of € 75 000. Across the week, EDW operated across 4 venues and more than 10 stages and event spaces, supported by a team of 238 organisers and volunteers.

Participants came from Estonia, Finland, Sweden, the United Kingdom, Germany, Canada, the United States, Norway, Ukraine, Spain, France, Lithuania, Latvia, the Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Belgium, Czechia, Iceland, Denmark, Israel and Italy, representing a broad cross-section of the international defence, security and technology community.

Estonian Defence Week brought several major defence and security events together under one umbrella, connecting industry, armed forces, policymakers, innovators, investors, researchers and other experts. Across the week, the focus remained on a common challenge: how to turn innovation, industrial capacity and international cooperation into real defence capability faster and at scale.

Estonian Defence Week is an annual event organised by the Estonian Defence and Aerospace Industry Association in cooperation with the Estonian Ministry of Defence.

“Estonian Defence Week has shown that Tallinn can serve as a meeting point for an international defence community that is looking to go beyond discussing the future of defence and start building it. Five days have created thousands of new meetings, new connections and ideas that will continue well beyond this week,” said Kalev Koidumäe, CEO of the Estonian Defence and Aerospace Industry Association (EDIA).

The organisers are already looking ahead. Estonian Defence Week will return in 2027, in week 39, and the ambition is to make next year’s event even stronger and more international.