California Extreme Pinball & Arcade Show 2026
2026-07-17 17:00 - 2026-07-20 01:00 UTC | Santa Clara Convention Center, 5001 Great America Pkwy, Santa Clara, CA 95054
You've been in rooms full of pinball machines before. Not like this.

Every July, collectors and operators bring their machines to Santa Clara — not for display, not behind velvet rope — but set up on free play for the entire weekend. Five hundred of them. The 1970s electromechanical tables that require a different kind of patience. The golden-age arcade cabinets. The obscure things from the late eighties that haven't been in a room together since the mall they lived in closed down. You pay once to get in, and then you just play.

This is California Extreme, July 17-19, 2026 at the Santa Clara Convention Center. The people who go every year describe it the same way: they expected to spend an hour and stayed the whole weekend. The machines are part of it. The other people who showed up knowing exactly where they were going — those people are the rest of it.

All-weekend pass recommended. You cannot see five hundred machines in a day. Advance tickets at caextreme.org. Santa Clara Convention Center, 5001 Great America Pkwy, Santa Clara, CA.
