The NZMS Colloquium 2026, the New Zealand Mathematical Society's annual gathering, runs 30 November to 3 December 2026 at the University of Otago's St David Lecture Complex in Dunedin, with six confirmed plenary speakers.
The New Zealand Mathematical Society will hold its 2026 Colloquium in Dunedin from Monday 30 November to Thursday 3 December, hosted by the University of Otago at the St David Lecture Complex on the Dunedin North campus. The programme opens with an informal welcome on the evening of 30 November, with lectures and talks running from Tuesday morning through to early Thursday afternoon. It is the latest instalment of an annual mathematics gathering the society has continued since 1966.
The colloquium is the flagship annual meeting of the New Zealand Mathematical Society, the country's national body for mathematics research. Founded in 1974 and recognised by the International Mathematical Union as New Zealand's national mathematical society, the NZMS traces the colloquium series back to the New Zealand Mathematics Colloquium first held in 1966. The 2026 edition is organised locally by a University of Otago committee of David Bryant, Stephen Fortune, Dominic Searles and Sarah Wakes. The host institution rotates year to year among New Zealand universities; the 2025 colloquium was held at the University of Waikato in Hamilton.
The colloquium draws New Zealand's mathematics and mathematics-education community, spanning established researchers, emerging academics and postgraduate students. Six plenary speakers are confirmed: Astrid an Huef (Victoria University of Wellington), Ofer Marmur (University of Auckland), Fabien Montiel (University of Otago), Rajko Nenadov (University of Canterbury), Katerina Nik (the ANZIAM lecturer, from KAUST) and Paul Zinn-Justin (University of Melbourne). Alongside the research programme, the society administers the Aitken Prize for the best student presentation and the John Butcher Poster Prize, and an education session for secondary-school teachers is tentatively scheduled for the morning of Thursday 3 December. Early-bird registration closes on 1 November and the abstract and poster submission deadline is 16 November, with student-support applications due before 15 October.
Sessions are held at the St David Lecture Complex, on the corner of Cumberland and St David Streets within the University of Otago's Dunedin North campus. The campus sits immediately north of central Dunedin, putting lecture theatres, accommodation and the city centre within close walking distance of one another. Social events use nearby landmarks: a welcome function on Monday 30 November at 5:30pm at the Otago University Staff Club, and the conference dinner on Wednesday 2 December at 6:30pm at Tuhura, the Otago Museum on Great King Street, a short walk from the lecture complex. Dunedin is served by Dunedin Airport at Momona, roughly 30 kilometres south of the city, with a sealed corridor connecting the airport to the campus. Delegate accommodation options include university halls close to the venue.
The NZMS Colloquium is a recurring, nationally significant academic conference whose host rotates between New Zealand universities, making it a repeat opportunity for whichever city holds it. Its 2026 return to Otago brings several days of multi-day delegate activity to Dunedin at the start of summer, combining campus lecture facilities with off-campus social venues such as the Otago Museum. For the business-events sector it is a useful marker of the scientific-congress segment that university cities compete for: a well-established society meeting with confirmed international and domestic speakers, a fixed multi-day footprint, and associated dinners and functions that draw on the host city's wider hospitality and cultural venues.
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