“And please pay half your monthly salary for coffee.”Image: keystone
17 dollars for coffee, 34 for pizza: Coachella is currently making headlines not only with music – but also with completely exorbitant food prices.
April 13, 2026, 1:25 p.mApril 13, 2026, 1:40 p.m
Kathrin Martens / watson.de
Coachella has started, as always the festival promises days full of music, sun and stars. Sounds like a dream? Nope. Because while the big acts are delivering on the stages, something completely different is causing a lot of conversation: the prices for food and drinks.
And they obviously have it all, because a lot of people are going completely crazy on social media right now.
Coffee and matcha for $53
At Coachella, just starting the day is expensive. Influencers are currently showing what they eat at the famous festival – and the reactions are clear: shock.
A Tiktoker reported that her breakfast was relaxed (French toast, pastries), but the fun stopped when she got coffee. A matcha initially cost $6, but the next day it suddenly went up to $13. Extra for milk foam: $2.50, coffee cost up to $17.
In the end, Tiktoker Cristina paid a whopping $53, or about 42 Swiss francs, for three coffees and a matcha. After all, the coffee was “the best festival coffee ever”.
Lunch isn’t a bargain either
And of course it doesn’t get any cheaper when it comes to food either. A burrito costs around 23 dollars (around 18 francs) at the festival site. According to Cristina’s review, it was rather small, but at least it was tasty. In normal food trucks you actually get a lot more for this money.
The price of dinner also goes up steeply. An influencer shows her festival meal. For a small pizza (four slices) and a drink she paid 34 dollars (almost 27 francs). The pizza is said to have tasted solid, but Tiktoker Natasha had points deducted because of tough edges.
Let’s do a rough calculation: a coffee for $17, a burrito for $23 and a pizza for $34 make a total of $74 (about 58 francs) for a day of food at Coachella.
3 nights in a hotel for $9000
Criticism abounds in the comments: “$17 for coffee is a crime,” “$23 for a burrito – please what?”, “$34 for pizza?!” Many people think the prices are just too high.
The cost of daily meals is only a fraction of the money you have to pay to visit Coachella. A Tiktoker woman was looking for accommodation options near the festival site.
According to her, hotels offered three nights for a hefty $9,000. Even in a smaller motel it should still be $6,000 for three nights.
Sure, Coachella has always been expensive. But the current demand for food and drinks pushes even die-hard festival fans to their limits. The big question is, is this still part of the experience – or is it just a rip-off?