Free Día de los Muertos events for kids in the Bay Area

The biggest free Día de los Muertos events for families in the Bay Area this year fall on Halloween weekend. Mexican Heritage Plaza in San José holds its free Avenida de Altares on Saturday, October 31. The Unity Council’s free festival in Oakland’s Fruitvale is on Sunday, November 1. Libraries often add smaller events, such as altar building, calavera crafts and bilingual storytimes. The live list at the bottom of this page shows the ones posted for the next two weeks.

What Día de los Muertos is, in a sentence or two

Día de los Muertos (Day of the Dead) is a Mexican tradition kept on November 1 and 2. Families remember people who have died by building an ofrenda, a home altar with photos, marigolds, candles, favorite foods and sugar skulls (calaveras). For kids it’s a gentle, colorful way to talk about family and memory. Many Bay Area events invite you to bring a photo or add something to a community altar.

San José: Avenida de Altares at Mexican Heritage Plaza

Avenida de Altares is the 10th annual Día de los Muertos celebration at Mexican Heritage Plaza, and the organizers call it a free family event.

• When: Saturday, October 31, 2026, 5:30 to 10:30 pm.
• Where: School of Arts and Culture at MHP, 1700 Alum Rock Avenue, San José.
• For kids: hands-on art activities for all ages and face painting.
• Also: a community altar gallery and an artisan market. Performers are still to be announced.
• Good to know: most of it is outdoors, with some activities indoors, so bring layers for the evening.

The page doesn’t mention parking or registration. If you’re going with little ones, arriving near the 5:30 start gives you the art tables before the evening crowd.

Oakland: the Día de los Muertos Festival in Fruitvale

The Unity Council’s Oakland Día de los Muertos Festival is a free outdoor festival.

• When: Sunday, November 1, 2026, 10 am to 5 pm.
• Where: Fruitvale Village, Oakland.
• For kids: the Unity Council lists family-friendly games, rides and activities.

The festival’s own site, diaoakland.com, hadn’t posted 2026 street closures or a route map when we checked. In past years it has called the festival a BART-able event reachable by BART and AC Transit, which is worth considering on a day this busy. Look at the site again the week before for this year’s layout.

Also on November 1: it’s the first Sunday of the month, when the Oakland Museum of California offers free admission, including its special exhibitions. The museum suggests booking online for your preferred entry time.

San Francisco: the Mission District procession

San Francisco’s Mission District has a long-running evening procession on November 2. The 2025 one was the 44th. For 2025, the Calle 24 Latino Cultural District listed the procession on November 2 at 7 pm, assembling at 22nd and Bryant streets. When we checked, no 2026 listing had been posted, so we don’t know this year’s time or route. In 2026, November 2 is a Monday, a school night, which matters if you have young kids. Check Calle 24’s events page before you go.

Library events: altars, crafts and storytimes

Public libraries are where most of the small, free, kid-sized Día de los Muertos events happen. Typical programs are sugar skull coloring, paper marigolds, papel picado, a community ofrenda in the children’s area, or a bilingual storytime. Many are drop-in. Some limit numbers for craft supplies, so arriving a few minutes early helps.

Each of these comes from a library’s own calendar, and the live list below picks them up as they’re posted. The search covers San Francisco, the Peninsula, the South Bay, the East Bay and the North Bay, and keeps only free events for kids.

Tips for going with kids

• Bring something for the altar. Many community ofrendas welcome a photo or a drawing. A child can draw a grandparent or a pet they miss.
• Talk about it beforehand. Skulls and skeletons here are joyful, not scary. A short book from the library the week before helps younger kids.
• Plan for crowds. Street festivals get busy, so pick a meeting spot in case you get separated, and consider transit.
• Dress for the evening. The San José and San Francisco events run after dark, and early November nights get cold.
• Check before you leave. Times and details can change. The organizer’s page is always the final word, and we link each one above.

See the free events near you

Nil, who started this site, is a Bay Area dad of three. Every weekend he worried about what to do with the kids that was fun, close and free, and the answers were spread over dozens of calendars, so he built this site to put them in one place. The live list below shows free Día de los Muertos events for kids for the next two weeks. For everything else on Halloween weekend, see our Halloween page, or browse free kids events in San José, Oakland and San Francisco.