Every kid in New York maybe has a Halloween plan by now, and most of them involve pillowcases, doorbells, and a strict route mapped out by an older sibling.
But this year, there’s a version of trick-or-treating that skips the sidewalks entirely and hands you a 94-foot blue whale instead.
The American Museum of Natural History is throwing its annual Halloween Celebration on Saturday, October 31, turning its renowned halls into a citywide costume party that happens to be staffed by dinosaur skeletons and giant squid replicas instead of neighbors with candy bowls.
22 October 2026 10:00 + more dates
American Museum of Natural History (AMNH)
It’s a tradition that’s been running for over a decade and a half, and this year’s edition lands squarely on Halloween itself, which almost never happens.
Here are all the details on this year’s event!
What this year’s Halloween will look like
The museum’s celebration will be hosted in the Milstein Family Hall of Ocean Life, directly beneath its famous 94-foot blue whale.
From there, trick-or-treaters and costumed families can make their way around Floor 1 of the museum for candy stops and a costume parade, turning one of AMNH’s most iconic levels into an afternoon-long Halloween route.
Expect a day built around:
- Halloween-themed arts-and-crafts stations
- Face painting by InHerBeauty
- Balloon animals created by Ken Romo
- Trick-or-treating around Floor 1 of the museum
- A costume parade through Floor 1, so kids can show off their Halloween look alongside fellow costumed museumgoers
Costumes are encouraged, though the museum does ask that guests skip full face masks!
The whale everyone’s really coming to see
There’s a reason this whale gets top billing every single year.
The 94-foot blue whale model suspended in the Irma and Paul Milstein Family Hall of Ocean Life is one of the most recognizable pieces of New York City itself, not just the museum, a fiberglass giant based on a real female blue whale found off the coast of South America nearly a century ago.
It’s been hanging there since 1969, gets a deep cleaning by museum staff once a year using long-handled brushes and vacuums, and remains the largest model of the largest animal to have ever lived on Earth.
Trick-or-treating in its shadow is the kind of visual that photographs itself, giant whale, tiny superheroes, candy in hand.
There’s a record-breaking dinosaur here too
If the whale wasn’t enough prehistoric star power for one building, the museum is also currently home to Apex, considered the largest and most complete Stegosaurus fossil ever discovered.
The specimen measures 11.5 feet tall and 27 feet long, is nearly 80% complete, and made headlines after selling at auction for a staggering $44.6 million before landing a four-year residency inside the museum’s Gilder Center.
Apex sits right near the museum’s fossil halls, meaning trick-or-treaters can go from candy stops to standing face to face with one of the priciest dinosaurs on the planet, all in the same afternoon.
Why this beats a regular trick-or-treat route
New York City sees millions of costumed kids every Halloween, but very few of them get to do their candy run indoors, climate-controlled, surrounded by blue whales, dinosaur skeletons, and taxidermied creatures from every corner of the planet.
The museum pulls in roughly 5 million visitors a year even on a normal weekend, and Halloween tends to be one of its most crowded, costume-heavy days on the calendar.
So if you’re bringing kids who’d rather see a stegosaurus than knock on another stranger’s door, grab your museum tickets before the word gets out to the masses.
The details
📍 American Museum of Natural History, 200 Central Park West, New York, NY
🗓️ Saturday, October 31, 2026
🎃 This is a ticketed add-on event, separate from general museum admission. Halloween Celebration tickets are $25 for the general public and $15 for members, and must be purchased on top of your museum entry.
🎟️ Book admission in advance through Fever here, then grab your Halloween Celebration add-on ticket through AMNH directly, since Halloween is consistently one of the museum’s busiest days of the year.