Boo in the Bottoms 2026: Dates, Daytime Events and Haunted Attractions

• Boo in the Bottoms takes over Kansas City’s Historic West Bottoms from Friday, Oct. 2, through Sunday, Oct. 4, with vintage shopping, trick-or-treating in the stores and a free “Thriller” dance lesson on Saturday.
• The Beast and Edge of Hell open their 2026 seasons that Friday night, with only 13 nights on the calendar through Halloween.
• The daytime side has no ticket. The haunted houses cost $40 each or $66 for both, plus a $5 fee per ticket.

Halloween starts Friday in the West Bottoms. Boo in the Bottoms, the Kansas City district’s Halloween shopping weekend, runs Friday, Oct. 2, through Sunday, Oct. 4, and on Friday night the Beast and Edge of Hell open for the season.

The district announced the lineup on Sept. 25: trick-or-treating at participating stores, fire pits with s’mores, costumed haunt characters on the streets and a “Thriller” dance lesson on Saturday. After dark, the same blocks lead to two of the country’s best-known haunted houses. Here’s the schedule, what’s free and what costs money.

When is Boo in the Bottoms 2026?

The weekend runs Oct. 2 to 4 across the district’s 13 blocks of old warehouses, just off the 12th Street Bridge on the west side of downtown Kansas City, Missouri. Hours vary by activity, and most of the daytime program costs nothing.

The schedule is the one the district published on Sept. 25. The haunted houses’ hours come from their official October calendars.

What is First Friday Weekend in the West Bottoms?

The West Bottoms shops on a monthly calendar. The big dates are First Friday Weekend, the Friday-to-Sunday stretch that starts on the first Friday of each month, when the district’s stores open together. Its website keeps a separate, much shorter list of stores that open every weekend.

Each month’s weekend gets a theme under a banner the district calls the Festival of the Full Moon. September was Bonfire in the Bottoms. After Boo in the Bottoms comes Blessings in the Bottoms, Nov. 6 to 8, and then Bows in the Bottoms, every weekend before Christmas starting Dec. 4.

The shopping is vintage and antique: furniture, décor, architectural pieces and collectibles, spread over multiple floors of buildings more than a century old. The district bills itself as the largest indoor vintage entertainment district open year-round.

This year’s featured shops include Good JuJu, Bella Patina, Serendipity, Robin’s Nest, Rustic Vintage Rose, Charmed House, Ugly Glass, All Keyed Up Piano Shop and Treasures on 13th, which has two stores in the Central Bag Building.

For food and drinks, the district lists Chef J BBQ, Java Garage, Bella Patina’s Painted Rooster Café and West Bottoms Whiskey Co.

Good JuJu has a history with the haunts: the district describes it as the original store that opened after the haunted houses helped bring people back to the area. Its owner, Pam Kenney, marked its 16th anniversary in 2023.

What’s free at Boo in the Bottoms?

Most of the daytime program. Kids and adults are encouraged to come in costume and trick-or-treat at participating stores. Characters from the Beast and Edge of Hell roam outside for photos, and the district describes them as family-friendly: in past years’ announcements, it stressed the daytime monsters are there for photo ops, not scares.

On Saturday, Oct. 3, from 11 a.m. to 2 p.m., dance instructor D3 Stepper teaches the zombie routine from Michael Jackson’s 1983 “Thriller” video in the street, for free and for all ages. Dancing isn’t required; the district’s spokesperson invites people to watch the dancers, too.

“Come down during the day and get into some good trouble. Hunt for vintage treasures, learn the ‘Thriller’ dance or watch the dancers, and get your picture with our haunt characters before they go to work. Then Friday night, things take a darker turn.”

Amber Arnett-Bequeaith, spokesperson for the Historic West Bottoms

The fire pits, with s’mores, run Friday to Sunday from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., next to the Full Moon Street Bar and its seasonal drinks. On Saturday, the KC Collectors Spooky Plant Sale sets up with plant vendors, Halloween items, candy, costumes and collectibles from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m.

The video below, from Full Moon Productions’ official channel, walks the same route on a 2023 First Friday Weekend: costumed characters and vintage shops by day, the lines at the Beast and Edge of Hell at night.

When do the Beast and Edge of Hell open in 2026?

