Rod Stewart Final Tour Announced After Heart Procedure

Rod Stewart is done with life on the road, sort of. In a Monday Instagram video, the 81-year-old singer announced The Final Encore, a 2027 run across the United Kingdom, Ireland, Europe, and the United States. It will be the Rod Stewart final tour, his last rock and roll tour. But he made one thing clear in the announcement: he is not retiring.

Stewart said in an Instagram video, filmed in a gold-tinted room, that he is not retiring but that next year would be his last tour, describing the decision as one made after much deliberation and sadness. The Rod Stewart final tour news landed just months after health issues forced him to cancel the rest of his 2026 shows.

The Final Encore tour dates and tickets

The Rod Stewart final tour will run from April to July 2027 in the UK and Ireland, with additional dates across mainland Europe and the United States. The UK leg opens Friday, April 23 at Dublin's 3Arena, followed by the SSE Arena in Belfast on April 27 and Glasgow's OVO Hydro on April 29, with shows in Birmingham and Manchester to follow. Eighties synth-pop singer Howard Jones will open the UK and Ireland dates.

Stewart is also scheduled to play US dates in the spring and fall, including Georgia and Florida in March and two nights in Colorado in September 2027, according to USA Today. Tickets for the Rod Stewart final tour go on general sale Friday, Oct. 2, with a fan club pre-sale starting Tuesday, Sept. 29.

Health issues behind the farewell

The announcement follows a rough summer for the singer. Stewart postponed a Cincinnati concert in August hours before showtime for what his team called an unforeseen but minor medical procedure, then canceled the remaining 11 shows of his One Last Time tour, including a six-date residency in Las Vegas, after undergoing a coronary stent procedure, according to Entertainment Weekly.

In a statement to USA Today on Aug. 11, his representatives said doctors were pleased with his recovery and that Stewart had returned to his normal daily activities, but that on doctors' advice he would take four weeks to recuperate before returning to the stage. His wife, Lady Lancaster, told the Press Association he would "come back stronger than ever" following the operation. Earlier in the year, Stewart had also postponed several shows because of a sinus infection and a respiratory infection that caused laryngitis.

A farewell he has been teasing for years

Longtime fans may take Monday's certainty with a grain of salt. Stewart has been teasing a touring exit for years, and the One Last Time tour that started in 2026 was already billed as a farewell before the heart procedure cut it short. What is different this time is the paperwork: the Rod Stewart final tour has a name, a venue list, and on-sale dates attached, as detailed by Gold Radio. It caps a busy 2026 for legacy acts, from Taylor Swift's surprise album announcements to an awards season dominated by familiar names.

Six decades, 250 million records

Stewart's career spans more than six decades, from his days with the Faces to a solo run that produced era-defining hits like "Maggie May," "You Wear It Well," "Tonight's the Night," "Hot Legs," "Da Ya Think I'm Sexy?" and "Young Turks." He has sold more than 250 million records worldwide and has been inducted into the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame twice, once as a solo artist and once with the Faces, as reported by Entertainment Weekly.

In his written statement, Stewart thanked the fans who made that run possible, writing that he has been singing the music he loves since he was 19 and that the career gave him a life beyond anything he could have imagined. For a performer who has been threatening to quit touring for years, the Rod Stewart final tour makes the goodbye official, on his own terms. For context on the procedure that sidelined him this summer, a coronary stent is a small metal mesh tube that opens narrowed arteries supplying blood to the heart, as Medline Plus explains in USA Today's reporting. The announcement went out through Stewart's official channels on Monday morning and was picked up by entertainment outlets within hours.