Bruno Mars Tour Opens Atlanta Run at Bobby Dodd Stadium
Bruno Mars Tour opened its Atlanta run on Saturday night at Georgia Tech’s Bobby Dodd Stadium, where Mars played the first of two shows in the city. It was his first proper Atlanta tour stop since a 2017 24K Magic Tour date at the now-defunct Music Midtown.
Bobby Dodd Stadium on Saturday
Mars, a 16-time Grammy winner, walked into a room that had been waiting nearly a decade for a real Atlanta tour stop. The city had seen him headline the Super Bowl Music Fest at State Farm Arena in 2019, but this was the first stop tied to a full tour visit since 2017.
Anderson.Paak opened a few minutes after 7 p.m. and performed for 30 minutes as DJ Pee.Wee, then Leon Thomas followed about 10 minutes later. By around 8:30 p.m., a crowd wave rolled through the stadium; Mars appeared about 15 minutes later and opened with a visual of him praying inside a church.
Risk It All, Cha Cha Cha, On My Soul
Mars started with “Risk It All,” “Cha Cha Cha” and “On My Soul,” then moved early into “24K Magic” and “I Just Might.” The two-hour set moved quickly through the kind of catalog that can make a stadium date feel more like a victory lap than a routine tour stop.
The crowd reflected the range Atlanta had not seen from Mars in this setting for years: kids, couples, young friend groups, seniors and solo fans packed the stadium, with many wearing red silk pajamas in a nod to the 2016 24K Magic album cover. The visual setup and the opener sequence gave the night a polished, tightly staged feel before Mars even hit the first chorus.
Two Nights in Midtown
For Atlanta, the practical takeaway is simple: this was the first of two nights at Bobby Dodd Stadium, and the city got the rare version of Mars that arrives with a full tour machine, two opening acts and a two-hour headliner set. A performance that starts with a prayer visual and a 7 p.m. opener is built for scale, not nostalgia alone.
That makes Saturday’s show more than a return date. It reset Mars’ Atlanta footprint from a one-off arena headline in 2019 to a proper tour stop in 2026, and the next night at Bobby Dodd Stadium should tell whether that demand holds across a second sell-through crowd.
