Dublin Halloween 2026: Bram Stoker Festival & Events Guide

Dublin Halloween is really two events a week apart, and most guides blur them together. The first is the Bram Stoker Festival, Dublin City Council’s free-to-cheap celebration of the Gothic. It runs over the October bank holiday weekend, Friday 23 to Monday 26 October 2026, and ends with a Macnas parade through the Georgian streets of the north inner city. The second is Halloween itself, Saturday 31 October, which is a neighbourhood affair: children trick-or-treating, pubs full of people in costume, and suburbs lit up by fireworks that are illegal without a licence.

This guide covers Dublin Halloween 2026 from both angles, with the programme checked against the festival’s own listings in early October. It covers the free events and how to reach them, the ticketed ones still worth chasing, ghost tours and dark history, Bram Stoker’s real Dublin, the Samhain fire festivals within reach of the city, and the practical side: the marathon, the clock change, mid-term and the weather. It is for anyone planning a late-October trip, and for anyone already here and wondering what to do on the night.

For the rest of the year’s calendar, see the Dublin events and festivals guide.

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Quick Answer: Dublin Halloween 2026

For the festival, come for the bank holiday weekend of 23–26 October. Stokerland, the free family festival in St Patrick’s Park, runs from the Saturday to the Monday, and the free Macnas parade is on the Monday evening, 26 October, at 19:00. Talks, tours and films fill the weekend, and many of the ticketed ones had sold out by early October. Halloween night a week later is about atmosphere rather than organised events, and in 2026 it is a Saturday, so the pubs will be packed.

Plan around three things on the festival weekend. The Dublin Marathon closes roads on Sunday 25 October, the clocks go back an hour that same morning, and the school mid-term break runs all the following week. Dublin Castle, a Dublin Halloween venue in other years, is closed to visitors until January 2027.

Bram Stoker Festival	Friday 23 – Monday 26 October 2026, over the October bank holiday weekend
Macnas parade, Fiáin	Monday 26 October at 19:00, in the north inner city; free, no booking
Stokerland family festival	Saturday 24 – Monday 26 October from 11:00, St Patrick’s Park; free
Dublin Marathon	Sunday 25 October, with city road closures
Clocks go back	02:00 on Sunday 25 October; sunset jumps from 18:10 to 17:08
Halloween night	Saturday 31 October; sunset at 16:55
Púca Festival, Co. Meath	29 October – 1 November, in Trim and Athboy
Derry Halloween	28 October – 1 November; parade on Saturday 31 October
Closed	Dublin Castle and the Chester Beatty, until January 2027

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The Bram Stoker Festival 2026

The Bram Stoker Festival is the centre of Dublin Halloween: Dublin City Council’s annual celebration of the city’s most famous horror writer, with four days of events inspired by the Gothic, the supernatural and the Victorian, at venues from Trinity College to the National Library and the Light House Cinema. The 2026 festival runs from Friday 23 to Monday 26 October, over the October bank holiday weekend, a week before Halloween rather than on it. The big outdoor events are free. The talks, tours and workshops are cheap, small and quick to sell out.

Free, no ticket needed

• The Macnas parade, Fiáin (Monday 26 October, 19:00), covered below.
• Stokerland (Saturday 24 – Monday 26 October, from 11:00), covered below.
• Making Faces! (Sunday 25 October): a free, drop-in family mask-making workshop at the National Museum of Ireland. Check the festival listing for which museum site is hosting it.

Free, but you need a ticket

• Dracula’s Disco (Monday 26 October), in the Round Room at the Mansion House. Tickets were listed as “coming soon” in early October.
• On the Hunt in the National Library (Saturday 24 October). Tickets are released on 14 October.

