San Jose's Halloween season is built for kids, and almost none of it requires a ticket beyond places you'd already go. The city's flagship free event, Pumpkins in the Park at Discovery Meadow, hands out free pumpkins on an early-October Saturday and has been doing it for nearly three decades. Happy Hollow Park & Zoo layers Green Halloween onto its regular admission for the back half of October — costume parade, animal shows, and in recent years a discount if your kid shows up dressed up. Down Hecker Pass, Gilroy Gardens runs The Great Big BOO! on fall weekends, deliberately pitched as not-too-spooky for the preschool-through-early-elementary crowd. Then there are the two great candy crawls: Santana Row's morning festival and Willow Glen's beloved Trick-or-Treat Along Lincoln Avenue, where merchants hand out candy in age-banded shifts and every kid leaves with a free book. One heads-up for longtime locals: Great America's Halloween events are gone, and Winchester's night haunt is genuinely scary — daytime tours are the family move there.
Happy Hollow's Green Halloween (roughly the last two weeks of October) folds a costume parade, creepy-crawly animal shows, crafts, and games into regular admission — and in 2025 a costume earned $3 off at the gate. Gilroy Gardens' The Great Big BOO! runs weekends from late September, aimed squarely at little kids: think friendly characters and candy, not chainsaws. Pumpkins in the Park at Discovery Meadow (early October, 10am–4pm) is the pure freebie — free entry, free pumpkins while they last, a costume contest, and inflatables along the Guadalupe River. Arrive before noon for pumpkin supply and easier parking.
Willow Glen's Trick-or-Treat Along Lincoln Avenue is the neighborhood classic, typically the weekday before Halloween, split by age: toddlers and preschoolers late morning, grades 1–6 mid-afternoon. Merchants hand out candy, and the Books for Treats table gives every child a free book. Street parking fills fast — walk or park a few blocks off Lincoln. Santana Row's Trick-or-Treat The Row (a weekday morning in late October) is free with no registration: shop-to-shop candy, live music, pumpkin decorating, and stilt walkers, all stroller-easy on flat pavement with garage parking.
After dark in October, Winchester runs a professionally produced haunt (in 2025: Festival Fright Nights, roughly $50–$90) — live scare actors, and absolutely not for young children. By day, the same gorgeous, odd mansion offers its regular tours, which many grade-schoolers find pleasantly spooky rather than terrifying. If your kid is haunted-house-curious but under 12, do the daytime tour and save the night event for teens.
Two things longtime South Bay families should know: California's Great America no longer runs any Halloween event — Halloween Haunt ended in 2021 and the family Tricks and Treats didn't return after 2024 — and Winchester's haunt rebranded from Unhinged to Festival Fright Nights in 2025. Don't plan around outdated listings.
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Pumpkins in the Park at Discovery Meadow (free entry and free pumpkins, early October), Willow Glen's Trick-or-Treat Along Lincoln Avenue, and Santana Row's Trick-or-Treat The Row are all free. Happy Hollow's Green Halloween is included with regular admission.
The nighttime haunt is not — it's a live-actor scare event aimed at teens and adults. Daytime mansion tours run as usual and suit school-age kids.
No. Halloween Haunt ended after 2021, and the family-oriented Tricks and Treats last ran in 2024.
Gilroy Gardens' The Great Big BOO! is designed to be not-too-spooky, and Santana Row's morning festival is flat, stroller-friendly, and only two hours. Both are gentler than evening events.