IMTS, the International Manufacturing Technology Show returned Sept. 9-14 to McCormick Place for its biennial five-day conference and trade show that brought 1,700 exhibiting companies and 89,020 registrants to Chicago. Attendance was up from 86,307 registrants while exhibiting companies were down from 1,816 for its last show in 2022, according to IMTS data. 

In its 97th year, the show—originally called the International Machine Tool Show until 1990—has been calling the iconic Chicago venue its home since 1972, when it only occupied the first floor of Windy City convention center, back when it was called “The Mall” level.  

McCormick Place no longer boasts a level with that name but has since ballooned in size right alongside IMTS, with the trade show now occupying all four buildings that make up the 1.2 million-square-foot convention center. The 40 million-plus pounds of machinery that were also onsite marked a record for the event, said Peter Eelman, chief experience officer at the Association for Manufacturing Technology (AMT), which owns and produces IMTS. 

True to form, IMTS 2024 maintained its positioning as the largest manufacturing technology trade show in the Western Hemisphere, focusing on the latest innovations in manufacturing and automation technologies, including the automotive, aerospace, medical, food, and software industries.  

But with its ever-expanding footprint (its highest-ever number of exhibiting companies was just under 2,500 in 2016), event organizers spent this year doing more of just that—organizing IMTS in original ways to ensure that each attendee experience could be personalized to their unique goals.  

The result: a jam-packed, yet cohesive event that seamlessly blended all that’s new and noteworthy in the fast-paced tech and manufacturing industries with steal-worthy show elements that organizers working in any industry could surely implement into their next large-scale event.  

Here are the top three moments from IMTS 2024 that stood out: 

1. Less breakout rooms in favor of more diverse educational programming and networking opportunities. 

Despite the show’s expansive size, there aren’t any more breakout rooms than there would be at other conferences, Eelman said—and perhaps even less—because “our conferences are more theoretical.” 

Thus, most of the onsite conversations take place right in exhibitors’ booths. For example, Eelman said: “In a first for IMTS, contract manufacturers learned how they could win defense business by engaging with exhibitor BlueForge Alliance, the non-profit defense industrial base integration supporting U.S. Navy and critical partner to the Submarine Industrial Base.” 

At the same time, “conferences continue to grow,” Eelman added. 

Similar to previous shows, the latest iteration of IMTS featured multiple conferences happening at once. New this year, however, was IMTS Elevate LATAM, which “focused on the high-growth markets of Mexico, Latin America, and Spain,” Eelman said. He added there were also two inaugural IMTS Elevate Women Make Manufacturing Move (WMMM) events—a reception designed for networking, plus a breakfast and keynote session featuring high-profile industry leaders with decision-making powers at NASA, Microsoft, and EY, among other notable firms.  

The returning conferences: the Supply Chain Forum, Parts Cleaning Conference, Industrial Laser Conference, the IMTS Investor Forum, and the Jobs Shops, which is one of IMTS Elevate’s programs and includes “three, half-day workshops are exclusively designed to offer job shop stakeholders new and creative opportunities to learn, connect, and transform today and tomorrow,” according to IMTS’s website. 

The events team also uses “Sectors” to further segment the exhibitor floor plan, with areas focused on industries such as “Fabricating & Laser,” technologies, such as “Additive Manufacturing,” as well as solutions like “Quality Assurance” just to name a few. IMTS 2024 also featured the all-new “Automation Sector,” which occupied the entirety of McCormick Place’s 705,000-square-foot North Building.  

Educational programming, meanwhile, featured 68 sessions across five different tracks this year—Process Innovations, Alternative Processes, Plant Operations, Quality and Inspection, and Automation—to allow for a more customized event itinerary. 

2. An expanded Creators Lounge—where attendees could see the video-editing process in action. 

The IMTS+ Creators Lounge first made its debut at the 2022 conference as a “destination where manufacturing influencers and content creators come together to connect and share stories and insights from the industry,” Eelman said. 

An impressive stat from IMTS 2024, Eelman noted: “the creators conducted 65 interviews throughout the week with an exciting rotation of expert guests and hosts [that], coupled with the efforts of the IMTS+ social media team, [produced] 170,000 organic impressions on posts from the IMTS official channels (#WEAREIMTS) and hundreds of thousands more impressions for all IMTS posts.” 

The success of the 2024 show’s Creators Lounge could be attributed to the accessibility of its editing area, Eelman suggested. In the past, this invite-only lounge—located within the IMTS+ Technology Hubs, powered by Hexagon and Google Cloud—was adjacent to an exclusive editing area, where an onsite team edited recorded programming in real time. This year, however, that area was open for attendees to see, making for an exciting sight. 

Eelman said of IMTS’s new-and-improved Creators Lounge: “This year, instead of closing off the editing area, we opened it up and allowed attendees to see the editing team doing their job in one half of the lounge, while the interview was being conducted in the other half. This gave a sense of activity and action that helped draw a crowd to the booth. People not only gathered or stopped by to listen to some of the interviews, they also were fascinated by the live production team.” 

3. Extensive programming for future generations. 

There’s no doubt IMTS proved its value to up-and-coming talent in the manufacturing industry with its 2024 show, with some 20,000 students and educators participating in this year’s event. Catering to students has become a vital element of the conference since IMTS first hosted a student event in 1998. 

“Manufacturing has a major gap between the amount of workers that it has versus the amount of workers that it needs,” Eelman said of why his organization puts an emphasis on what’s come to be known as the Smartforce Student Summit.  

It’s “a unique opportunity for young people to find a profession that has a tremendous need while at the same time preparing for a career that may not require a four-year college degree,” Eelman added of the program, which was co-produced for the first time this year with AMT. It also further catered to youngsters with its relocation to the second level of the venue’s East Building—a mindful move given that it’s closer to the student bus drop-off and pickup spot at McCormick Place. 

The Summit is chock full of hands-on exhibits and demonstrations designed to inspire youngsters to pursue careers in the manufacturing and STEM fields. 

The next IMTS will return to McCormick Place Sept. 14-19, 2026. 

Photos courtesy of the Association for Manufacturing Technology

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