Foodist Istanbul 2027

How it compares

WorldFood Istanbul is the long-running food fair in the city and the one most buyers will weigh first. It runs in December at Istanbul Expo Center and reported 1,345 exhibitors and 78,341 visitors in 2025, with a FoodTech section for processing and packaging. A buyer who wants products and production equipment on the same trip is better served there. Foodist fits a buyer who needs finished products only and wants to meet the exporters' associations and their members three months earlier.

F Istanbul comes in August and also mixes food with processing and packaging. It is a smaller fair, which suits a short visit focused on nuts, dried fruit and confectionery.

For a global supplier search, Anuga in Cologne (8,015 exhibitors in 2025) and SIAL Paris (7,500 in 2024) take turns each October, a few weeks after Foodist, and Gulfood serves Gulf distribution and international traders from Dubai. Each brings suppliers from far more countries. Foodist is the better trip when the brief is Turkish supply itself: pasta, pulses, nuts, confectionery, olives and dairy from the producers who make them.

Foodist Istanbul is the trip for importers, retail chains and food service buyers who want to source finished Turkish food products directly from producers and exporters before year-end orders close.

Who exhibits

The 2026 directory was overwhelmingly Turkish, and large branded producers took stands next to cooperatives and family firms. Pasta makers Mutlu, Nuh'un Ankara and Oba sat in the staple-food halls, with Sütaş, Tukaş, Tiryaki's retail food arm and the Koska halva makers elsewhere on the floor. A China pavilion in Hall 10 brought seed, grain and dried-food traders, many from Inner Mongolia, and smaller groups came from Azerbaijan, Iraq, Iran and the Czech Republic.

This year's list is on its way. A HallBrief brief picks the exhibitors worth meeting for your goals and the people to talk to at each. Get a brief

Foodist Istanbul 2027

The second Foodist Istanbul returns to Tüyap on the same early-September dates. Last year's first show filled the grounds with Turkish producers grouped by product, ran pre-scheduled B2B meetings between exhibitors and foreign buying delegations, and paired them with the Foodist Forum and Show Kitchen. The forum covered food exports, digital retail shelves, packaging and food safety, with ministry officials and executives from Migros and Tiryaki on stage, while chefs reworked Turkish dishes such as olive-oil plates and buttered simit.

• The B2B meeting area, the Foodist Forum and the Show Kitchen all sat in Hall 12 last year, so a buyer with scheduled meetings can fit sessions in between without crossing the grounds.
• Halls follow product groups: confectionery and nuts in Halls 1 to 3 and 11, pasta, pulses, flour and other staples in Halls 4 and 6 to 9, dairy and meat in Hall 5, beverages in Hall 12 and the national pavilions in Hall 10.
• Foreign buyers should apply through the hosted buyer program: delegations get a lounge for meetings and a schedule of one-to-one meetings with exhibitors matched to the product groups they buy.
• Tüyap sits in Büyükçekmece, far west of the city center, and Turkish Airlines, the official airline, gave delegates a discount on international flights into Istanbul Airport last year.

Exhibiting

Exhibiting suits Turkish producers chasing export orders and foreign suppliers wanting a national pavilion in front of Turkish retail and food service buyers. Stands are sold through Tüyap's sales team on enquiry and placed by product group. In 2026 the fair held the Ministry of Trade's prestige fair status, which raised the stand subsidy cap for Turkish exhibitors who belong to an exporters' association; they had to mark the prestige fair claim in their application.