Day Air Ballpark is getting ready to glow again. The Dayton Dragons announced that Deck the Diamond, the ballpark's walk-through holiday lights event, will return for a second season running 41 nights from November 13, 2026, through January 2, 2027, with more than 1.5 million lights strung across the home of the Dayton Dragons in Dayton, Ohio.
That light count marks a jump from last year's debut season, when organizers used 1.1 million lights. According to the Dayton Daily News, the total number of lights grew from 1.1 million last year to more than 1.5 million this year. The ballpark will also swap out its previous on-field theme for something new this time around.
“This year, our theme on the field is different. It's penguins,” organizers told the paper, signaling a shift from the display's debut look. The newspaper's report also noted that a new Polar Barrel Express ride has been added alongside the existing North Pole Express, a move organizers said was intended to help reduce crowds during busy nights.
What Families Can Expect Each Night
Every ten minutes, visitors will see a synchronized music-and-light show across the lit-up ballpark, according to milb.com. The same report lists a lineup of family-friendly activities planned for each night, including s'more roasting at fire pits, visits with Santa, a scavenger hunt, ornament-making, and rides on the North Pole Express.
As reported by WKEF, Dayton Dragons Senior Director of Corporate Partnerships Tucker Ellis is expected to share what is new this year and how people can take part. The station's report frames the event as part of the ballpark's broader push to bring a lineup of family-friendly activities to the holiday season.
Ticket Prices and What They Cover
The event website lists admission at $13.50 for all dates, with an added $2 fee for anyone buying tickets day-of. Exactly what that admission price covers is less clear, since the event's own pages give conflicting answers. The dragonsdeckthediamond.com homepage states that all activities, excluding the North Pole Express train and s'more fire pits, are included with the cost of a ticket, while the site's activities page says all activities excluding the North Pole Express are included in the ticket cost, with food, beverage, and merchandise listed as additional costs.
Those two pages, both found on the Deck the Diamond event website, don't agree on whether the s'more fire pits require an extra charge. Families planning a visit may want to confirm the exact inclusions before heading to Day Air Ballpark, since the discrepancy between the two official pages hasn't been resolved publicly.