Both open Friday, Oct. 2, and both run the same 13 nights: Oct. 2, 3, 9, 10, 15, 16, 17, 22, 23, 24, 29, 30 and 31. Thursdays and Fridays run 7:30 to 11:30 p.m. Saturdays run later, 6:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m.

Tickets are timed. On Thursdays and Fridays, the ticket site sells entry windows at 7:30, 8:30, 9:30 and 10:30 p.m.; on Saturdays, hourly from 6:30 to 11:30 p.m. The houses themselves stay up all year: Full Moon Productions, which owns both, says its crews rework the scenes in the off-season.

How much are tickets?

Prices are the same every night, according to the ticket site on Monday, Sept. 28:

Each ticket carries a $5 service fee, and a 9.975% sales tax applies to every order. Sales are final: no refunds or price adjustments. Groups of 25 or more get a discounted rate through the ticket office.

What should you know before going to the Beast or Edge of Hell?

Everyone starts at the Central Waiver Station, 1300 W. 13th St., and the attractions ask guests to arrive an hour before their entry time. Each guest is recorded on video confirming they’ve read the release of liability, then gets a security bracelet. Tickets for open time slots are sold there, too.

Minors need a parent or guardian, 18 or older with a valid ID, to sign the waiver in person. That adult doesn’t have to go inside, but children under 12 must go in with one. The waiver asks guests who are pregnant or have heart, seizure or breathing conditions to stay out.

The last stop is a metal detector. Weapons are banned, and so are costumes, so the one from the afternoon trick-or-treating stays in the car.

Parking is free, the ticket page says. The map on the district’s website shows free lots under the 12th Street Bridge, at 11th and Hickory, along Santa Fe Street and under I-670 between Liberty and Wyoming.

Closer $10 VIP lots sit next to Edge of Hell, the Beast and Good JuJu, and the city runs pay-to-park spaces under I-670.

Why are the West Bottoms haunted houses famous?

Edge of Hell opened in 1975 and calls itself the oldest continuously operating haunted attraction in the U.S. This is its 52nd season. The route goes through pitch-black caves, snake pits and rat-infested crypts and ends with what it calls a five-story plunge from heaven to hell.

In 2011, Guinness World Records measured Medusa, a reticulated python kept at Edge of Hell, at 25 feet 2 inches, and named her the longest snake ever in captivity. Full Moon says live snakes, rats, spiders and a crocodile live in its houses year-round.

The Beast followed in 1991. It spreads over several floors of a building from around 1900, with scenes built on history’s darkest chapters, from voodoo curses and witch trials to Jack the Ripper, plus large animatronics and illusions.

The houses are a family business. Amber Arnett-Bequeaith, who carries the title Queen of Haunts, is Full Moon’s creative vice president and the district’s president. Full Moon’s website says she slept in a coffin at Edge of Hell as a small child.

Kansas City had more than 13 haunted houses in the 1980s, she has said, and fewer, more elaborate ones today. When Travel Channel ranked America’s scariest attractions with Elvira, Mistress of the Dark, all four West Bottoms haunts of the time made the top 10. Elvira called the district a “village of the damned.”

More Halloween: need a costume for Saturday? Here are thrift store Halloween costumes you can put together, and Disney World’s Halloween food, with prices. For a night in, there’s how to watch American Horror Story Season 13 and what’s new on Netflix in October. More in Trending.

— Bruno Monteiro

Sources: Historic West Bottoms District announcement, “Boo in the Bottoms Awakens Halloween in Kansas City from Daytime Delights to Nighttime Frights” (PR Newswire, Sept. 25, 2026), with quotes from Amber Arnett-Bequeaith; the district’s earlier announcements for Boo in the Bottoms (Oct. 4, 2023, and Sept. 30, 2025) and Bonfire in the Bottoms (Sept. 1, 2026); the Beast and Edge of Hell websites (October 2026 calendars, safety and release-of-liability pages, checked Sept. 28, 2026); the attractions’ Interactive Ticketing page (prices, fees and entry times, checked Sept. 28, 2026); Full Moon Productions’ website (history, year-round animals, the Travel Channel ranking, Elvira’s quote and the Haunt World honor); the Historic West Bottoms website (shops and parking map); Guinness World Records (Medusa, 2011). Photos courtesy of Full Moon Productions and the Historic West Bottoms District.