Ticketed highlights

Event	When	Where	Price
Stitch (theatre)	23–26 October	Smock Alley Theatre	€20
Stoker on Stoker: Unearthing the Secrets of Dracula (talk)	25 October	Trinity College	€13 + €1 fee
Stoker on the Runway: The Gothic in Contemporary Fashion (talk)	25 October	Trinity College	€13 + €1 fee
Dracula (1958), 4K restoration	25 October	Light House Cinema, Smithfield	€13, or €10.50 concession
Blood, Guts & Black Pudding (literary talk)	26 October	Old Irish Times Building	€20 + €1 fee
Night Bites evening workshops and events	23–26 October	Various, including the Digital Depot	From €10

By early October several events had already sold out, including the candlelit tours of Marsh’s Library, both of historian Donal Fallon’s walks (Mount Jerome Cemetery and Dublin’s Victorian pubs), Petrified Live and the body-snatching talk at Green Street Courthouse. Watch for returns, and book anything else now. The full programme and booking links are on bramstokerfestival.com.

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The Macnas Parade: Fiáin, Monday 26 October

Macnas is the Galway street-spectacle company behind some of the best giant-puppet processions in Irish festival history. Its 2026 Dublin show, Fiáin (“wild”), celebrates the wild elements of the West of Ireland and forty years of the company’s work. It is the festival finale and the one Dublin Halloween event everyone can see: free and unticketed.

• When: Monday 26 October, the bank holiday. Gather from 18:45 (the organisers ask people not to arrive earlier). The parade starts at 19:00 and takes about 20 minutes to pass any one spot.
• Route: it starts halfway up North Great George’s Street, then runs along Great Denmark Street, Gardiner Place, Mountjoy Square and Gardiner Street to Seán McDermott Street. That is the Georgian north inner city, about ten minutes’ walk from the Spire on O’Connell Street.
• Where to stand: most of the route has no barriers between you and the performers. Gardiner Place and Seán McDermott Street give the flattest access, and the pavements around Great Denmark Street are uneven.
• Access: a limited number of relaxed and wheelchair viewing spaces can be pre-booked, with bookings opening at noon on 7 October. There is no seating, and there are no toilets on the route.
• Road closures: the festival publishes these from 14 October.

Forget older descriptions of a Macnas parade down O’Connell Street: the 2026 route uses the squares and side streets to the north-east of it, and it is over in twenty minutes, so be in place on time. Full details are on the festival’s Fiáin page.

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Stokerland: Free Family Days in St Patrick’s Park

Stokerland takes over St Patrick’s Park, on Bull Alley Street beside St Patrick’s Cathedral, for the three days of the bank holiday weekend: Saturday 24, Sunday 25 and Monday 26 October, from 11:00 each day. It is free, needs no booking, and is the best Dublin Halloween day out for families with children under 12, with circus and street theatre (including Walk The Plank’s pirate acrobatics), dance parties, storytelling, face-painting, games and a Victorian carousel that is free to ride. There are food stalls, and picnics are welcome.

• Access: the park is wheelchair accessible, with a wheelchair-accessible portaloo. The step-free entrance is on Patrick Street. A relaxed session, with quieter sound and no sudden noises, runs on the Monday from 11:00 to 13:00.
• Rules: under-18s must be with an adult.
• Getting there: buses run along Patrick Street. The nearest Luas stop is St Stephen’s Green, about fifteen minutes’ walk away, and the nearest car park is Q-Park Christchurch.

Pair it with the neighbours. St Patrick’s Cathedral is next door, and Marsh’s Library, where the teenage Bram Stoker read, sits behind it. Dublinia and Christ Church Cathedral are a few minutes up the hill. For lunch, see the Liberties.

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Dublin Halloween Night: Saturday 31 October

By Halloween itself the festival is over, and the night belongs to the neighbourhoods. Children trick-or-treat around the residential streets in the early evening, and adults head for the pubs and clubs in costume, with Temple Bar the busiest. Because Halloween falls on a Saturday in 2026, expect queues, door policies and a great many capes. If you want a costume party, book one. If you want a quiet pint, go to a local pub away from the centre. See Temple Bar nightlife and traditional pubs, and Dublin’s oldest pubs for somewhere with a bit of age to it.

Bonfires and fireworks: what visitors should know

You will hear fireworks all evening and see bonfire smoke over the suburbs, but none of it is an organised event. In Ireland it is illegal to buy, possess or set off fireworks without a licence, with penalties of up to €10,000 and five years in prison. Each year the Gardaí run Operation Tombola against illegal fireworks and Halloween disorder. Councils and Gardaí also remove stockpiled bonfire material ahead of the night, and the fire service has one of its busiest nights of the year. The bonfires are unofficial, so do not go looking for one, and keep pets indoors if you are staying somewhere with them.

