Six Flags Over Texas is gearing up for another Fright Fest season, and this year the Arlington park is adding a Día de los Muertos-themed scare zone to its lineup of nighttime haunts. The seasonal event kicks off September 11 and runs through November 1, transforming the park after dark on select nights while daytime family programming continues alongside it.
According to WFAA, Fright Fest will include five haunted mazes and six outdoor scare zones this year, per the park's press release. The new Día de los Muertos zone joins returning favorites like The Last Harvest, Outlaw's Revenge, The Plague, and Forsaken Fairgrounds, giving guests a mix of familiar frights and fresh territory to wander through once the sun goes down.
A New Hybrid Horror Zone Debuts
Also new for 2026 is Doc Varnum's Hybrid Hell Pit, described as an immersive experience featuring hybrid creatures and unpredictable encounters, all set within a haze of mysterious swamp fog, the station's report notes. It joins a maze roster carrying over licensed horror properties from last year, including Saw: Legacy of Terror, The Conjuring Universe, The Strangers: No Escape, and Eversmile Industries presented by M&M's, along with Terror at the Polynesian Palm presented by Skittles.
The event's live entertainment lineup also returns with a heavy dose of theatrical scares. Shows include The Awakening, Wake the Dead, The Spectral Sisters, and Ballet Folklorico: Día de los Muertos, per the same account. Good Morning Texas covered one of the park's haunted mazes during the 2025 Fright Fest season, giving Dallas-area viewers an earlier look at the kind of live-action scares the park has built its fall reputation on.
Daytime Family Fun Runs Alongside the Scares
While Fright Fest leans into adult-oriented horror after dark, Six Flags is pairing it with its Tricks and Treats experience, aimed squarely at families and available on select days. That daytime program includes a trick-or-treat trail, a hay bale maze, and a costume contest, giving younger visitors their own seasonal activities without the scare-zone intensity. The dual approach reflects a broader shift across the newly merged Six Flags Entertainment Corporation, which began expanding family-friendly daytime programming like Tricks and Treats — originally a Cedar Fair property — across legacy Six Flags parks following the companies' 2024 merger, according to Haunted Attraction Network.
The Arlington park is also running its annual Oktoberfest festival on Saturdays and Sundays from September 12 through November 1, serving German-inspired food and beverages during daytime hours, per the City of Arlington. Stacking multiple seasonal events allows the park to draw different crowds throughout the same weekend, from families grabbing pretzels in the afternoon to thrill-seekers lining up for mazes at night.
Tickets, Passes, and Practical Details
Fright Fest and park tickets cost at least $69, and haunted maze access requires a separate pass on top of standard admission. A Haunted Attractions Pass, which provides access to six haunted attractions, starts at $30 for single-night entry, WFAA reports. Park guidelines also recommend that families with children 12 and under exit the park by 6 p.m. on event nights, before evening scare actors take over the outdoor zones following The Awakening ceremony, according to the Guide to Six Flags Over Texas.
This year's Fright Fest also lands during a milestone stretch for the Arlington park, which is marking its 65th anniversary and debuting Tormenta Rampaging Run, a giga dive coaster billed as the world's tallest, fastest, and longest, standing 309 feet tall and reaching 87 mph — a launch Hoodline covered in its earlier coaster reporting. Six Flags Over Texas opened as the chain's founding park on August 5, 1961, developed by Angus G. Wynne Jr. with an initial $10 million investment across 212 acres in Arlington, according to History.com.
