The 20 Best Halloween Movies (and Where to Stream Them)

The short answer

If you only watch one movie this Halloween, make it John Carpenter's Halloween (1978). It is the film the holiday borrowed its movie identity from, and it still works because it is patient, quiet and almost bloodless. Watching with kids? Put on Hocus Pocus (1993). Want something newer? Get Out (2017) is the modern pick that holds up on a second viewing.

Below are 20 picks sorted by mood, each with the year, director, US rating and where it is streaming in the US as of late October 2026. Streaming deals change every month, and Halloween titles move around more than most, so check your app before you settle on the couch.

Once you have a shortlist, our Halloween movies streaming guide shows where each one plays, the best psychological horror movies go darker, and our The Exorcist (1973) review revisits a true classic. For the holiday's roots, see Halloween on Wikipedia, and check live availability on JustWatch.

Quick picks

• Best overall: Halloween (1978) - AMC+
• Best for families: Hocus Pocus (1993) - Disney+
• Best for younger kids: The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993) - Disney+
• Best slasher for people who don't like slashers: Scream (1996) - Hulu
• Best modern horror: Get Out (2017) - Peacock
• Best horror comedy: Beetlejuice (1988) - HBO Max
• Best for a sleepover: Happy Death Day (2017) - Peacock
• Best if you want to actually be scared: Hereditary (2018) - HBO Max

Classic Halloween movies

These are the ones people come back to every October. Some are older than your parents, and they still beat most of what came out last year.

Halloween (1978)

Director: John Carpenter | Rated: R | Stream: AMC+

A masked man comes home to a small Illinois town on Halloween night, and a babysitter named Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis, in her first film role) slowly figures out she is being watched. That's the whole plot. What makes it great is how little Carpenter shows you. Most of the fear comes from a figure standing still at the edge of the frame and a piano theme Carpenter wrote himself. If you have only seen the sequels, the original will surprise you with how restrained it is.

Psycho (1960)

Director: Alfred Hitchcock | Rated: R | Stream: Netflix, Peacock

Hitchcock pulled the rug out from under audiences so hard that cinemas enforced a no-late-entry policy. Without spoilers: the movie you think you are watching for the first 40 minutes is not the movie you end up with. It's black and white, it's over 65 years old, and it is still one of the most tightly built thrillers ever made.

Night of the Living Dead (1968)

Director: George A. Romero | Rated: Not rated | Stream: Peacock, Tubi (free with ads)

Seven strangers barricade themselves in a farmhouse while the dead walk outside. Romero made it on a tiny budget near Pittsburgh, and it more or less invented the modern zombie movie. It's grim in tone rather than graphic, and the ending is one people still argue about. Because it fell into the public domain, you will find it on a lot of services. Stick to legitimate ones like Peacock and Tubi.

The Nightmare Before Christmas (1993)

Director: Henry Selick | Rated: PG | Stream: Disney+

Tim Burton produced it and came up with the story, but Selick directed it, which surprises a lot of people. Jack Skellington, the Pumpkin King, gets bored of Halloween and tries to take over Christmas. The stop-motion is gorgeous, the Danny Elfman songs are stuck in your head for a week, and it works in both October and December. It counts as a classic and a family pick.

Family-friendly Halloween movies

Spooky without nightmares. These are good for a family movie night, though you know your kids best. A PG rating can still mean a jump or two.

Hocus Pocus (1993)

Director: Kenny Ortega | Rated: PG | Stream: Disney+

Three 17th-century witches, the Sanderson sisters, get accidentally summoned back to modern Salem by a teenager who lights the wrong candle. Bette Midler, Sarah Jessica Parker and Kathy Najimy are clearly having the time of their lives. It was not a hit when it came out. It became one because families rewatched it every October for 30 years, which tells you something.

Hocus Pocus 2 (2022)

Director: Anne Fletcher | Rated: PG | Stream: Disney+

The sisters return 29 years later with a new group of Salem teens to deal with. It's not as sharp as the first one, but the cast is back, and it makes an easy double feature with the original on the same app.

