Festival records the highest number of visitors ever from Prague, the Czech Republic, and abroad. Its attitude and atmosphere aspire to be the most “visitor-friendly” event among Czech Republic’s major music festivals

One of the paramount moments of the festival was the long-awaited performance by Gorki Aquila, the leader of Porno Para Ricardo, a forbidden band from Cuba. Because of the interdiction imposed by Cuban authorities, Aquila had to perform with the support of Alaverdi, a Prague-Lithuanian band. A happening was held during the concert to say, "Music does not ask for permissions" where thousands of festival visitors gave the symbolic pink card to Raul Castro and the Cuban communist regime. "It is going to look great on the postcards: Gorki Aquila in front of thousands of visitors showing the pink card to the totalitarian administration of Cuba. We will be handing out the postcards in the Cuba stand at Wenceslas Square during the Week of Freedom on 28 and 29 June. Our website will publish the addresses where we hope the people of Prague will send the postcards with their own messages," David Gaydečka, a festival organizer, invites everyone to join in.

The United Islands festival is a one-of-a-kind event in Prague as well as in the country. It offers its visitors an opportunity to enjoy an entire weekend in Prague with a most original musical as well as non-musical program in the beautiful area of the parks and islands in Prague's historical center. "One of the reasons the atmosphere of United Islands is so unique is the audiences. Quite a lot of non-Prague visitors arrived this year, too. We were quite surprised by how everyone was positive and non-conflicting; in spite of the high number of visitors, the festival did not experience stressful situations. Prague has been for some time in dire need of an event that interrupts the everyday busy life of the city. Now, everyone, enjoy the holidays and other summer activities!" says David Gaydečka, an organizer of the festival. 

This edition of the festival has recorded over 40,000 visitors, which made some of the stages achieve their capacity limits at times, preventing more visitors from attending. This was the case especially of the Euro Jazz Stage in Jazz Dock, the afterparty, and the Střelecký Island during the Audio Bullys concert. Barbora Šubrtová, the festival spokesperson, adds, "Our expectations have proven right; they were based on the double increase of hits on the festival website. The size of the festival was such that we are sure about more than 40,000 visitors attending, yet we cannot quite positively say it was 41 or 51,000 people. For the next year, we will be considering ways of improving this; one of them might be priority admittance of Partner Pass holders." David Gaydečka and Martin Voňka, organizers of the festival, say, "We are pleased that the festival is showing a growing trend. Not everything can be planned. One of those things is the weather, and it worked out just fine, again. At any rate, we are happy that the festival has taken a deep breath in the past three years and has attracted lots of other positive activities, collaborations, and co-productions - that might be one of the causes of this year's success. Thank you everyone, especially the visitors, for attending!"

This year, United Islands brought the British producer duo Audio Bullys to Prague for the first time, organized a happening with Gorki Aquila, a forbidden punk rocker from Cuba, which the administration of the totalitarian island regime will certainly learn about, imported the exclusive Residual Gurus street project from Barcelona in the Cattack, Catalan Eve block with Catalonian and Spanish artists; the event also introduced special Portuguese and Polish program blocks. The festival turned Janáčkovo Riverbank into United Islands Boulevard and introduced a new concept of the secondary program with food, fashion, and chemistry zones, the Comedian Avenue, and a family program on Dětský Island. On Thursday, the eve of the main performances, the festival held over 60 concerts in 20 clubs of Prague.

After several years, Česká spořitelna became the general partner of the festival again. The event has also won the traditional support of the City of Prague and other main partners.