The Irish Halloween at home

Halloween traditions here are older than the American version. Look for barmbrack in bakeries and supermarkets all through October: a spiced fruit loaf with a ring baked inside, and whoever finds it is supposedly the next to marry. The original jack-o’-lantern was a carved turnip; the pumpkin arrived back across the Atlantic with the American version of the festival. Snap-apple and bobbing for apples still turn up at children’s parties.

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Dublin Halloween Ghost Tours and Dark History

• The Ghostbus Tour. DoDublin’s theatrical ghost tour runs year-round on a vintage double-decker, with actors and stops at atmospheric sites around the city. It lasts about two hours and leaves from Dublin Bus headquarters at 59 Upper O’Connell Street. It is for ages 14 and over, and under-16s must be with an adult. During the Halloween holidays a Ghostbus Kids version runs for ages 7–14, lasting about 90 minutes, from bus stop 271 at the O’Connell Street–Abbey Street junction. Book on dodublin.ie.
• Glasnevin Cemetery. Ireland’s largest cemetery, with about 1.5 million burials, among them Daniel O’Connell, Michael Collins, Charles Stewart Parnell and Brendan Behan. Its guided “Dead Interesting” tour takes about 90 minutes. For Halloween, Vintage Tea Trips pairs it with tea and barmbrack on a vintage bus from St Stephen’s Green, on selected dates up to 1 November, including 24, 26 and 31 October. The return from Glasnevin is up to you, but Kavanagh’s, the Gravediggers pub, is by the old gate.
• St Michan’s Church, Church Street. Its vaults hold the mummified remains of Dublin families from the 17th to 19th centuries, seen on short guided tours. Stoker is said to have visited them. The vaults are not wheelchair accessible and photography is not allowed. Tours run Monday to Saturday, with shorter hours in winter, so check before you go.
• Marsh’s Library. Ireland’s oldest public library, with caged reading alcoves, behind St Patrick’s Cathedral. Admission is about €7 (under-18s free), Tuesday to Saturday. The festival’s candlelit tours are sold out, but it is atmospheric enough by day; see marshlibrary.ie.
• Folklore at The Stag’s Head. The long-running Irish folklore and fairies storytelling evening has moved from The Brazen Head to The Stag’s Head on Dame Court. It runs on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 17:00 to 18:30 and costs €23 for adults and €15 for children aged 6–14. It is a pre-dinner show, so eat elsewhere afterwards.
• Kilmainham Gaol. There is no Halloween special, and it does not need one: this is the darkest history in the city, and it sells out weeks ahead in every month. See Kilmainham Gaol.

For history and literary walks the rest of the year, see Dublin walking tours.

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Bram Stoker’s Dublin

Stoker was a Dubliner for the first thirty years of his life, and his city is easy to trace on foot, with one bus or taxi ride out to Clontarf.

• 15 Marino Crescent, Clontarf: where he was born on 8 November 1847. It is a private house, so look from the street. The crescent is about 3 km north-east of the city centre.
• Trinity College: he studied here from 1864, taking his BA in 1870 and his MA in 1875. See Trinity and the Book of Kells.
• Marsh’s Library: he first signed in as a reader on 4 July 1866, aged 18.
• Dublin Castle: he worked here as a civil servant, and his first book was the decidedly un-Gothic The Duties of Clerks of Petty Sessions in Ireland (1879). The castle is closed to visitors until January 2027; see the Dublin Castle guide.
• Kildare Street: a commemorative plaque marks his former home.
• St Michan’s Church: he is said to have visited its vaults.

He also reviewed plays for the Dublin Evening Mail. In 1878 he married Florence Balcombe and moved to London to manage Henry Irving’s Lyceum Theatre, a job he held for 27 years. Dracula followed in 1897. He died in London on 20 April 1912. Our literary Dublin guide covers the city’s other writers.

