Halloween 2026 falls on Saturday 31 October. Nothing has to move to the weekend, because the night already is the weekend.
That sounds like a small thing and it is not. It is the difference between a Halloween you can actually do properly and one you spend queueing. Every restaurant table, club ticket, cab and hotel room in London is competing for a single evening, the Night Tube is running because it is a Saturday, and the next day is Sunday 1 November, so nobody has to be anywhere.
It also means the usual advice is wrong. In a normal year the events spread across a week and you can pick your night. This year they concentrate.
The clocks, and why this is the first dark Saturday
British Summer Time ends on Sunday 25 October 2026, the last Sunday of the month. Halloween is the Saturday after that.
So 31 October is the first Saturday night of the year that is properly dark by teatime. Not a detail anybody writes down, but it is the reason the whole season works the way it does, and you can see it in the programming: Halloween at Kew runs 6pm to 10pm until 24 October, then switches to 4pm to 10pm from 25 October. The trail gains two hours on exactly the day the clocks go back. The venue is not being generous, it is just getting dark earlier.
Practically: if you are going to anything outdoors, the light is gone by about half past five, and it will be colder than the afternoon suggests.
What is actually confirmed
This is the part worth having. The largest Halloween listing online currently carries “dates TBC” against Halloween at Kew. Kew published its dates, its session times and its full price list some time ago. So rather than a list of links, here is what has genuinely confirmed 2026 dates and prices, taken from each venue directly.
| Event | Dates in 2026 | Adult price |
|---|---|---|
| Halloween at Kew | 16 October to 1 November | From £19.50 off peak, £24 peak |
| Thorpe Park Fright Nights | 2 to 4 and 9 to 11 October, then 15 October to 1 November | From £39 online, £66 walk up |
| London Dungeon, Curse of the Mummy | 17 October to 1 November | £27 online, £35 on the day |
| Tower of London | 24 October to 1 November, 10:30 to 16:00 | Included in admission |
| Hampton Court Palace | 24 October to 1 November | Included in admission |
All five run through to Sunday 1 November, which is the quiet recommendation on this page. The Sunday is a great deal less busy than the Saturday and everything is still open.
The costume rule nobody mentions
The Tower of London will refuse you entry if you turn up in a Halloween costume. At its own Halloween event.
Its wording is plain: the ghosts are dressed for the occasion, but visitors are asked not to be, and anyone arriving in costume will be turned away. The reason is obvious once you think about it, since the Tower has actors in costume and cannot have the public confused with them, but it catches families out every year.
The other half of that trap is the hours. The Tower’s Halloween runs 10:30 to 16:00 and that is the whole of it. It is a daytime half term event designed to delight rather than frighten, with ghosts gathering at the Haunted Forge at 11.15, 12.45 and 14.45 each day. It is not a night at the Tower, it closes before dark, and if you were picturing torchlight you have the wrong event.
It is included in normal admission, members go free, and it needs no separate booking.
The ticketed nights, in detail
Halloween at Kew
In its third year, and the best after dark option in London that does not involve a scare actor jumping at you. A 1.5km illuminated trail through the gardens with fire performers, a headless horseman and a new cursed tomb.
Entry is by timed slot and the slot decides the experience. Kew sells three tiers: Daylight up to 6pm, Twilight from 6pm to 7.30pm, and Moonlight after 7.30pm, with the scare level rising as it gets darker. Book Moonlight if there are no children with you. Last entry is strictly 8:30pm and the gardens close at 10pm.
Entrances are limited to Victoria Gate, Elizabeth Gate and Brentford Gate, and the gate is fixed at the point of booking.
Two warnings. There are no exchanges and no refunds once tickets are bought. And Kew’s £1 tickets for Universal Credit and Pension Credit holders apply to standard daytime entry only and explicitly not to Halloween at Kew, which is separately ticketed and not part of general admission. The same exclusion applies to Christmas at Kew, and it is the single most common misunderstanding about that place.
The London Dungeon
Curse of the Mummy runs 17 October to 1 November and is included in the standard ticket, not sold as an add on. It is built around the real Victorian story of the mummy board of a priestess of Amen-Ra, brought back to London by an amateur archaeologist, and the run of misfortune that followed everyone who owned it.
Book online. A standard adult ticket is £27 booked ahead against £35 on the door. That is an eight pound penalty for turning up, and on Halloween Saturday walking up is a poor plan anyway. Anytime Entry, which frees you from a fixed slot, is £35 online and £43 on the day. The Screams and Spirits ticket is £33, a six pound upgrade.
Thorpe Park Fright Nights
The largest scare event within reach of London, running its twenty fifth year, and the dates are not what people assume. It is not every night in October. It runs 2 to 4 October, 9 to 11 October, and then continuously from 15 October to 1 November.
Tickets are from £39 online, against £66 on the gate, and the scare mazes are recommended for 13 and over, which effectively makes this the adult option on the list. Five mazes this year including a new one, Tenement, alongside the park’s rides after dark.
It is in Surrey rather than London, so treat it as a day out rather than an evening, and book the date rather than hoping. The organisers say popular dates sell out and on a Halloween Saturday that is not marketing.
Halloween on a Saturday night
The rest of it is simply London on a Saturday, with costumes, and that cuts both ways.
Book the table now, not in the last week. A Saturday Halloween is the single busiest restaurant night of the autumn, and the places that would normally hold a table back will not be holding one. The best restaurants in London and the smarter rooms are the starting points, and set menus are the sensible move on a night when kitchens are running flat out.
Check the door policy before you commit to a costume. Plenty of London bars and most of the smarter ones have a dress code that does not pause for 31 October, and a costume is not an exemption. Our guide to London dress codes covers which rooms actually enforce one. The rule of thumb is that anywhere with a cloakroom and a minimum spend will not want a mask.
If you want the night out without the costume, that is entirely normal and most of the city is doing it. London after dark covers the ground, activity bars and comedy clubs are both good answers to a night when the clubs are full of people in facepaint, and live music bars run their usual Saturday programme.
Getting home, which the Saturday fixes
Because Halloween is a Saturday, the Night Tube runs. Six lines run right through the night on Fridays and Saturdays: Central, Jubilee, Northern, Piccadilly, Victoria and Windrush.
That is genuinely the luckiest part of this year’s date. Bonfire Night five days later falls on a Thursday, when none of them run, and the difference between the two nights is a tube home against a night bus or a surge priced car.
Three of the six do not run their whole route, which is the detail that strands people. Our Night Tube guide has which sections actually run, and the last twenty minutes of the journey is where it goes wrong, not the first.
What to do about it this week
Book Kew now if you want a Moonlight slot on the 31st. Timed entry, limited capacity, no refunds, and the Saturday is the first to go.
Buy Dungeon tickets online rather than on the day and save eight pounds a head.
Put the restaurant in the diary before the middle of October.
Consider Sunday 1 November instead. Every one of the five confirmed events is still running, the city is quiet, and nothing is sold out.
Everything here was taken from Kew, Historic Royal Palaces, the London Dungeon and Thorpe Park’s own published pages, rechecked on 28 September 2026. Prices are the advertised adult minimums and peak dates cost more. Halloween Saturday is a peak date everywhere. Confirm before you book.
Where to go next
Bonfire Night in London is the next thing in the calendar and the trap is the opposite one: 5 November 2026 is a Thursday, and the two biggest displays have both moved to the weekend after it.
The Night Tube covers which six lines run, which sections do not, and what to do from Sunday to Thursday when none of them are running.
London after dark is the wider guide to the evening, and London at Christmas picks up where the autumn leaves off, including the Christmas markets and what has confirmed its 2026 dates.
Questions we get asked
What day is Halloween 2026 in London?
Saturday 31 October. That matters more than it sounds, because nothing needs to be moved to the weekend the way Bonfire Night does, so every event, restaurant table and club night lands on the same evening. It also means the Night Tube is running, since it operates on Friday and Saturday nights only, and that the following day is Sunday 1 November with nobody due at work.
What is actually confirmed for Halloween in London 2026?
Rechecked on 28 September 2026, five major events have published dates and prices. Halloween at Kew runs 16 October to 1 November from 19.50 pounds. Thorpe Park Fright Nights runs 2 to 4 and 9 to 11 October then 15 October to 1 November, from 39 pounds. The London Dungeon's Curse of the Mummy runs 17 October to 1 November, included in a ticket costing 27 online or 35 on the day. The Tower of London and Hampton Court Palace both run 24 October to 1 November, included in normal admission.
Can you wear a costume to the Tower of London at Halloween?
No, and this catches people out every year. The Tower asks visitors not to wear costumes to its Halloween event and states that anyone arriving in costume will be refused entry, because it has actors in costume and cannot have the public mistaken for them. The event also runs 10:30 to 16:00 only, so it closes before dark and is a daytime half term activity rather than a night at the Tower.
How much is Halloween at Kew?
Non-member adult tickets are 19.50 pounds off peak and 24 at peak, with member adult tickets at 16.75 and 20.55. Entry is by timed slot in three tiers: Daylight up to 6pm, Twilight from 6pm to 7.30pm and Moonlight after 7.30pm, with the scare level rising as it gets darker. Last entry is strictly 8:30pm and the gardens close at 10pm. Note that Kew's 1 pound Universal Credit and Pension Credit tickets apply to standard daytime entry only and do not apply to Halloween at Kew.
Does the Night Tube run on Halloween 2026?
Yes, because 31 October 2026 is a Saturday. Six lines run through the night on Fridays and Saturdays: the Central, Jubilee, Northern, Piccadilly, Victoria and Windrush. Three of the six do not run their entire route, which is the thing that strands people, so check the specific section you need rather than assuming the line is running end to end. Bonfire Night on 5 November is a Thursday and has no Night Tube at all.
When do the clocks go back in 2026?
Sunday 25 October 2026, the last Sunday of the month, which is the weekend before Halloween. That makes Saturday 31 October the first properly dark Saturday night of the year, with the light gone by around half past five. You can see venues respond to it in their own timings: Halloween at Kew runs 6pm to 10pm until 24 October and then 4pm to 10pm from 25 October, gaining two hours on exactly the day the clocks change.
Written by Robert J Wills, no. 156 in the guide.
Last checked 28 September 2026 against the venues' own published information. Nobody pays to appear here and we take no bookings.
