Jack O' Lantern Extravaganza at the Pittsburgh Zoo

If you are looking for a way to fill a fall evening with the kids, the Pittsburgh Zoo & PPG Aquarium has its annual Jack O' Lantern Extravaganza back for 2026. It is one of those seasonal traditions that has become a go-to for local families around Halloween, and this year it runs from Friday, October 23 through Thursday, October 30, with the gates open from 6:30 PM to 10:00 PM. There are a couple of additional dates beyond that as well, so it is worth checking the full schedule if the end of the month does not line up with your plans.

The draw is simple: thousands of hand-carved jack o' lanterns lit up after dark, which is a lot to take in when you are walking through the zoo grounds at night. Around the pumpkins, there are spooky scavenger hunts and seasonal food and drink to keep everyone going, and the night train that ran last year is back as well. It is built as a family-friendly walk-through, so it works just as well for young kids as it does for older ones.

If you are planning to go with a group that includes adults who might want something a bit more lively, there is a 21+ layer to the event on Thursday nights. Those add-on activations turn the evening into something a bit different, with a mixology class, a comedy night, and the Disco's UNdead Halloween Party all on the table. It is a nice way to stretch the event across a couple of visits if you want to do the family walk-through one night and the adult programming another.

It helps to know what you are walking into before you head over. The zoo sits on 77 acres in Highland Park and holds more than 4,000 animals across 475 species, so the scale of the place is part of the experience. It has a long history behind it, too: it opened in 1898 as the Highland Park Zoo after Christopher Lyman Magee donated $125,000 to build a zoological garden, and it has grown into one of the largest zoo-aquarium hybrids in the country. The PPG Aquarium opened in 1967 as the AquaZoo and was the second-largest aquarium in the U.S. at the time, and the zoo has added a whole series of themed areas over the decades, from the African Savanna to the Tropical Forest. It is a place with a lot of layers, and the Extravaganza uses that space in a way you do not get during a normal daytime visit.

Tickets are sold through the event website, so it is worth grabbing yours ahead of time rather than hoping to walk up. The event runs from 6:30 PM to 10:00 PM, which gives you plenty of time to wander the grounds at your own pace, whether you are there for the pumpkins, the scavenger hunts, or the night train. For a family tradition that is easy to drop into a fall weekend, it is hard to beat.