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Samhain: Where Halloween Came From

Halloween’s roots are Irish. Samhain (pronounced roughly “SOW-in”) marked the end of the harvest and the start of the dark half of the year. It was the night when the boundary with the Otherworld was believed to be thinnest, and the night of the great fires. One of the most important Samhain sites was Tlachtga, the Hill of Ward near Athboy in County Meath, and today the Púca Festival lights a Samhain fire in Athboy on 31 October. The Church’s All Saints’ Day (1 November) and All Souls’ Day (2 November) settled on top of the older festival, and its eve became All Hallows’ Eve, or Hallowe’en. In Irish, Halloween night is still Oíche Shamhna.

Irish emigrants carried the customs to North America in the 19th century: dressing up and going door to door, carved turnip lanterns, and fortune-telling games. They came back as trick-or-treat and the pumpkin. Dublin Halloween today mixes the two: barmbrack and bonfires on one side, costumes and sweets on the other.

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Dublin Halloween Day Trips: Púca, Derry and After Dark

Púca Festival, Trim and Athboy: 29 October – 1 November

Púca is a four-night Samhain festival in the County Meath towns of Trim and Athboy. The free spectacles include the Púca procession in Trim on Friday 30 October, projections on Trim Castle, fire shows, and the lighting of the Samhain fire in Athboy on the 31st. The headline concerts and comedy are ticketed, and the 2026 line-up includes The Coronas, The Waterboys and Hothouse Flowers. Bus Éireann’s route 111 runs from Dublin to Trim roughly hourly, taking about 1h 15m, and continues to Athboy. The festival also runs a coach from Dublin and a free hourly shuttle between the two towns. See pucafestival.com and our Trim Castle and Boyne Valley guide.

Derry Halloween: 28 October – 1 November

Derry~Londonderry’s Halloween runs over five days and is mostly free. The Awakening the Walled City trail runs from 28 to 30 October, 18:00–21:00, and the carnival parade starts at 19:00 on Saturday 31 October, with fireworks at about 20:15. A free timed ticket is needed only for one section of the city walls. At about three and a half hours by road, it is an overnight trip rather than a day out, and it is in the UK, so you pay in sterling.

Emerald Park After Dark and Newbridge House

For families, Emerald Park, the former Tayto Park near Ashbourne, runs After Dark evenings on 16–18, 23–25 and 30 October, from 18:30 to 22:00 with last entry at 20:00. Bus Éireann’s route 105 stops at the park entrance. See our Emerald Park guide. Closer in, Newbridge House and Farm in Donabate runs Pumpkins After Dark, an illuminated pumpkin trail with no jump scares, from 2 to 31 October; check the opening nights before travelling. Our family attractions guide covers the rest of mid-term week.

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Dublin Halloween Weather, Daylight and Logistics

October is Dublin’s wettest month. Met Éireann’s 1991–2020 averages for Dublin Airport give a high of 13.7 °C and a low of 6.7 °C, with 80 mm of rain over about 12 wet days, and the last week runs cooler than the monthly average. Pack a hooded waterproof rather than an umbrella. The wind finishes umbrellas, and the parade is outdoors in the dark.

Date	Sunrise	Sunset
Saturday 24 October	08:08	18:10
Sunday 25 October (clocks go back)	07:10	17:08
Saturday 31 October	07:21	16:55

• Marathon Sunday, 25 October. The Dublin Marathon closes roads across the city on the Sunday morning, so allow extra time for buses and taxis.
• The clock change. The clocks go back at 02:00 that Sunday morning, to 01:00. You get an hour of extra sleep, and the evenings are suddenly darker.
• Mid-term. Irish schools are off for the week of 26 October, so family attractions are at their busiest.
• The deer rut. In Phoenix Park the fallow deer rut runs from mid-October to early November, at dawn and dusk. Stay 50 metres back.
• Hotels. The bank holiday, the marathon and the festival all fall on one weekend, which makes it one of the tighter weekends of the autumn for rooms. Book early; see where to stay in Dublin.

The whole month is covered in Dublin in October, and the year in our Dublin weather guide.

