PyCon US 2026 Adds AI and Security Tracks to Long Beach Conference

PyCon US 2026 will take place in Long Beach, California from May 13th to May 19th, with core conference programming scheduled for May 15th through May 17th. This marks the event's first West Coast appearance since Portland, Oregon in 2017 and its California return since Santa Clara in 2013. Two new dedicated tracks have been introduced: an AI program on Friday and a Security track on Saturday. Silona Bonewald of CitableAI and Zac Hatfield-Dodds from Anthropic serve as chairs for the AI track, while Simon Willison will act as an in-the-room chair. The conference typically attracts over 2,000 attendees while maintaining a community-focused atmosphere. Additional features include lightning talks, the PyLadies auction, sprints where participants can contribute to projects with maintainer guidance, and open spaces for unconference-style conversations. Willison plans to participate in open space discussions about Datasette and agentic engineering. Organized by the Python Software Foundation, PyCon US represents a key funding source and aligns with the foundation's mission to promote Python programming and support its diverse international community. Attendees are encouraged to book accommodations through the official hotel block.