Noah Kahan's 2026 The Great Divide World Tour is officially underway, with the folk megastar kicking off his eagerly awaited run with a double-header at Orlando's Kia Center.

After the opening show last night (Thursday, June 12th), the picture is a little clearer in terms of the setlist, the staging and more. After singing along to Kahan's soul-baring anthems all night (whether you were watching via live-stream or you were lucky enough to be there), we've broken down the five main takeaways down for you.

Here are our five biggest surprises from the opening night of Noah Kahan's 2026 ‘The Great Divide Tour’:

1. We're going to need an official Extended Version of ‘Orbiter’

‘Orbiter’ is the song that's been on everyone's lips for the past month or so, courtesy of the adorable, heartwarming TikTok trend that uses the bittersweet ode as its soundtrack.

Given how popular the song has become since the arrival of The Great Divide back in April, despite not being one of his most uptempo tracks, we suspected he'd surely have to include it in his setlist. Thankfully, Kahan has obliged - but he's taken it a step further.

Instead of singing the official rendition of ‘Orbiter’ that appears on The Great Divide: The Last Of The Bugs deluxe album, Kahan performed the version with the extended outro. This portion was initially packaged up as part of another song, ‘I Belong to You’.

Given the fact that ‘I Belong to You’ never saw the light of day, and how ‘Orbiter’ is blossoming into one of the biggest hits from The Great Divide so far, we'd love to see Kahan releasing an extended version of the song in honour of his 2026 tour. And honestly, after hearing his evocative croons reverberating out into the Orlando, Florida air last night, we feel like we could listen to ’Orbiter’ for hours on end.

2. The ‘Call Your Mom’ moment

Although, from the outside looking in, it might look on paper as though a Noah Kahan concert will be the most depressing, heart-rending night of your life, the reality is, Kahan often laces a lot of humour into his performances. And he's showcasing this on his 2026 tour through a hilarious moment referencing his Stick Season stand-out, ‘Call Your Mom’, when he picks up the phone in the middle of his concert.

While pretending to speak to his mother - or maybe she really is on the other line each night, who knows! - Kahan quips, “No, I'm not doing anything right now. Hey mom! You want me to write an entire other album about your divorce? Okay. Talk a lot about my a**hole on stage? Sure! They love it when I get hemorrhoids? Great!”

It was a tongue-in-cheek in-joke with the crowd, who are all-too-aware of Kahan's amusing tendency to keep fans updated on his toilet habits via X (formerly Twitter).

Kahan's show is the perfect balance of catharsis and camaraderie, and this new sketch epitomises that, as he has us all laughing one moment, before breaking our hearts with his moving performance the next. We must say, we'd love it if Kahan added ‘Call Your Mom’ itself back into the setlist, alongside this humourous skit.

3. New year, new me, new tour...new stage

Kahan is experimenting with a brand new stage design for 2026, and based on his first show in Orlando, Florida, we reckon it's a major upgrade compared to last year's set.

The show opens with Kahan walking out the front door of a reconstructed house, with a front-porch and an old-timey feel, which is meant to symbolise the house from The Great Divide cover art. This, in turn, represents Kahan's double-bolted and boarded-up memories, experiences and pain that he has kept to himself inside this metaphorical house. The opening of the door seemingly - like he suggests on ‘Doors’ - conveys how he has decided to let fans in for the first time.

There's also a fun point later in his set, when Kahan is performing ‘We Go Way Back‘ - one of this writer's favourites from the new album - and he goes up to sing it from the rooftop.

Fans have been commenting across social media praising how Kahan's walkway, which snakes a long way out into the audience, provided a great means of ensuring all attendees on the floor got an opportunity to see him performing up-close.

@rebekahmarie8 THE GREAT DIVIDE TOUR - OPENING NIGHT! AMERICAN CARS @Noah Kahan #noahkahan #thegreatdivide #thegreatdividetour #orlandoflorida #noahkahanconcert ♬ original sound - bekah

4. Noah becomes the Piano Man

For the first time, we're seeing Kahan stepping away from his trusty guitars and banjos, and instead sitting down at a piano for the keys-driven intro to ‘End of August’. He joked about being nervous for this back in April, sharing via X, “End of August means I’ll have to play piano on tour and let me tell you I am absolutely horrible at it”.

We're glad he does, though, as it serves as a haunting, ethereal introduction to the song. ‘End of August’ serves as a cornerstone of the project as a whole, and it feels fitting that Kahan has chosen to keep it in the setlist - even if it means relearning the piano.

5. The setlist is still Stick Season-heavy (justice for ‘Staying Still’)

Fans are rarely 100% happy with a setlist, especially when it's coming off the back of a new album release. Ahead of the tour kick-off, there was a lot of speculation about what Kahan would do with the show - especially given the fact that he'd been touring Stick Season for the best part of four years, and he'd honed a dependable but captivating setlist during that time. Would he lean entirely towards recent material? Would he only add a couple of new songs? Would he mix it up?

Well, we finally have our answer, and it seems - as you'd expect - Kahan has opted for a balance between tracks from The Great Divide and songs from his Stick Season era.

Sadly, this does mean that older staples such as ‘False Confidence’, ‘Maine’ and ‘Mess’ have fallen by the wayside, with zero songs from his pre-Stick Season period making it into the set. This is undoubtedly a shame for Kahan's Day One fans, but causing more of a stir online are the songs he's omitted from The Great Divide.

For instance, numerous ticket-holders are pleading for ‘Staying Still’ to make it onto the setlist, especially given how this was a song fans basically lobbied to be released on the deluxe version of the album. With the raging electric guitars and galvanising beat, we're sure ‘Staying Still’ would sound incredible if Kahan does add it in.

Other setlist absences being mourned are ‘Willing and Able’, ‘23’ and ‘Spoiled’, with Kahan catching some flak for keeping in quite a few deeper cuts from his Stick Season era, such as ‘Everywhere, Everything’, ‘The View Between The Villages’ and ‘All My Love’.

We loved Stick Season, so we're certainly not mad about Kahan still performing these gems, and while we'd love to see him play around with a few more newer songs too, really, this backlash is simply another testament to how brilliant an album The Great Divide is. Kahan's songwriting is so visceral and personal that we all have songs that have spoken to us in a unique way, and that we feel should be in the setlist. But ultimately, Kahan only has roughly two hours - and in that time, regardless of what songs he performs, rest assured he'd putting on a truly fantastic show.

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