From the Primo Maggio Concert to the Circus Maximus, INWIT is behind the connectivity powering Rome’s biggest live events.
The Circus Maximus and Piazza San Giovanni in Laterano are among Rome’s most iconic landmarks. Their significance, however, goes beyond art, archaeology and history: today, they are also places where thousands of people come together to experience and share moments in real time, especially when the city’s biggest concerts take the stage.
Behind every post, story, message and video shared while the music plays, there is an invisible infrastructure keeping people connected. In Rome, that infrastructure includes INWIT’s network, which, through its subsidiary Smart City Roma and as part of the Roma 5G project, provides free Wi-Fi connectivity across 100 squares throughout the capital.
When the network keeps the beat
On 6 and 7 June 2026, the Circus Maximus hosted two sold-out dates of Cesare Cremonini’s Cremonini Live26 tour, marking the Bologna-born singer-songwriter’s first-ever performances at the iconic venue. Around 65,000 people attended each night, bringing the total audience to more than 130,000 over the two dates.
For spectators, connectivity was an essential part of the live experience. Rome’s Wi-Fi network, developed by Smart City Roma, handled nearly 3,000 connections across the two evenings, managing traffic peaks in real time in an exceptionally demanding environment.
The scale of data exchanged tells the story: around 700 GB of traffic flowed through the network during the concerts — far exceeding the approximately 5 GB recorded on an average day.
The network had already demonstrated its ability to handle large-scale events just a few weeks earlier, during the 2026 Primo Maggio Concert. As it does every year, Piazza San Giovanni in Laterano became the stage for Italy’s largest free music event, drawing tens of thousands of people for hours of live performances.
From 5:00 pm to 11:00 pm, the network managed more than 460 GB of traffic. Thousands of users were simultaneously active within a confined area, sharing photos and videos, streaming content and exchanging messages — all in real time and without interruption.
The Smart City Roma project
Keeping tens of thousands of people connected in a concentrated area is no ordinary challenge.
When a crowd gathers across just a few hectares, with thousands of smartphones connecting at the same time, data traffic can surge dramatically, putting conventional networks under intense pressure.
Supporting major events is therefore part of a much broader infrastructure strategy: Roma 5G, developed by Smart City Roma, an INWIT Group company, in partnership with Roma Capitale to help transform Rome into an increasingly connected and technologically advanced smart city.
The project includes more than 850 Wi-Fi hotspots across 100 squares, 5G coverage throughout the metropolitan network supported by around 1,500 small antennas and 85 km of fibre-optic cable, as well as 2,000 ultra-broadband connected cameras.
Together, these assets form a digital infrastructure designed to support the city in every context — from everyday urban life to the extraordinary moments that bring Rome’s public spaces to life.
Because Rome is not only one of the world’s great capitals. It is also a capital of live events. And keeping the city connected, even when the crowds are at their largest and the network is under its greatest pressure, is part of what INWIT does.
