IFAT Munich, the world’s leading trade fair for water, sewage, waste and raw materials management, is marking six decades of shaping the global environmental technology industry. To mark the milestone, organizer Messe München has released a short film, “Turning Ideas into Impact: 60 Years of IFAT,” tracing how the event has grown from a regional exhibition into the sector’s largest international meeting point for the circular economy.
Six Decades Of Environmental Innovation
IFAT was founded in 1966 and has tracked, and helped drive, the transformation of environmental technology ever since, from the first mechanised waste collection systems to today’s sensor-based sorting, digital water networks and circular material flows. The brand has since expanded well beyond Munich: IFAT now extends worldwide through regional editions including IFAT Eurasia, IFAT India, IFAT China, IFAT Africa, IFAT Brasil and IFAT Saudi Arabia, giving the format a genuinely global footprint across the water, waste and recycling sectors.
A Record-Breaking 2026 Edition
The most recent edition, IFAT Munich 2026, underlined how far the fair has come. It drew a record 3,400 exhibitors from around 60 countries and roughly 142,000 visitors from nearly 160 countries, spread across 300,000 square metres of exhibition space at Messe München. More than half of all visitors travelled from outside Germany, and the fair’s unusually large outdoor demonstration area saw more than 110 machines and vehicles running live, letting attendees watch abrasive, sticky and heterogeneous materials actually being processed rather than judging equipment from a datasheet alone.
What The Fair Covers
IFAT organises its programme around five focus areas:
- Circular economy and recycling
- Water infrastructure resilience and drinking water supply
- Waste management
- Climate resilience
- Digitalisation and municipal technology
Next Stop: IFAT Munich 2028
IFAT returns to Messe München from 29 May to 1 June 2028 for its next Munich edition, continuing the fair’s two-year cycle. For companies working anywhere along the water, waste and recycling value chain, from shredders, screens and sensor-based sorters to dosing, dewatering and sludge-drying lines, the show remains one of the few places to see this scale of solids-handling and water-treatment equipment demonstrated in person rather than on paper. The 60-years film is available on the IFAT Munich YouTube channel, and further practical details are available at ifat.de.