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Gotchas

• The festival is the weekend before Halloween. The Bram Stoker Festival runs from 23 to 26 October 2026, not from 30 October to 2 November.
• The parade is on the Monday evening, on the northside. Fiáin starts at 19:00 on 26 October on North Great George’s Street, not on O’Connell Street, and passes any one spot in about 20 minutes.
• The small ticketed events go first. Several tours and talks had sold out by early October.
• Two of the free events need tickets: Dracula’s Disco, and On the Hunt in the National Library (released on 14 October).
• Marathon morning and the clock change both fall on Sunday 25 October.
• Dublin Castle and the Chester Beatty are closed until January 2027, so there are no castle tours or events this year.
• Fireworks are illegal without a licence, and the bonfires are unofficial. The parade is the spectacle to go and see.
• It is mid-term week from 26 to 30 October, so expect queues at family attractions.
• October is the wettest month. A night-time parade needs a hooded waterproof.

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Dublin Halloween FAQ

When is the Bram Stoker Festival 2026?

Friday 23 to Monday 26 October 2026, over the October bank holiday weekend, a week before Halloween. Stokerland runs in St Patrick’s Park from the Saturday to the Monday, and the free Macnas parade, Fiáin, closes the festival at 19:00 on Monday 26 October. The full programme is on bramstokerfestival.com.

What is there to do in Dublin for Halloween?

Dublin Halloween has two parts. Over the festival weekend (23–26 October) there are free family days at Stokerland, the Macnas parade, and Gothic talks, tours and films. On Halloween night itself, Saturday 31 October, there are costume nights in the pubs and the Ghostbus Tour. Within reach of the city, the Púca Festival in Trim and Athboy (29 October – 1 November) lights a Samhain fire on the 31st, and Emerald Park runs After Dark evenings.

Is there a Halloween parade in Dublin?

Yes. The Macnas parade, Fiáin, is the finale of the Bram Stoker Festival, at 19:00 on Monday 26 October 2026. It starts on North Great George’s Street and runs via Mountjoy Square to Seán McDermott Street. It is free, needs no booking and takes about 20 minutes to pass. Gather from 18:45.

Is Dublin Halloween good for families?

Yes. Stokerland is free, aimed at under-12s, and runs from 11:00 on 24–26 October in St Patrick’s Park, with a relaxed session on the Monday morning. There is also a free mask-making workshop at the National Museum on 25 October, the Ghostbus Kids tour for ages 7–14, Emerald Park’s After Dark and the Macnas parade. The adult ghost tours are for ages 14+ or 18+.

Are there ghost tours in Dublin at Halloween?

Yes. DoDublin’s Ghostbus Tour runs year-round for ages 14 and over, lasting about two hours from 59 Upper O’Connell Street, with a kids’ version in the Halloween holidays. Glasnevin Cemetery runs guided tours, and on selected dates Vintage Tea Trips pairs one with a Halloween tea on a vintage bus. Book ahead for late October.

Are fireworks legal in Ireland at Halloween?

No. Buying, possessing or setting off fireworks without a licence is illegal in Ireland, with penalties of up to €10,000 and five years in prison, and the Gardaí run an annual operation against them. The bonfires you see on Halloween night are unofficial, not organised events.

Why is Dublin connected to Dracula?

Bram Stoker was born in Clontarf in 1847. He studied at Trinity College, read at Marsh’s Library and worked as a civil servant at Dublin Castle before leaving for London in 1878, and he published Dracula in 1897. The Bram Stoker Festival celebrates that Dublin connection every October.

What is Samhain?

Samhain (pronounced roughly “SOW-in”) is the Gaelic festival that marked the end of the harvest and the beginning of winter, around 31 October and 1 November. It was a night of fires, when the Otherworld was believed to come close. Irish emigrants carried its customs to America, and they returned as modern Halloween. In Irish, Halloween night is Oíche Shamhna.

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Keep Planning

• Dublin in November — the quiet month after Halloween.
• Dublin literary festivals — the rest of the bookish calendar.
• Christmas in Dublin — what comes next.
• Dublin for families — for the rest of mid-term week.
• Smithfield and Stoneybatter — around the Light House Cinema.

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Keep Reading

• Emerald Park (Tayto Park) — the After Dark Halloween season, and why mid-term week is the busiest.
• Dublin Mountains Hikes — including the Hellfire Club, which is exactly where you want to be in late October.
• Dublin in October: Weather, Halloween, Marathon & What to Do