Some 1 million visitors took part in the event, Gregor Lemke, spokesman for the association of Munich city centre innkeepers, said in summing up the event on Sunday.

Because the Oktoberfest had to be cancelled for the second year in a row due to the pandemic, 51 inns and beer gardens invited visitors to the Wirtshauswiesn, where people wearing traditional dirndl and lederhosen, music, beer, gingerbread hearts and ox on the spit were supposed to create the Oktoberfest atmosphere.

According to Lemke, 800,000 litres of beer were drunk and 600,000 pretzels eaten.

A conspicuously large number of young people took part in the replacement event, said Peter Inselkammer, spokesman for the Association of Oktoberfest Innkeepers.

Due to the positive response to the Wirtshauswiesn, the organizers plan to hold it again next year – even if there is another Oktoberfest. However, no decision has been made yet.

The traditional festival – known as the Wiesn in the local dialect after the fairgrounds on which it is normally held, the Theresienwiese – takes place over a much larger area and welcomes some 6 million people annually from all parts of Germany and the world.

According to Munich’s Lord Mayor Dieter Reiter and Wiesn boss Clemens Baumgaertner, concepts are currently being developed for how the event could take place in 2022.