Pennsylvania’s best haunted houses, ghost tours & spooky experiences
These haunted houses, ghost tours, and other spooky season activities across Pennsylvania are frightfully fun.
Pennsylvania is home to plenty of opportunities to get scared this spooky season, whether you’re interested in touring some of the most famous haunted attractions in the country, hearing scary stories rooted in history on a classic ghost tour, or exploring regional haunts that combine local lore and unusual sites with classic jump scares. You’ll find Hollywood-level special effects in every corner of Pennsylvania as well as attractions based on unsettling state history. Read on to learn about the scariest frights that you can visit this fall.
Nationally acclaimed haunted houses
These haunted attractions have been awarded by national publications for their designs, special effects, and expertise in scaring even the bravest of visitors. And they’re right here in Pennsylvania!
Hundred Acres Manor – Bethel Park (Allegheny County)
Located in the South Hills of Pittsburgh, Hundred Acres Manor has been named one of the best haunted houses in the country by the Travel Channel and other travel outlets. The attraction is made up of five different terrifying themes, like “The Sisterhood” and “South Valley Hospital,” together forming a walk-through haunt spanning over a mile. The haunted house is even home to a “Scream Bar” hosted by local brewery Cinderlands (which is located outside the manor if you’re more interested in sipping than shrieking). Plus, while most haunted attractions are for-profit enterprises, Hundred Acres is a 501(c)3 nonprofit that has donated millions of dollars to local charities since it first opened two decades ago.
Shocktoberfest – Sinking Spring (Berks County)
Shocktoberfest near Reading is often referred to as a “haunted theme park”—or a scream park. The attraction has been designed as “Zombie World Theme Park,” where “guests can view an array of natural and genetically engineered Zombies in a safe and controlled habitat,” according to Shocktoberfest. The outcome of this scenario is similar to the plot of Jurassic Park—the undead find a way, you might say—and provides the backstory to much of the thrills. You can take a hayride tour with the “Zombie Safari Company” or see the renovated “prison” where zombies are kept in a sort of zoo, where they are totally all contained and definitely won’t escape to chase and scare you. The park also offers food and drink options, including adult beverages. And if the zombies are too scary for young kids or kids at heart, “Spooktoberfest” is a family-friendly version of the attraction open two hours before the real frights begin.
Reaper’s Revenge – Blakely (Lackawanna County)
Not far from Scranton, Reaper’s Revenge is known as one of the scariest haunted hayrides in the country. The ride explores the attraction’s 66 acres of forest in northeastern Pennsylvania, with chilling creatures and elaborate sets waiting at each turn to inspire nightmares. While the hayride has achieved national fame, Reaper’s Revenge is also home to other spine-tingling attractions like the Lost Carnival, post-apocalyptic Sector 13, and industrial horror Pitch Black.
Halloween Nights at Eastern State Penitentiary – Philadelphia
Halloween Nights at Eastern State Penitentiary is the historic prison’s biggest fundraiser of the year, and it goes all out with Hollywood-quality sets, special effects, and scares. The festival features five haunted houses like “Dark Tides,” a creepy “abandoned” fishing village, and “Apocalypse Pass,” where, according to Eastern State, “containment has broken down, giving way to an unpredictable outbreak.” Several years ago, the site stopped including the prisoner experience as part of the haunted attraction, and visitors can instead take historic tours of the country’s first penitentiary. Beyond the scares, Halloween Nights also offers themed bars, lounges, and live entertainment areas.
Bates Motel and Haunted Hayride – Glen Mills (Delaware County)
The Bates Motel and Haunted Hayride is known as one of the best haunted attractions in the U.S. for its traditional haunted house (the Bates Motel) as well as its haunted hayride throughout the farm’s forest, which the attraction promises has “more pyrotechnics than a Kiss concert.” The haunt is also home to the Revenge of the Scarecrows Haunted Corn Trail, which has buildings, sets, animatronics, and actors just like a regular haunted house, except it’s a winding outdoor maze.
Ghost tours with real—and disturbing—history
If you prefer haunting history to jump scares, you can join a ghost tour in a Pennsylvania city or town said to be haunted by ghosts.
Grim Philly Twilight Tours – Philadelphia
As one of the oldest cities in the country, Philadelphia is also purported to be one of the most haunted, with ghostly residents dating back to the 1600s. You can learn about the people and the lore behind Philadelphia’s most popular ghost stories on a ghost tour with Grim Philly Twilight Tours. The tours take guests through the historic district and are led by historians who’ll share both disturbing truths and frightening legends. Tour guides won’t water down their stories: Grim Philly’s two-hour night tours are explicitly meant for adults.