Coraline (2009)

Director: Henry Selick | Rated: PG | Stream: HBO Max, Hulu, Peacock, and free with ads on Tubi

An 11-year-old finds a small door in her new house that leads to a better version of her life, with an "Other Mother" who has buttons for eyes. Selick again, and again stop-motion. This one is creepier than Nightmare. It's a good pick for kids around 9 and up, and plenty of adults find it unsettling too.

Edward Scissorhands (1990)

Director: Tim Burton | Rated: PG-13 | Stream: Disney+, Hulu

More gothic fairy tale than horror. Johnny Depp plays an unfinished man with scissors for hands who gets taken in by a suburban family. It's sweet, sad and very Burton. It suits older kids and anyone who wants Halloween atmosphere without any scares.

Slasher-lite: scary but not too much

For people who want the masks and the jump scares without the gore. These lean on suspense, jokes and twists more than blood.

Scream (1996)

Director: Wes Craven | Rated: R | Stream: Hulu (and on Pluto TV from October 8, 2026)

Scream turns 30 this year, and it still plays like a puzzle box. A killer in a ghost mask is stalking teenagers who have all seen enough horror movies to know the rules, and that is the joke and the threat at the same time. Watch it right after Halloween (1978) and you'll catch a lot of the references. It's rated R, so this is a teens-and-up pick.

Happy Death Day (2017)

Director: Christopher Landon | Rated: PG-13 | Stream: Peacock

Groundhog Day, but with a masked killer. A college student keeps waking up on the morning of her birthday and keeps getting killed by the end of the day until she figures out who's behind it. Jessica Rothe carries the whole thing and is very funny. The PG-13 rating keeps it light, so it's a good sleepover movie.

Freaky (2020)

Director: Christopher Landon | Rated: R | Stream: Peacock

Same director, same idea of mixing comedy into a slasher. A high-school girl (Kathryn Newton) swaps bodies with a serial killer (Vince Vaughn) on Friday the 13th. Vaughn playing a nervous teenage girl is worth the price of admission on its own. It has more violence than Happy Death Day, so keep it for adults and older teens.

Halloween (2018)

Director: David Gordon Green | Rated: R | Stream: Peacock

A direct sequel to the 1978 film that ignores every sequel in between. Jamie Lee Curtis returns as a much older Laurie who has spent 40 years preparing for one night. If you want to keep going, Halloween Kills is also on Peacock, and Halloween Ends is on Netflix.

Modern Halloween movies

Released in the last decade or so, and strong enough that they'll probably end up on lists like this for years.

Get Out (2017)

Director: Jordan Peele | Rated: R | Stream: Peacock

A young Black man visits his white girlfriend's family for a weekend, and their politeness starts to feel wrong. Peele's debut won the Oscar for Best Original Screenplay. It's smart, funny in places, and the tension builds so steadily that you don't notice how tightly you are holding the remote. It doesn't take place on Halloween, but it's one of the best horror films of the century so far.

Hereditary (2018)

Director: Ari Aster | Rated: R | Stream: HBO Max (also listed on Hulu and Prime Video)

This is the one on the list that is genuinely hard to sit through. It starts as a family grief drama and turns into something much darker. Toni Collette's performance is outstanding. We'd only recommend it to adults who know they like slow, heavy horror. Don't put it on at a party.

The Black Phone (2022)

Director: Scott Derrickson | Rated: R | Stream: Netflix

In 1978 Denver, a boy is kidnapped and locked in a basement with a disconnected phone that somehow keeps ringing. Ethan Hawke plays the kidnapper, mostly behind a mask. It mixes a supernatural mystery with a kid-against-the-odds story, and it is more hopeful than you'd expect.

