Every year on Halloween, various businesses hold activities, with Shanghai Disneyland and Happy Valley hosting the largest events. However, the most attractive, creative, and popular is the Halloween street parade organized spontaneously by Shanghai residents. People gather annually at Found 158 for various cosplay activities.

Why Found 158? It used to be Shanghai’s most famous nightlife hotspot (although it’s not as popular as before since the COVID-19 pandemic). It’s a sunken plaza with many bars and nightclubs, featuring an open-plan design that facilitates mingling and socializing. The bar customer highly overlaps with the young crowd that enjoys Halloween, making it the liveliest spot for Halloween celebrations each year.

It’s unclear when this spontaneous event began, but it went viral during Halloween in October 2023, as that year marked the official end of pandemic restrictions in China. This event, paused for two years (there was a small-scale event in 2022 due to pandemic controls), attracted many young people and spread widely on social media, bringing it to the attention of many non-local residents.

As a result, for Halloween in October 2024, many visitors from outside Shanghai plan to participate.

If you want to experience the Halloween atmosphere in Shanghai, I suggest heading out on October 25, 26 Friday and Saturday. The 25th and 26th will be the busiest days as the weekend before Halloween is always the most bustling. This coincides with the peak hours of Shanghai’s nightlife—crowds start growing at around 7 or 8 PM, peaking from midnight to 2 AM, and winding down by 3 or 4 AM the next morning. (So if you have work the next day, many choose to stay home.)

You can visit the following areas for the best experience:

1) Found 158 – This is the busiest spot. Go early to avoid being locked out due to crowd control measures.

2) and 3) – These are other nightlife hotspots where crowds gather.

Other roads marked in red will also have heavy foot traffic.

A few tips:

  • The internet can be very slow in the Found 158 area when it’s crowded, possibly leaving you without a connection.
  • Bring a power bank. Frequent photo taking, video recording, and poor signal can drain your battery quickly.
  • From midnight to around 3 AM, it can be very difficult to get a taxi in this area, so be prepared to wait in line for half an hour or more.


If you miss this event, no worries! You can join the Shanghai Pub Crawl. I’ll still show you the vibrant nightlife of Shanghai and take you to the coolest bars and nightclubs

Some videos I took last year: