THE HALLOWEEN EVENTS IN TORONTO WE’RE ACTUALLY EXCITED ABOUT
Toronto gets considerably more fun once October arrives. Casa Loma becomes a haunted castle, Vaughan fills with horror mazes, an unassuming property in Etobicoke becomes somewhere we'd absolutely rather not enter alone, and by Halloween night Church Street barely resembles the street we know the rest of the year.
There are plenty of Halloween events in Toronto, but October doesn't need to become a checklist. We'd pick one or two depending on whether we're after a good date night, actual scares, a longer night with friends or simply somewhere worthy of the costume we've been planning since September.
By CELESTE FERNER SEPTEMBER 12, 2026
SO, WHERE SHOULD YOU ACTUALLY GO?
For a date or a group where not everyone enjoys being terrified, Legends of Horror at Casa Loma is the easiest choice. You get the castle, installations and enough scares to make it feel like Halloween without spending the entire evening preparing for the next jump scare.
If fear is actually the point, we'd choose Martino Manor. For a bigger group wanting several hours of entertainment, Screemers gives you much more to do. And we'd save Halloween on Church for October 31 itself, especially this year when Halloween falls on a Saturday. Families with younger kids are better off looking at Casa Loma's earlier Family Hours rather than trying to negotiate their way through one of the more intense haunted houses.
Casa Loma already looks suspiciously appropriate for Halloween, and Legends of Horror takes advantage of it. The roughly two-kilometre route moves through the lower gardens, outdoor sets and underground tunnels, combining live performers with projections, animatronics and installations. We'd allow at least an hour and book after dark, when wandering underneath a Gothic Revival castle starts to feel considerably less like a normal Toronto Tuesday.
Standard evening tickets start at $45 online through October 15 and rise to $55 later in the month, so going earlier has advantages beyond avoiding the biggest crowds. The route includes stairs and uneven terrain, and quite a bit of it is outdoors or underground, which means cute shoes and an optimistic October outfit are probably not the move.
If we're bringing younger kids, we'd look at the early Family Hours on select dates. The sets, lighting and effects stay, while the live scare actors disappear, making it much easier to enjoy the castle without creating a new childhood memory nobody asked for.
Martino Manor is smaller, stranger and much less polished than Casa Loma, which is exactly why we'd choose it when someone asks for something genuinely scary. The experience lasts around 20 minutes, moving through eight environments filled with actors, animatronics, narrow spaces and fairly graphic horror. A new Funeral Parlor joins the experience for 2026, and the attraction isn't recommended for children under 13.
There's no advance booking here: tickets are sold at the door and payment is cash only. We'd arrive around opening rather than showing up late on Halloween weekend, when a short but intense haunted house can suddenly involve a very long wait outside.
Screemers is where we'd send the group chat that wants to make an entire evening of Halloween. There are seven haunted mazes, unlimited rides on the Midway of Madness and a licensed Vampire Lounge, so nobody is driving to Vaughan for a single 20-minute walkthrough.
General admission starts at $44.95 plus HST on weeknights, then gets more expensive on Fridays, Saturdays and the final Halloween weekend. If our schedule allowed it, we'd go Tuesday through Thursday: cheaper tickets, potentially shorter queues and a much better chance of actually getting through everything we came for.
It's not recommended for kids under 10, but we'd also think about the personalities involved rather than just everyone's age. A friend who loves roller coasters and haunted houses will probably have a considerably better evening here than someone who agreed to come because they thought there would mostly be pumpkin displays.
Halloween on Church is a completely different kind of night, and that's why we'd keep it on this list. On Saturday, October 31, Church Street between Carlton and Gloucester closes to regular traffic and fills with costumes, DJs, performances and people coming into the Village simply to see what everyone else decided to wear. The festivities run from 6:30 p.m. until midnight, and it's free.
There's no complicated strategy required. We'd make a dinner reservation somewhere nearby, take the TTC, arrive later once the street has filled up and leave enough time to wander rather than treating it like another attraction to complete. The costumes and people-watching are the experience here, and on Halloween night we'd much rather be in the middle of downtown Toronto than standing in another haunted-house queue.