Civil War Ghosts – Gettysburg (Adams County)
Because more than 50,000 people were wounded, died, or went missing in a span of three days during the Battle of Gettysburg in 1863, Gettysburg is regularly considered one of the most haunted places in the country. People have claimed paranormal encounters with Civil War-era ghosts for decades. The tour company Civil War Ghosts brings these experiences to life alongside real history on daily, one-hour ghostly walking tours, which visit some of the town’s most haunted sites, like the Gettysburg Orphanage.
Unique and offbeat spooky experiences
These haunted attractions aren’t your typical haunted houses; instead, they incorporate elements like haunted caves, immersive theater, and regional lore.
Hellstead Manor – Hallstead (Susquehanna County)
Hellstead Manor is a homegrown haunted attraction set inside a nearly two-century-old manor house in the town of Hallstead. The story-driven haunt leads guests through the historic home and into the surrounding woods, where frightening creatures and jump scares await. The attraction is owned by a couple, one with family ties to the manor and the other a former Hollywood special effects makeup artist. Hellstead Manor “isn’t just a façade,” owner Eric Lusk said in an email, as the manor is said to be genuinely haunted. “It’s different from other haunted houses because it’s a real house, with decades of bizarre history and people’s own stories about it,” he said. Lusk has used his Hollywood experience to design realistic monsters and frights, some inspired by the manor’s history and legends, and others imagined for the haunt.
The Haunted Mine at Tour-Ed Mine – Tarentum (Allegheny County)
During spooky season, Tour-Ed Mine in Tarentum near Pittsburgh turns into The Haunted Mine, complete with a haunted train car ride through the mine. The tour is based on the abusive dealings of the fictional Louis W. Hicks, a businessman who operated a dangerous and illegal mine using slave labor. Visitors to The Haunted Mine attraction are invited to try to find the lost souls who were Hicks’ victims—without becoming victims themselves. (Not-so)-fun fact: Louis W. Hicks isn’t real, but Lewis W. Hicks owned and operated more than a dozen coal mines in the Greater Pittsburgh area during the late 1800s and early 1900s. A 1980 article in The Western Pennsylvania Historical Magazine described the “slave-like conditions” of Hicks’ mines and the private armies he’d hire to break workers’ strikes.
Eeriebyss Factory of Terror – Erie (Erie County)
Eeriebyss Factory of Terror is located in a former factory building originally built in 1892, and the haunted attraction leans into that history by creating an industrial warehouse of scares. The factory once housed Griswold Manufacturing, which produced cast-iron pots and pans, but as Eeriebyss, it now produces a half mile of scares along two floors of the four-story building.
Castle Blood – Monessen (Westmoreland County)
Castle Blood in Monessen is a beloved area institution that is unlike other Halloween attractions. Not your average haunted house, Castle Blood is part escape room, part theater performance, and part immersive haunt. As you travel through the building—a century-old former funeral home—you’ll be presented with puzzles, challenges, and a host of terrifying creatures who may help you, sidetrack you, or simply scare you silly. In addition, the cast rotates, so each visit to Castle Blood’s “haunted adventure tour” promises a new experience!
Ghosts and Goblins at Lincoln Caverns – Huntingdon (Huntingdon County)
Lincoln Caverns gets the Halloween treatment with Ghosts and Goblins, an annual event that has transformed the cave into a spooky attraction since 1983. The caverns present different scary stories each year throughout the haunted cave tour, haunted hayride, and haunted walking trail that make up the attraction. Daytime tours are family-friendly, while the real scares happen at night.
Scream Mountain – Spring Mount (Montgomery County)
Scream Mountain is the haunted version of Spring Mountain, the ski resort in Montgomery County. The attraction features a haunted hayride that takes guests on a tour around the mountain. You can also add a haunted ski lift ride that takes visitors up the mountain, where they will then find their way down the mountain on a spooky trail. A “starter” haunted hayride allows guests to take the ride before the attraction opens, and without actors in the woods, so you can appreciate the scenes without the scares.
Our stories may be republished online or in print under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. We ask that you edit only for style or to shorten, provide proper attribution and link to our web site. Please see our republishing guidelines for use of photos and graphics.
