Haunted houses and Halloween nights in Houston, and where to eat after

Halloween 2026 is a Saturday. The Texans are out of the way: they play the New York Giants at home on Sunday, October 25, then take their bye week. The haunts are spread across the whole metro. 13th Floor is on FM 1960 in northwest Houston, The Haunted Trails is in Old Town Spring, Phobia sits on Beltway 8 on the south side, Creepy Hollow is in Rosharon south of Pearland, and REDRUM Fear Park is in Richmond. Kemah and Galveston are down toward the coast. This is the scary half of a night out. The eating half is at the end.

I write the haunt guides on Mr. Fear, a Halloween site, and I am a guest here. Top of Houston asked for the haunted houses. They supplied the tables.

The night, in order

Pick one side of town for the evening rather than planning to cross the city between haunts. Then read the ticket rules, because they differ sharply: REDRUM Fear Park accepts only online tickets, Creepy Hollow’s ticket booth is cash only, and 13th Floor and Phobia both say all sales are final. If your dates are flexible, 13th Floor says September and weeknights have shorter lines than October weekends. 13th Floor, Phobia Beltway 8 and Creepy Hollow run rain or shine with covered lines; The Haunted Trails does not operate in extreme weather. Eat after, not before, and go to the haunt early: the three restaurants at the end of this post are open until 11 p.m. on Fridays and Saturdays, earlier than several haunts close.

The haunted houses

• 13th Floor Haunted House Houston, Northwest Houston: an indoor, no-touch haunt on FM 1960, open select nights from September 12 to November 13. 13th Floor suggests ages 12 and up, and bans full-face masks and props.
• Phobia Haunted Houses, Beltway 8, South Houston: eight haunts at one stop between Highway 288 and I-45 South. The minimum purchase is a three-house ticket, and the booth closes 10 to 15 minutes before the listed closing time. Check the official calendar for 2026 nights.
• Phobia Haunted Houses, Kemah Boardwalk, Kemah: two linked haunts, DOOM and Darke Labs, on one ticket and one line. Open September 26 to November 7, and a ticket is valid any night it is open.
• Creepy Hollow Haunted House, Rosharon: three haunts, Dark Woods, Pitch Black and Scare Factory, plus five shows on one ticket. Fridays and Saturdays from September 25 to October 31, 7:30 to 11:30 p.m., plus October 25 and November 6 and 7. Actors do touch guests unless you buy a No Touch Pass. All ages are welcome at parents’ discretion.
• REDRUM Fear Park, Richmond: four haunts, including Live Industries, new for 2026, plus live shows, on select nights from Friday, October 2. Closing times vary between 10 p.m. and midnight. Only online tickets are accepted.
• The Haunted Trails and Hayride, Old Town Spring: an outdoor haunted hayride through a wooded trail with live actors, plus a second attraction, Psycho Hollow. Fridays and Saturdays in October run 7:30 to 11:30 p.m., with the hayride starting at 8 p.m.

With kids

Zoo Boo at the Houston Zoo in Hermann Park runs September 25 to October 31; reserve online. Boo on the Boardwalk in Kemah is in its 25th year, with trick-or-treating at Boardwalk shops on October weekends and free costume contests on October 10, 17, 24 and 31 at 5:30 p.m. Children’s Museum Houston runs Halloween at the BOO!seum all October, closed Mondays, with a free HAPPY HOUSE family night on Thursday, October 29, 5 to 8 p.m. On Halloween morning the Houston Symphony plays its Haunted Halloween concert at Jones Hall at 10 and 11:30 a.m., with trick-or-treating inside the hall. For mild scares after dark, BOOriffic Nights at Dewberry Farm in Brookshire run September 26 to November 1 from 7 p.m. with a creepy corn maze and a pumpkin stroll.

Twenty-one and over

The adult side of a Houston Halloween is mostly ghost tours with bar stops. Houston Historical Tours runs three downtown haunted walking tours for ages 21 and up, by appointment only. Nightly Spirits runs the Houston Booze and Boos Tour for 21 and over and the Nightmares and Nightcaps Tour for 18 and over. In Galveston, Moody Gardens turns Halloween night over to adults from 9:30 p.m., with a DJ, trivia, a 10:30 p.m. costume contest and an R-rated film at midnight for ages 18 and up. The Hideout, the secret bar at 13th Floor, is 21 and over.

What is not open this year

Three names people search for have not confirmed a 2026 season. Purgatory Scream Park in Kingwood says it will open only 20 select nights this year, but its calendar still shows 2025 and no 2026 dates are posted. Houston Terror Dome in Channelview has not announced 2026 dates, and its official website was not loading when I checked. Houston Scream Fest still lists only its 2025 season hours.

The full list

Dates, ticket rules, ages and addresses for every one of these, plus the Galveston ghost and cemetery tours, pumpkin patches from Montgomery to Simonton and the free Día de los Muertos festivals at MECA and Discovery Green, are on my beat, not a restaurant site’s. The Houston haunted house and Halloween events guide on Mr. Fear has all 25 listings checked against each organizer’s own page, with the links to book.

Where to eat after

Ambriza is on Louetta Road on the north side, the closer stop after 13th Floor on FM 1960 or The Haunted Trails in Old Town Spring. La Fisheria is on Milam Street downtown and Mexican Sugar is on West Dallas Street west of downtown, so both are on the way back in from Phobia on Beltway 8 and Creepy Hollow in Rosharon, south of the city. These three are on the Top of Houston Mexican list. The scores are theirs, not mine.