Pairi Daiza celebrates its biggest Halloween ever with 23 late-night openings.

On the programme: 246 artists, 55 shows and activities, including the new projection mapping show The Legend of the Moon Dragon, a ghost train featuring a giant werewolf, and the voodoo traditions of Benin.

23/09/2026

From 17 October to 8 November inclusive, Halloween will take over the ten Worlds of Pairi Daiza. For 23 days, the Garden will remain open until 10 p.m.

Designed for the whole family, this year’s programme will put fantasy, spectacle and wonder centre stage. Throughout the day and into the evening, theatre, dance, circus, aerial acrobatics, live music, street performances and video projections will bring the visit to life. Across the Garden’s 75 hectares, 75 sets created especially for the occasion, including 26 legendary creatures, will transform the landscape and immerse visitors in worlds that are, by turns, mysterious, enchanting and just a little unsettling.

This year, 246 artists will take part in the festivities, 43% more than in 2025. In total, 55 shows and activities will be on offer, an increase of 30%, with 40% of them being completely new. Some will take place at specific locations throughout the Garden, while others will appear unexpectedly along the way.

Because Halloween at Pairi Daiza is not simply something to watch: it is something to experience. Visitors are welcome to come in costume, take part in the daily fancy-dress competition, search for a hidden secret word or submit their own creation to the scarecrow competition.

More than 1,000 pumpkins and chrysanthemums will complement the colours of autumn, while artists and characters may appear without warning around the next corner. A family-friendly Halloween designed to make visitors smile, dream, marvel and wonder.

One of this year’s most striking new attractions travels through the various Worlds of Pairi Daiza

Among this year’s new attractions is a ghost train that will travel through the different Worlds of Pairi Daiza.

Created by Grand les Yeux, Drop The Spoon and The Pairi Daiza Steam Railway, the train will feature carriages filled with moving characters and visual effects. A skeleton will be at the controls of the locomotive. At the rear, one extraordinary passenger is certain to attract attention: a 2.5-metre-tall, animated werewolf, locked inside a cage.

As it makes its way through the Garden, the ghost train will become a spectacular moving Halloween set in its own right.

Discovering voodoo

The journey continues in The Land of Origins. At the heart of the stilt village inspired by Ganvié, visitors will be able to discover different aspects of Beninese voodoo, a spiritual and cultural tradition that remains very much alive in Benin today, far removed from the stereotypes to which Western fiction has so often reduced it.

Masks, music, dance, rituals, medicinal plants and crafts will offer an insight into its practices and symbolism. The objects on display have been acquired directly from Beninese craftspeople, while the costumes have been blessed in Benin in accordance with local traditions.

Priestesses, musicians and dancers will inhabit the different houses of the village, alongside a bokonon, a Beninese voodoo priest, bringing this tradition to life through the knowledge and experience of people who know and practise it themselves.

Día de los Muertos among Edenya’s tropical plants

For its very first Halloween, Edenya, the world’s largest indoor tropical garden, will also take on a completely different atmosphere.

Amid the tropical vegetation, eight musicians and dancers will bring a world inspired by Día de los Muertos to life three times a day, accompanied by a 3.5-metre-tall skeleton. Giant skulls nearly 3 metres high, inspired by Mexican iconography and painted by local artists, will complete the setting. Music, dance and colour will lie at the heart of this new experience.

A different atmosphere after nightfall

The experience will change once again as the sun goes down. Light projections will take over, transforming buildings and landscapes throughout the Garden.

A brand-new creation will appear on the Lake: The Legend of the Moon Dragon. Developed in collaboration with Grand les Yeux and Drop The Spoon, this production will mark the beginning of a new story centred on the dragons associated with Pairi Daiza’s different Worlds. The projection mapping show will be displayed on a monumental 50-metre water screen.

Popular favourites return

Alongside the new productions, several much-loved Halloween favourites will also return. These will include Pyronix’s pyrotechnic show, the Pandalloweens, the Bat Family, the Coffin Dance, the Choir of Ghost Monks and the Three Jeannes.

The giant Moon Dragons will also return to the Pairi Daiza Dome, which will be completely transformed for the occasion. A family of dragons will keep watch over a treasure trove of semi-precious stones from around the world. The magician Valentin will also perform in the Dome from 2 p.m. to 5 p.m., followed by concerts from 6 p.m. to 9.30 p.m.Throughout the festivities, the family-friendly spirit of the event will remain at its heart.

Pumpkins for the animals

The animals will also enjoy a few seasonal surprises. Throughout the year, their keepers provide enrichment activities designed to stimulate their curiosity and encourage natural behaviours, through games, new scents, changes to their environment or opportunities to forage for food. At Halloween, some of these activities will simply take on a seasonal twist. Elephants, hippos and gorillas may, for example, discover and enjoy pumpkins, while other animals will find surprises suited to their diets: mealworms for the meerkats, for instance, or meat for some of the big cats.

The festivities and extended opening hours until 10 p.m. will be organised with the same respect for the needs of every species. The animals will not be required to alter their usual routines: some will return to their indoor areas in the early evening, as they normally do, while others will be able to move out of public view at any time. The location of the activities and their noise levels will be coordinated with the zoological team to ensure that the animals’ rest and welfare remain a priority at all times.