On June 8, 2024, saunas were heated up and, together with the Finns, a SAUNA WORLD RECORD was set!

On June 8, 2024, Estonia celebrated International Sauna Day for the first time, following the example of Finland.
To mark the occasion, sauna enthusiasts were invited to visit a sauna on that day and take part in an attempt to set a WORLD RECORD – “The most photos of people in a sauna posted on Facebook in one hour.” Participants had to take a photo of themselves in the sauna (with body covered by a towel or swimwear) and post it on Facebook between 7:00 PM and 8:00 PM on June 8.

The world record attempt was evaluated by GUINNESS WORLD RECORDS™.
RESULT: Thanks to the strong efforts of sauna lovers from Estonia and Finland, the Guinness World Record for “The most photos of people in a sauna posted on Facebook in one hour” was officially confirmed! On June 8, during International Sauna Day, a total of 3,909 photos were uploaded to a specially created Facebook group within one hour, of which 3,602 met the Guinness rules and were officially counted.

Thousands of people around the world took part in this record attempt, sharing their sauna experiences and love for saunas on social media. The Guinness World Records process was overseen by an official representative, and three additional experts reviewed the photos to ensure they met the required criteria.

“This is a unique initiative in Estonia,” commented Anneli Lepp, head of tourism at Visit Estonia. “While various sauna-related records have been set in the past, no one has attempted a massive collective sauna session like this before. The passion and enthusiasm people showed on that day were truly wonderful. We are very proud to have brought our sauna tradition to such a wide international stage. We also saw that love for saunas knows no borders. With this record, we want to invite even more people to experience our unique sauna world.”

Lea Sudakova, a lecturer at the Estonian University of Life Sciences and an auditor for the Guinness record project, noted that participating as an evaluator was both challenging and humorous. “I’ve worked with data for decades, but this project turned out to be surprisingly complex – for example, technical glitches occurred as Facebook slowed down due to the high volume of images, which increased the time needed for counting. We also had to carefully check whether each photo met the requirements set by Guinness. One thing we didn’t anticipate was people posting photos of dogs sitting on the sauna bench – many of those came from Finland. But what warmed the heart most were the staged photos by sauna communities, where real effort had gone into contributing to the record,” Sudakova recalled.

The event reached far beyond Estonia, with photos submitted from every corner of the world. The most photos came from Estonians, followed by Finns, and nearly 300 from Latvians. Surprisingly many participants also came from Thailand, confirming that sauna culture truly has global appeal. In total, photos were posted from 47 countries and 6 continents: Africa, Asia, Australia, Europe, North and South America. The most distant photos came from New Zealand and Japan, where sauna culture has been rising in popularity over the past decade.

One thing is clear – sauna culture is alive and well, with much more to offer in the future!