📷 Long Beach boardwalk · golden hour
Skip the endless searching. Every Thursday, we send you the best events, positive local stories, and hidden gems — handpicked by people who actually live here.
More events on the calendar this week. Filter by town, kid-friendly, free, rainy-day. Refreshed daily.
📷 Long Island Press
Westbury High School senior Maria Rodriguez has been named among the top 100 Long Island high school girls soccer players for the 2026 season.
📷 The Lobster Roll · Amagansett
"You don't go to the Lobster Roll for the roll. You go for the parking lot, the picnic table, the late afternoon. The roll is incidental." — Long Island TodayRead the full review →
Hungry past this week's pick? Our ranked guides break the Island down by meal — the best lunch on Long Island, the best diners on Long Island, and Best Brunch in Nassau County — and every review lives in the handpicked Long Island restaurant directory.
This week's short list, the full Best of LI shortlists, and the by-town directory. Free members get one pick a week — Insiders get the whole eat beat.
A curated ranking across 14 categories — our editors' picks for the best on the Island.
See the full 14-category ranking, plus the top 5 in every category.
Pick your block. Get events, restaurants, good news, and a cheat sheet tuned to that ZIP. Refreshed monthly by Insider members.
📷 Long Island
Every town gets a refreshed cheat sheet each month — what locals know, where to park, when not to bother. Written by Insiders, for Insiders.
Become an Insider →There's almost always something free happening on Long Island today — free concerts at the bandshells, farmers markets, library programs, street fairs, and beach boardwalks. Every free event on our events calendar is tagged Free right on the listing, so you can scan today's and tonight's free things to do in one pass. The boardwalks at Long Beach and Jones Beach, downtown strolls in Port Jefferson, Northport, and Greenport, and most town parks and harbor walks are free year-round.
Long Island is packed with family-friendly outings: kid-friendly festivals and fairs on the weekly events calendar, the beaches and boardwalks, apple and pumpkin farms out east in season, and rainy-day standbys like the Long Island Children's Museum. For where to take the crew for ice cream, bagels, or pizza afterward, our editors rank the best of each in the Best of LI 2026 guide.
Start with this week\'s events (dated, free picks first), then Best of LI for where to eat — pizza, bagels, brunch, lobster rolls — and the town guides for beaches, parks and downtowns from Long Beach to Montauk.what's happening this weekend, or get the free Weekend Briefing and have it land in your inbox every Thursday morning.
The classic Long Island activities: the ocean beaches (Jones Beach, Robert Moses, Cooper's Beach), the North Fork wine trail, whale watching and lighthouse climbs out in Montauk, Gold Coast mansions and arboretums on the North Shore, and boardwalk-and-brunch weekends in Long Beach. We keep a running list of the 50 best things to do on Long Island, and the weekly events calendar covers what's on today, tonight, and this weekend.
Free gets you the weekly Briefing — top picks, all the good news, this week's restaurant pick, and who's #1 in Best of LI. Insider unlocks everything else.
Every Thursday morning — events, eats, good news, and one local hidden gem. Join the free weekly Briefing.
