Halloween Horror Nights turns 35 in 2026, and Universal Orlando is running its longest event ever: 48 select nights from August 28 through November 1 at Universal Studios Florida, the earliest start date in the event’s history. This year’s theme is the Infernal Carnival of Nightmares, and the event is fronted by two returning co-icons appearing together as allies for the first time: Jack the Clown and Dr. Oddfellow. This guide tracks every house, scare zone, show, and ticket product Universal has announced so far. It’s updated as Universal makes new reveals.
For dates, lineups, and tickets at every Universal park, see our Halloween Horror Nights 2026 all-parks guide.
Quick facts
- Event: Halloween Horror Nights 35 (HHN 2026)
- Where: Universal Studios Florida
- Dates: 48 select nights, August 28 through November 1, 2026
- Theme: Infernal Carnival of Nightmares
- Icons: Jack the Clown and Dr. Oddfellow (first time as allies)
- Haunted houses: 8 of 10 announced
- Scare zones: 2 announced
- Shows: 1 announced
- Premium Scream Nights: August 27 and October 19 ($399)
- Single-night tickets: from $87.99
- Official site: UniversalOrlando.com/HHN
Table of contents
- Haunted houses (8 of 10)
- Scare zones
- Shows
- Tickets: what you’re actually buying
- Getting there
- Halloween Horror Nights Hollywood 2026
Haunted houses (8 of 10 announced)
Jack & Oddfellow: Chaos & Control
The anniversary’s original icon house explores the origin of the rivalry between Jack the Clown and Dr. Oddfellow, told from Oddfellow’s perspective, including the moment the two adversaries stop fighting and join forces. Universal announced the house at a MegaCon Orlando panel with Mike Aiello, Lora Sauls, and Charles Gray of Universal Orlando’s entertainment creative development team.
Read our full coverage of Jack & Oddfellow: Chaos & Control.
Sinners
Based on the 2025 Ryan Coogler vampire horror film. The house is set inside Club Juke, the 1930s Mississippi juke joint at the center of the film, with the Smokestack Twins facing a vampire attack. The Orlando version opens as “libations flow freely, and guitar screams fill the air at the Smokestack Twins’ juke joint” before “Remmick’s troop of bloodthirsty vampires crash the party.” Sinners earned 16 Academy Award nominations at the 2026 ceremony, the most for any film in Oscar history, and won four including Best Actor for Michael B. Jordan.
Read our full coverage of Sinners.
Stranger Things 5
Developed in partnership with Netflix, the house draws from the show’s fifth and final season. Guests navigate the town of Hawkins as the barrier between reality and the supernatural collapses. Familiar locations include the Wheeler House, Hawkins National Laboratory, the MAC-Z military base, the Upside Down, and the Abyss. Demogorgons hunt at every turn, and Vecna pulls guests into the final battle.
Read our full coverage of Stranger Things at HHN.
Hellraiser
Hellraiser’s first-ever appearance at HHN, based on the original Clive Barker trilogy (1987’s Hellraiser, 1988’s Hellbound: Hellraiser II, and 1992’s Hellraiser III: Hell on Earth). Doug Bradley, the original Pinhead, reprises the role for both coasts, lending his voice to the production. Guests enter via the Lament Configuration and move through three confirmed settings: the shadowy attic of Frank Cotton’s family home, the disturbing Channard Institute, and the Labyrinth where Pinhead and the Cenobites lie in wait.
Read our full coverage of Hellraiser at HHN.
H.R. Bloodengutz Presents: A Halloween Fright-Tacular!
The horror host returns after 15 years, a direct sequel to the 2011 “H.R. Bloodengutz Presents: Holidays of Horror” with the original actor reprising the role. Bloodengutz has broken out of Carey Penitentiary on Halloween Day and returned to the derelict WKNB television studio to present a marathon of straight-to-TV Halloween films. The house is structured around seven scenes tied to seven fake movies. Some are callbacks to HHN’s own past.
Read our full coverage of H.R. Bloodengutz.
Madlands: Caged Cannibals
Original concept exclusive to Orlando. A defunct zoo is now the deadly domain of warring cannibal factions that have taken their animal instincts to extremes. Rival tribes occupy the abandoned grounds and have adopted the apex-predator behaviors of the species that once lived there, learning those traits from the zoo’s old signage and exhibit remnants. Universal Orlando’s Lora Sauls called it “one of the most aggressive in the event, very bloody, very in your face.”
Read our full coverage of Madlands.
Cybergoria
Original concept exclusive to Orlando. Set thousands of years in the future, Cybergoria’s backstory centers on a corporation called Bio Immortal Bionic Intelligent Systems that offered customers cryo-frozen immortality on the condition they be frozen until the tech to deliver eternal life caught up. The company never delivered. Its intelligent facility, left to “make do with its resources,” began fusing human and robot parts to keep tissue alive. Show director Matthew Flood compared the intensity to Universal’s 2024 “Insidious: The Further” house.