Late Night with the Devil (2023)

Directors: Cameron Cairnes and Colin Cairnes | Rated: R | Stream: Hulu

A 1977 late-night talk show host, desperate for ratings, books a possessed girl for his Halloween-night broadcast. The whole film is presented as the tape of that episode. David Dastmalchian is great in the lead role, and the retro TV format makes it feel different from everything else here.

Comedy-horror Halloween movies

For groups that want to laugh more than scream.

Beetlejuice (1988)

Director: Tim Burton | Rated: PG | Stream: HBO Max

A recently deceased couple (Geena Davis and Alec Baldwin) hire a sleazy "bio-exorcist" to scare the new living family out of their house. Michael Keaton is only on screen for about 17 minutes and steals all of them. It's rated PG, but it's a 1980s PG, so expect some language. If you liked it, the 2024 sequel Beetlejuice Beetlejuice exists too.

Death Becomes Her (1992)

Director: Robert Zemeckis | Rated: PG-13 | Stream: Prime Video, Peacock

Meryl Streep and Goldie Hawn play rivals who drink a potion for eternal youth and then find out what "eternal" really means for a body that keeps getting damaged. It's a dark, silly satire about vanity, and it has a big cult following now.

Shaun of the Dead (2004)

Director: Edgar Wright | Rated: R | Stream: availability rotates, check JustWatch before you plan around it

A London slacker tries to sort out his life, his girlfriend and his mum in the middle of a zombie outbreak, mostly by going to the pub. It's a loving parody of Romero's films that also works as a proper zombie movie. Pair it with Night of the Living Dead for a fun double bill.

Trick 'r Treat (2007)

Director: Michael Dougherty | Rated: R | Stream: HBO Max, AMC+

Four linked stories all take place on the same Halloween night in one small Ohio town. Watching over all of them is Sam, a tiny trick-or-treater in a burlap sack mask who punishes anyone who breaks the holiday's rules. Brian Cox and Anna Paquin lead the cast. It went straight to video after years on a studio shelf and became a cult favorite anyway, mostly because nothing else feels this much like Halloween. It's darkly funny rather than silly, and it has some violent moments, so keep it for adults.

Where to stream Halloween movies by service (US)

Here's a quick summary if you already know which subscription you have. This was checked in late October 2026. For the full list by service, including every Halloween franchise film, see our guide to Halloween movies streaming now.

• Disney+: Hocus Pocus, Hocus Pocus 2, The Nightmare Before Christmas, Edward Scissorhands
• Hulu: Scream, Late Night with the Devil, Edward Scissorhands
• Peacock: Get Out, Happy Death Day, Freaky, Halloween (2018), Night of the Living Dead
• HBO Max: Beetlejuice, Hereditary, Trick 'r Treat, plus its "Horror Comes Home" collection
• Netflix: Psycho, The Black Phone, Halloween Ends
• AMC+: Halloween (1978), most of the early sequels, Trick 'r Treat
• Prime Video: Death Becomes Her, plus rentals of almost everything above
• Tubi / Pluto TV (free, with ads): Night of the Living Dead, Scream (Pluto TV from Oct 8)

Licensing changes constantly, often on the 1st of the month. If something has gone, it can usually be rented digitally for a few dollars from Prime Video, Apple TV or Fandango at Home. Stick to legitimate services. "Free movie" sites that aren't licensed are often full of malware and don't pay the people who made the film.

Plan a three-movie Halloween night

• Family night (Disney+): The Nightmare Before Christmas, then Hocus Pocus, then Hocus Pocus 2.
• Laughs to screams (Peacock): Happy Death Day, then Freaky, then Get Out.
• The origin story: Halloween (1978) on AMC+, then Scream on Hulu, then Halloween (2018) on Peacock.

If you're still in the mood after that, check out our Frankenstein review for a modern take on the original monster, or our Backrooms review for one of this year's biggest horror releases, which is now streaming on HBO Max.

Related reading

• Halloween movies streaming now
• The Exorcist (1973) review
• Best horror movies on Hulu
• All horror reviews and guides
• All streaming guides