If your trip lands on Halloween weekend this year, you picked well: October 31 falls on a Saturday in 2026, which is the best configuration the calendar offers and the reason the whole city fills up. Here's the useful part, though. The city's biggest haunted houses are permanent and open every day of the year, so availability is not your problem. The weekend is. Six places are worth the Friday or the Saturday, and the ones that sell out do it early.
The ones that actually try to scare you
Universal Horror Unleashed at AREA15 is the closest Las Vegas gets to a serious haunt, built by the studio that has been doing this in Orlando and Hollywood for more than thirty years. Four houses draw on Universal's horror library, with live actors working the corridors and scare zones between them, and it operates from a permanent building rather than a tent that comes down in November. The permanence is the point: the sets are constructed properly, which is why it holds up against the seasonal attractions other cities put together in six weeks.
Universal Horror Unleashed | AREA15 | Live-actor haunted houses | Not for young children
Check Universal Horror Unleashed
Oddyssey Manor sits in the same complex and works the opposite way. It runs about 80 minutes, it's 21 and over, and it's immersive rather than a walkthrough, meaning you're inside the story instead of moving past it while people jump out. Go here if the AREA15 trip is the plan and you want the two experiences to feel different rather than doubled. Go to Universal Horror Unleashed instead if what you want is to be genuinely frightened.
Oddyssey Manor | AREA15 | About 80 minutes | 21 and over
Halloween-shaped, but a show
Ghost Stories is the one to book if the room matters more than the fright. It runs inside 1923 Prohibition Bar underneath Mandalay Bay, it's 21 and over, and it's an hour of seance-style storytelling in a basement speakeasy rather than a haunted attraction. The venue does most of the work here, and an hour is exactly right for something that lives on atmosphere.
Ghost Stories | 1923 Prohibition Bar, Mandalay Bay | About an hour | 21 and over
Zombie Burlesque has been running on the Strip since 2014, which tells you it works as a comedy show first and a Halloween show second. The premise is a 1950s variety act performed by the undead, it's 16 and over, and it runs about 75 minutes. It's the pick for a group that wants the costume energy without anyone actually being scared.
Zombie Burlesque | V3 Theater, Miracle Mile Shops | About 75 minutes | 16 and over
For groups who'd rather solve something
The Official SAW Escape Room and Escape Blair Witch is the licensed one, which matters more than it sounds: the rooms are built from the actual films rather than being generically grim, and both run about an hour at 16 and over. Book it when the group is six people who would rather do something than watch something. If those two are sold out for the weekend, Escape IT is the other horror-licensed room in town and takes the overflow.
SAW Escape Room and Escape Blair Witch | Off-Strip | About an hour | 16 and over
BLACKOUT Dining in the Dark isn't a horror attraction at all, and it's on this list because it unsettles people more than half the things that are. You eat a multi-course meal in total darkness, served by guides, without being told what's on the plate until afterward. Ninety minutes, 13 and over, off-Strip. It's the one to book when somebody in the group has firmly declined to be chased down a corridor.
BLACKOUT Dining in the Dark | Off-Strip | About 90 minutes | 13 and over
Check BLACKOUT Dining in the Dark
The local haunts, October only
Las Vegas does have a seasonal haunt scene. It just lives off the Strip, in parking lots and on the west side, where locals go. Asylum and Hotel Fear have been scaring people in the Meadows Mall parking lot since 1999, two walk-through houses built in the old tradition of a dark maze and a lot of shouting. Halloween Maze sets up on West Desert Inn Road and runs Thursday through Sunday nights into early November, with a new layout each season. Neither is walkable from a Strip hotel and neither is bookable here. For a group with a car and a taste for old-school jump scares, though, they're the real local version of the season.
Halloween weekend itself, October 29 to November 1
Haunted Brunch is the daytime option, and the one built for the season. It's back for a fourth Las Vegas year, now in The Venue at the Rio: an hour of acrobatics, dance, dark comedy and live scares that restage horror-movie moments while the room eats. It plays Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays through the season. The Rio pitches it at 15 and up, with younger horror fans welcome at a parent's discretion. Before booking, know that the Vegas.com ticket is show admission only; the brunch and the bottomless mimosas are bought separately at the venue.
Haunted Brunch | The Venue, Rio | About 60 minutes | 15 and up recommended
The nights belong to big names. Metallica play Sphere on Thursday the 29th and again on Halloween night, Ricky Martin has BleauLive Theater at Fontainebleau on the 30th and 31st, and Earth, Wind and Fire close their Venetian Theatre run on those same two nights. Mary J. Blige plays Dolby Live at Park MGM on the 30th and 31st, and Bryan Adams brings his acoustic show to Encore Theater from October 28 through November 1, Halloween included. For something louder than all of them, the NHRA Las Vegas Nationals fill Las Vegas Motor Speedway from Thursday to Sunday.
What to book first
A Saturday Halloween concentrates everything onto one night, which matters more than it sounds. The two AREA15 attractions and the escape rooms close out first because they sell by timed entry with a fixed number of slots an hour, while the theater shows keep selling until the room is full. Book the timed-entry ones first and slot the shows around them, not the other way round. And if the 31st itself is gone by the time you look, the Thursday and Friday either side are the same attractions with a fraction of the competition. For more on the complex both haunts sit in, see our AREA15 guide; the horror rooms are compared properly in the horror escape room writeup and the wider escape room roundup; and if the macabre rather than the scary is the draw, REAL BODIES at Horseshoe runs all year too. For the concerts and shows dated to the weekend itself, go to the Las Vegas Halloween hub.