Read our full coverage of Cybergoria.
Invasion: Alien Abduction
Original concept exclusive to Orlando, and the first original alien-abduction house in the event’s 35-year history. A ship of Grays has descended on a remote Southwestern homestead and is tearing the property apart, snatching the family and its livestock for experiments. Senior show director Charles Gray moved the setting away from the cliche cornfield to a turquoise-and-cactus Southwest, and gave the aliens a unique shuffling movement style. The house uses a vibrating floor to make guests feel the ship overhead.
Read our full coverage of Invasion: Alien Abduction.
Two houses remain unannounced. They’ll be added to this guide as Universal reveals them.
Scare zones (2 announced)
Infernal Carnival of Nightmares
The first scare zone shares its name with the event theme itself. “Jack and Dr. Oddfellow invite you to step right up and see what horrors hide in every shadow at a sinister spectacle decades in the making,” Universal wrote in the announcement. The announcement graphic highlights the first letter of each word in red, spelling out “ICON,” a nod to the two co-icons. Universal has not yet confirmed the scare zone’s specific park location or additional details about its characters or design.
Read our full coverage of the Infernal Carnival scare zone.
Sideshow of Decay
The second scare zone is set in a carnival junkyard. Per Universal: “Cindy’s time has come. With Dr. Oddfellow’s dark sorcery, she opened a portal in the carnival’s junkyard, using it to resurrect decayed nightmares from the past that are back to haunt you.” This is the first time the Cindy and Dr. Oddfellow mythologies have been connected, and the first use of the Oddverse portal device outside the icon house itself. Universal has not named which past characters return through the portal.
Read our full coverage of Sideshow of Decay.
Shows (2 announced)
Nightmare Fuel: Blood Noir
The sixth annual edition of Universal Orlando’s Nightmare Fuel stunt show, and the first show revealed for HHN 35. Blood Noir trades the connected 2024/2025 circus story arc for a vampire noir setting: “a sinister spectacle of pyro, aerialists and illusions.” The Fuel Girls, the London-based fire performance troupe that has anchored the show since its 2021 debut, have confirmed they will not return this year due to a Rock Orchestra touring conflict in Europe. Nightmare Fuel’s Wildfire (2022) previously won an IAAPA Brass Ring Award, with the citation calling the franchise the highest-rated show in HHN history.
Read our full coverage of Nightmare Fuel: Blood Noir.
Stranger Things: Return to Hawkins
A nighttime lagoon show staged on the Universal Studios Florida lagoon, announced July 15. Universal frames it as a 10th-anniversary tribute to the Netflix series spanning all five seasons of Stranger Things. Format uses water screens, projection mapping onto park buildings to recreate Hawkins locations, dynamic lighting, and audio pulled from the series’ original score. Per Jason Horne, assistant director of entertainment creative development at Universal Orlando, this is the first HHN lagoon show built entirely around a single franchise. The show is a separate experience from the previously announced Stranger Things Season 5 haunted house. Included with standard event admission.
Read our full coverage of Stranger Things: Return to Hawkins.
Tickets: what you’re actually buying
Ticket products announced for HHN Orlando 2026:
- Single-night tickets: from $87.99
- Express Pass: from $169.99
- Scream Early (2 p.m. early-entry add-on): from $70
- Premium Scream Night: $399 (August 27 or October 19)
- Multi-night passes (Frequent Fear, Frequent Fear Plus, Rush of Fear, Ultimate Frequent Fear): coming soon
Here’s my take. What you’re really buying is your wait time. If a house like Stranger Things runs a two-hour line on a busy Saturday, that’s what general admission gets you: the full two hours. Express Pass cuts that roughly in half, so 60 minutes on the same line. RIP Tours skip the line entirely, so zero wait. Premium Scream Night is a mix of those benefits, plus food and beverage and parking bundled in, and how well it holds up depends on how many other Premium buyers are there the same night.
The other lever is timing. Early entry with Scream Early (2 p.m.) gets you into houses before the peak crowd arrives. Staying late helps too. The middle of the night is when the lines are worst, and there’s no ticket product that fixes that except one of the tour tiers.
For the complete ticket breakdown, including which multi-night pass fits which visit pattern, see our Halloween Horror Nights Tickets 2026 Guide.
Getting there
Universal Studios Florida is at 6000 Universal Boulevard, Orlando, FL 32819. Event nights typically begin at 6:30 p.m. and run past midnight, with specific hours varying by date. Check the official calendar for exact times.
Halloween Horror Nights Hollywood 2026
The West Coast event runs 42 select nights from September 3 through November 1 at Universal Studios Hollywood, starting each night at 7 p.m. Three houses have been announced so far: Sinners, Stranger Things, and Hellraiser. For the Hollywood-specific guide, see our Halloween Horror Nights 2026 in Hollywood: Complete Guide.
This guide is updated as Universal makes new announcements. Last updated July 14, 2026.
