Cannes' year compresses into about ten weeks of high demand and forty of considered availability. Most clients are looking at the wrong half. The Festival de Cannes in May and the Cannes Yachting Festival in September pull the largest fleets and the highest rates of the Cannes year. The rest of the season is the quieter, more reliable one.
The town sits on the western Côte d'Azur and is one of the principal year-round charter ports between Monaco and Saint-Tropez. From the brokerage desk the question is rarely whether to charter in Cannes; it is when, and out of which port.
The two ports of Cannes
Cannes operates two charter harbours: the Vieux Port and Port Pierre Canto. The Vieux Port sits at the foot of the old town, beside the Palais des Festivals and a short walk from the Croisette. It is the larger of the two harbours and the more demanded, with quays for yachts up to 140 metres, and it stays open while it is rebuilt in stages until the end of 2027; berthing is held by long-term residents and by the season's incoming charter fleet.
Port Pierre Canto, at the eastern end of the Croisette, has 553 berths and takes yachts up to 90 metres: less foot traffic, and a calmer embarkation away from the centre of town.
The choice is operational. Day charters and shorter weeks favour the Vieux Port for proximity to the Croisette and to the town's restaurants, and the largest yachts lie there too. Port Pierre Canto suits guests who prefer a quieter embarkation at the far end of the Croisette.
Anchorages and day routes: the Lérins, Cap d'Antibes
The cruising from Cannes is short-range and route-flexible. The Lérins islands sit a fifteen-minute tender from the Vieux Port. Sainte-Marguerite and Saint-Honorat are the principal anchorages. Sheltered swimming, restaurant-on-island lunches at the Sainte-Marguerite quayside, and the option to anchor on either side of the islands depending on the wind. Along this coast, yachts of 24 metres and over may anchor only outside the seagrass zones mapped by the Préfecture maritime, and the largest use designated anchoring zones off Cannes and Golfe-Juan.
Cap d'Antibes is a half-hour cruise east. The protected anchorages along the cap, the village of Antibes itself, and the route through to Juan-les-Pins all fit into a day. The longer day route extends to Saint-Tropez (about two and a half hours under way) and back; this is the canonical Cannes-led Riviera day.
Many weekly charters from Cannes route the Riviera arc to the east (Cannes, Cap d'Antibes, Saint-Jean-Cap-Ferrat, Villefranche, Monaco) over five to seven nights, with the Lérins as the day-one anchorage and the return through the same ports on the way west.
Cannes' two big weeks: Festival and Yachting Festival
The Festival de Cannes runs for twelve days in May. The Cannes Yachting Festival follows in September, an in-water show held across the Vieux Port and Port Pierre Canto. Both fill the two harbours; both run rates materially above the standard Riviera weekly figure.
Festival week is the more demanded of the two for charter. The yacht serves as private accommodation, evening hospitality venue, and the route between the harbour and the Croisette. Late requests can sometimes still be placed, but the yachts available a few weeks out are not the yachts available twelve months earlier.
The Cannes Yachting Festival is more broker-side than principal-side: a boat show for buyers and the trade, with the yachts on display filling the berths of both harbours for the week.
The shoulder months
June and September, outside the event weeks, consistently deliver the best Cannes charters of the year. The weather is settled, the Lérins anchorages have room, and the international fleet is on the coast. It is the window we suggest first to clients with flexible dates.
The deeper shoulders (early June, and the first days of October before the season closes) are the most operationally flexible. Anchorages are quieter, the harbour traffic is light, and the rate sometimes softens off the August peak figure. For clients who want the Côte d'Azur without the August density, these are the weeks to brief.
What the published rate sheets do not capture is that Cannes' calendar runs in two simultaneous tracks: the event-driven track and the cruising-driven track. They overlap only twice. Brief for the track you actually want.
