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Convention center

Building designed to hold a convention

Wikipedia contributorsAdapted for Fathomly · View authors
4 min read
Source updated September 16, 2026
Image credit is listed at the end of this article.

A convention center (American English; or conference centre in British English) is a large building that is designed to hold a convention, where individuals and groups gather to promote and share common interests. Convention centers typically offer sufficient floor area to accommodate several thousand attendees. Very large venues, suitable for major trade shows, are sometimes known as exhibition halls. Convention centers typically have at least one auditorium and may also contain concert halls, lecture halls, meeting rooms, and conference rooms. Some large resort area hotels include a convention center.

In Francophone countries, the term is palais des congrès (such as the Palais des Congrès de Paris) or centre des congrès (such as the Centre des congrès de Quebec).

01Types

  • Meeting facilities with lodging: hotels that include their own convention space in addition to accommodation and other related facilities, known as convention hotels.
  • Meeting facilities without lodging: are convention centers that do not include accommodation; usually located adjacent to or near a hotel(s).
  • Other: any convention and meeting facilities designed to hold large numbers of people. Can exist alone (e.g., stadiums, arenas, parks, etc.) or within other structures (e.g., university lecture halls, museums, theaters). Usually do not include accommodation.
A southern entrance of the Helsinki Fair Centre in Pasila, Helsinki, Finland
A southern entrance of the Helsinki Fair Centre in Pasila, Helsinki, Finland

02History

The original convention centers or halls were in castles and palaces. Originally a hall in a castle would be designed to allow a large group of lords, knights and government officials to attend important meetings with the king. A more ancient tradition would have the king or lord decide disputes among his people. These administrative actions would be done in the great hall and would exhibit the wisdom of the king as judge to the general populace.

One of the most famous convention center debacles happened in France on June 20, 1789. King Louis XVI locked a group known as the Third Estate out of the meeting hall in Versailles. This led to the revolutionary group holding their meeting in an indoor tennis court. This was the first modern democratic conference center and led to the Tennis Court Oath and the French Revolution.

Melbourne's Royal Exhibition Building, host of the 1880 World's Fair
Melbourne's Royal Exhibition Building, host of the 1880 World's Fair

03Some historic centers

19th-century exhibition halls

20th-century exhibition halls

21st-century exhibition halls

Watch videos about Convention centerExplainers and documentaries on YouTube (opens in a new tab)

Sources and credits

This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Convention center”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.

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Related topics

Palais des Congrès

Palais des Congrès is the French term for a convention center.

Stadium

A stadium is a place or venue for (mostly) outdoor sports, concerts, or other events and consists of a field or stage completely or partially surrounded by a tiered structure designed to allow spectators to stand or sit and view the event. Pausanias noted that for about half a century the only event at the ancient Greek Olympic festival was the race that comprised one length of the stadion at Olympia, where the word "stadium" originated.

List of convention and exhibition centers

The following is a list of convention and exhibition centers by country.