Coachella participants are waiting in traffic for hours to enter the campsite

Coachella 2025 is in slow start.

The festival participants, which take place every April in Indio, California, told Business Insider that they had spent up to 12 noon to wait to enter the campsite on Thursday – and some have not yet arrived.

“I made a joke earlier than I did not know that the Fyre Festival tickets were included in the admission this year, but it is honestly what I feel,” said Adam Roberts while waiting in his car. “I feel dubed.”

Festivalgoers, which paid at least $ 800 each to attend, said they had heard no news about delays despite the updates in the official and Instagram application promoting partnerships with Amex and Nobu.

Coachella representatives did not immediately respond to a request for BI comments.

‘I have never seen lines so long’ ‘

Bi spoke to several experienced veterans of Coachella who have repeatedly camped at the music festival. No one said they saw something like what they had experienced on Thursday morning.

Hailey Maxwell was heading for her fifth Coachella when she arrived in Indio around 3 am. While the official site indicates that the campsite opens at 9 am on Thursday before the festival – which takes place from Friday to Monday – Maxwell said that this had generally not been the case in the past.

“They generally open the doors around 3:15 a.m. to 3:30 am each year, which is why people are waiting in the region,” said Maxwell. “We are generally at the campsite before sunrise. I am not even in the security checkpoint.”

Maxwell had laid down for nine o’clock when she called Bi of her car around 12:30 p.m. PT.

“The instructions were the same as they had on the website in recent years, but this time they have directed people in a different way,” she said. “There was no traffic control, so nobody knew where they were going. It took us four hours just to travel half a billion.”

Oliver and Kayla Standring, who arrived online at 8 a.m., told Bi that they instantly knew it would be bad.

“I have camped four times in Coachella, and generally it is a fairly fluid process,” said Oliver Standring, adding that it took “two hours max” in the past years.

A lack of toilet and food

The festival -goers told Bi that one of the biggest problems was lack of access to the toilet while they were waiting.

“This is the middle of the desert; there is no bush to hide,” said Kayla Standring. “I had to open the two doors of the car to block myself, then the car girls behind us saw, and they started doing this. I started a revolution for women.”

“People pee in cuts,” said Roberts, who arrived around 4:30 am. “It’s been eight hours; people have to do what they have to do.”

Many participants said they had stopped drinking water, so they wouldn’t have to continue peeing on the side of the road. But that means becoming more dehydrated in the heat of the desert.

“It is already very hot outside,” said Maxwell. “My car is air conditioned, but if that was not, I would die. I know that people’s cars overheat, and some people have already lacked gas.”

Kayla Standring said she saw people walking a mile to the nearest rite to get supplies while Zoe Bush and her friends used Doordash to deliver food to their car.

“I spent five years now and I was never even bad from a distance. It is always a gentle navigation,” Bush at Bi told Bush. “But our group led to eight hours in the bay region and currently runs over two hours of sleep.”

Zero communication

When Kayla Standring asked a security guard what was going on, she said he told her to “download the Coachella application” to find out. However, each festivalizer who spoke to BI said that he had not received any communication from Coachella staff and that there was also a lack of panels or traffic control on the ground.

Participants flooded one of Coachella Instagram posts – promoting a Nobu Omakase experience – to demand answers. They also tried to take matters into their own hands, whether in search of solutions via boards of directors of Reddit or to contact city officials.

“The people of my group called the police and let them know what’s going on because, at this stage, it is a health risk,” said Maxwell. “So, the Nobu thing really felt outside the pocket to publish and not at all to answer what is going on.”

“I have done many music festivals. People understand that sometimes things happen, but no communication is what makes him frustrating,” said Roberts.

Mixed feelings

While the participants are preparing for the three -day festival, this year’s start -up of Coachella’s experience left a defeated feeling while others are trying to maintain their morale.

Kelly Jensen, who was stuck online from 2 a.m. to 2 p.m., finally arrived at the campsite, but she said that the test was “literal hell”.

“It was really the worst experience of all time and also super disappointing due to the amount of money we spent to be during an event that we really liked,” Jensen told Coachella four times, Bi. “We finally entered, but no one has energy to start installing the camp.”

“Given this experience, I would never camp again – and the campsite is a large part of these experiences,” said Roberts. “I’m sure that once we get there, things will be better, but it’s absolutely not the way to start the event.”