Every event on Noctern has two parts: an Event Series (the title, artist, description, and image that appear on all performances) and one or more Event Occurrences (the specific date, pricing, and seating for each night). Creating an event builds both at once.
Before you start
- Venue Admin required.
- Your venue must be active. See Venue hub first.
- If your event uses reserved seating, build the layout first in AdminEvents → Layouts.
Steps
Go to AdminEventsCreate Event.
2Event title4Pricing strategyCreate Event form showing title, date, pricing strategy, and status fields Under Series details, fill in:
- Title — the name shown on the public listing and tickets.
- Artist / performer — shown beneath the title.
- Description — 1–3 paragraphs about the show. Supports rich text.
- Image — upload a 4:3 photo. This image appears on the event card and ticket PDFs.
Under Event details, fill in:
- Date and time — when doors open and the performance starts.
- End time — controls when the box-office PIN expires (2 hours after this).
- Sales start date — when tickets go on sale publicly. Set this in the future to configure the event before tickets open.
- Event type — Ticketed (patron must buy a ticket) or Open (free; no purchase required, just a public listing).
Choose a Pricing strategy:
- Base + Fees — patrons see your base price plus itemized service and credit-card fees at checkout.
- All-In — patrons see one price; Noctern works backwards to find the base price that produces your all-in total after fees and taxes. Enter the price you want patrons to pay.
Set pricing. For a ticketed GA event, enter at least one pricing tier and set GA capacity (the maximum number of tickets that can be sold). For reserved seating, select your venue layout and set per-tier prices.
A ticketed GA event with no capacity set will not accept checkout.
Leave Status as Draft for now. A Draft event is visible only to admins — it does not appear in the public listing.
Click Save to create the event.
6Draft / Active6Save / CreateStatus toggle (Draft selected) and Save button at the bottom of the Create Event form Review the event preview. When everything looks right, reopen the event, change Status to Active, and save.
1Event row2Upcoming badgeAdmin events list with the Neon Nights Tour showing an Active badge Only Active events appear in the public listing at noctern.com.
Use the Sales start date to set up events weeks in advance without them going on sale immediately. The public listing will show the event but display "On sale [date]" until the window opens.
Tips
All-In pricing is the easiest experience for patrons — the price on the listing is exactly what they pay at checkout. No fee surprise at the end.
You can add multiple occurrences (dates) to the same series later from the event detail page. Each occurrence shares the title, description, and image but has its own date, price, and layout.
Watch out
A Draft event will not appear in the public listing even if all fields are complete. Remember to flip Status to Active when you're ready to sell.
For All-In pricing, enter the exact price the patron should pay — not the base price. Noctern calculates the base automatically. If you enter the base price by mistake, patrons will be charged more than you intended.
Changing a pricing tier price after tickets have already sold does not change what buyers already paid. It only affects future purchases.
- Create a new event with the title "Test Show" and today's date plus 30 days.
- Set pricing to All-In, enter $35 as the all-in price, and set GA capacity to 50.
- Save as Draft and confirm the event does not appear on the public /events page.
- Change Status to Active, save, and confirm it now appears in the public listing.
- Return to the event and change Status back to Draft to clean up.