In 2025 the main parades of the Grupo Especial in Rio de Janeiro’s carnival are scheduled to take place on the nights of Sunday, 2 March; Monday, 3 March; and Tuesday, 4 March. The 12 schools that will parade for the first time over three nights and when are:
Sunday, 2 March 2025
Monday, 3 March 2025
Tuesday, 4 March 2025
After a gap of three years, the new digital edition of Brazil’s Michelin Guide was launched on 20 May 2024 at the Copacabana Palace in Rio de Janeiro.
21 restaurants in Rio and São Paulo have been awarded a Michelin star. No restaurant got the top three star rating but two stars went to D.O.M., Evvai and Tuju in São Paulo and Lasai, ORO and Oteque in Rio de Janeiro.
One star restaurants include Fame Osteria, Huto, Jun Sakamoto, Kan Suke, Kazuo, Kinoshita, Kuro, Maní, Murakami, Oizumi Sushi, Picchi and Tangará in São Paulo and Cipriani, Mee and San Omakase in Rio de Janeiro.
The FIFA Women’s World Cup and 31 teams will be flying down to Rio de Janeiro and nine other Brazilian cities in 2027 to join the Brazilian team after FIFA chose Brazil to host the 10th edition of the Women’s World Cup. The first nation to be handed the rights by an open vote, with member associations voting 119 to 78 in favour of Brazil over a joint bid by Belgium, the Netherlands and Germany.
Brazil has already successfully hosted the men’s World Cup in 1950 and 2014 and are expected to use the Maracanã Stadium (Rio de Janeiro), NeoQuímica Arena (São Paulo), Mineirão (Belo Horizonte), Mané Garrincha (Brasília), Fonte Nova (Salvador), Castelão (Fortaleza), Arena Pernambuco (Recife), Beira-Rio (Porto Alegre), Arena Pantanal (Cuiabá) and the Arena da Amazônia (Manaus) for games.
The exact dates of the tournament are not yet known, but probably June and July of 2027. The tournament will follow the same 32-team format as was used in 2023 in Australia and New Zealand.
Big news coming out of Rio de Janeiro in regard to carnival. From 2025 there will now be three nights of the parades of the top Grupo Especial samba schools, with four instead of six schools parading each of the nights.
Unidos de Padre Miguel, champion of Série Ouro, will open the parades on Sunday 2 March, with Unidos da Tijuca, 11th place in Grupo Especial this year, opening Monday, 3 March, and Mocidade, 10th placed in 2024, opening Tuesday, 4 March. The order and day of the other 9 schools will be decided on 23 May.
As a result of Tuesday being used for Grupo Especial, LIESA – Liga Independente das Escolas de Samba is studying the best solution for the parade of the children’s schools that traditionally take place on the Tuesday.
The changes mean at least 75,000 extra people will get to see the parades live and each night will not be such of a marathon for those at the sambódromo or watching on TV.
Rio the Guide 