Are The Eagles Retiring in 2026? Everything We Know

The Eagles have had a long and illustrious career, but all things must come to an end.

The group has been together off-and-on since 1972, and fans have been speculating that 2026 may very well spell the end of the Eagles.

Are the Eagles Retiring?

Yes.

The Eagles announced their final tour, The Long Goodbye, in June of 2023.

The massive trek was slated to possibly continue for multiple years as the band said goodbye to fans by playing as many shows in every city as fans demanded.

“The Eagles have had a miraculous 52-year odyssey, performing for people all over the globe; keeping the music alive in the face of tragic losses, upheavals and setbacks of many kinds,” the band explained.

“… Our long run has lasted for longer than any of us ever dreamed. But, everything has its time, and the time has come for us to close the circle.”

Are The Eagles Retiring in 2026?

That’s not clear.

Though the tour dates appear to have stopped, the band has been performing a residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas, and their official tour calendar still lists upcoming Vegas dates.

The Eagles have not yet announced the final show of their career. It’s unclear if the group will continue into 2027.

Why Would the Eagles Retire?

For the same reason every other classic artist retires: They’re getting older, and it’s harder to maintain the pace and quality of live performances.

Eagles drummer-singer Don Henley, guitarist Joe Walsh and bassist Timothy B. Schmit are all in their late 70s, so they’ve already kept working for a dozen years past normal retirement age.

Vince Gill is a decade younger than his Eagles colleagues, but even he is years past retirement age, while Glenn Frey’s son, Deacon Frey, is in his early 30s and could conceivably go on to a long career after the Eagles if he wanted to.

Henley is especially well-known for demanding the highest level of performance from his band members, so it’s not surprising that he would choose to walk away before they begin to lose their voices and playing skills.

“There were no mistakes allowed,” former Eagles guitarist Don Felder told Ultimate Classic Rock in 2013.

“That was just the way it was. If I had a pull on ‘One of These Nights,’ on the first high note on ‘One of These Nights,’ that was just a tiny hair flat or something, I could just feel Henley’s eyes scouring into the back of my head,” he added with a laugh.

“No mistakes were allowed, and it really kept the quality at a high level. People get sloppy when you play the same show two or three hundred times, but you really don’t want to do that with the art that you’ve written and recorded. You want to present it at its absolute highest performance.”

Age and illness have already brought change to the Eagles.

Glenn Frey died in 2016 at the age of 67, and longtime guitarist Steuart Smith, who began playing with the Eagles in 2001 after Felder’s firing, has retired from the road due to his recent diagnosis of Parkinsonism.

Will the Eagles Ever Record New Music Again?

The Eagles band members have made it clear that new music from the current touring lineup is very unlikely.

The group released the final album of its career, Long Road Out of Eden, in 2007, and the double album was the top-selling album of the year, ultimately selling 7 million copies worldwide.

It also won Grammy Awards for Best Country Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocals for “How Long” and Best Pop Instrumental Performance for “I Dreamed There Was No War.”

However, it was a long, painful process to record the album, which took six years of off-and-on work to complete. The band members have said repeatedly that it will probably stand as the group’s final studio recording.

Once again, that’s more Henley’s call than anyone’s, driven largely by a changing marketplace.

“I’m not sure I care anymore,” Henley told Louder Sound in 2019. “We could make the best album we’ve ever made in the history of this band, and it wouldn’t get played on the radio simply because it’s all about demographics now. It’s about marketing youth to youth.”

What Happens Next for the Eagles?

It’s not a certainty, but it seems likely the group will announce the final run of shows for its farewell tour in 2027, and probably stage a final show in some enormous stadium venue as its final goodbye.

After that, the music that the band has created over the decades will live on.

“Most importantly, we thank you from the bottom of our hearts for embracing this band and its music,” the Eagles said in announcing their final tour.

“At the end of the day, you are the reason we have been able to carry on for over five decades,” they added. “This is our swan song, but the music goes on and on.”