Struggling to plan a fun-filled weekend in Manchester? Come rain or shine (in this city’s case, mainly rain), we’ve got you covered when it comes to what’s on this weekend in Manchester. From brunches to gigs, there’s something for everyone, including some activities for the kids, on our list of things to do in Manchester this weekend.
Manchester is marking a decade of monstrous fun as the beloved MCR Monsters return to take over the skyline. Celebrating their 10th anniversary, the giant inflatable beasts peer over landmarks and rooftops across the city to form their biggest trail yet.
The Halloween in the City festival ramps up the action during its headline weekender, introducing new attractions like The Monster Bake-Off and a massive Monsters Party Procession. Expect dancing puppets, stilt walkers, a six-piece brass band marching through Market Street, and pop-up family raves in St Ann’s Square. Grab your best costume and track down all 12 creatures across town.
Step into Halloween Town as you explore a moonlit trail of dazzling lights and iconic characters. Disney Tim Burton’s The Nightmare Before Christmas Light Trail will soon transform Arley Hall & Gardens into a 1.2-mile, multi-sensory walkthrough featuring over 1,700 light installations, 3D sculptures and scenes from the film. Coming to the UK for the very first time this autumn, the bewitching experience opens on October 22 and is suitable for all ages.
Carrot Productions brings a live orchestra to Manchester Central to celebrate 50 years of Aardman animations. The first half features a newly scored montage spanning five decades of the studio’s characters, from Shaun the Sheep to Morph. For the second half, the orchestra provides a live, synchronized soundtrack to a full screening of Wallace & Gromit: A Matter of Loaf and Death.
Luke Jerram’s spectacular seven-metre moon replica takes over Campfield Studios this autumn. Suspended and internally lit, the installation uses detailed NASA imagery at a 500,000:1 scale to bring the lunar surface to Manchester.
The free exhibition is set to a surround sound composition by Duncan Speakman and Sarah Anderson. As the artwork travels the globe, it gathers new music and personal stories, alongside a rolling programme of moon-inspired events tailored to each venue.
James Blake at New Century Hall
English singer-songwriter and producer James Blake heads to Manchester this autumn as part of his ‘Trying Times‘ tour. He takes over New Century Hall for a two-night residency, bringing his signature blend of electronic production, R&B, and intricate vocals to the city. The performances feature tracks from across his extensive catalogue, known for his emotive falsetto. Singer-songwriter Monica Martin joins the line-up as the main support act for both nights.
Nashville-style chicken joint Dave’s opens its second Greater Manchester outpost, bringing its notorious seven-level spice scale to the Trafford Centre. You can grab fresh-to-order chicken tenders and sliders ranging from completely mild all the way up to the infamous Reaper—a spice level so intense it requires a signed waiver.
To mark the launch, the restaurant is handing out 200 free sliders on a first-come, first-served basis to opening-day customers who sign up via their app. Expect late-night bites set to an old-school soundtrack.
After a massive run in London, Sir David Attenborough’s immersive environmental show is heading north to Chester Zoo this autumn. Taking over the former Ape House, the 50-minute experience surrounds you with 360-degree projections, original animation, and natural world footage narrated by Attenborough himself.
The story traces the four-billion-year history of Earth and humanity’s impact on it, backed by an original score and run through 50 speakers. It’s the first time the full-scale production has been staged outside the Natural History Museum. Relaxed sessions are available for visitors with younger kids.
Artist Umi Ishihara brings Nocturnal Melody to esea contemporary for its first exhibition outside London. The experience begins with Nocturnal Vibration, a soundscape combining dissonant animal calls with distorted fragments of club music. The gallery’s central film follows Tokyo dancers Eri and Catalina through dressing rooms, stages, and the Shibuya club district.
Drawing on her upbringing in Japan’s 1990s free rave scene, Ishihara narrates the piece, blending documentary footage and night-vision shots with sequences of surreal nocturnal creatures roaming the city. Across the gallery, the installation Nocturnal Breath bathes the space in blue light, featuring figures in pearlescent skinsuits that explore nightlife, performance, and liberation outside conventional societal rules.
Step inside the cosmos in this free-roam virtual reality journey, created in collaboration with the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. The experience transforms raw astronomical data from NASA, the ESA, and the Smithsonian into immersive 3D worlds, allowing you to walk through the birth of stars and the surfaces of alien planets. Guided by “Astro,” you begin on the summit of Mount Hopkins in Arizona before embarking on a tour of the galaxy. Highlights include witnessing solar flares from the Sun, exploring the lava-covered landscape of the “diamond planet” Janssen, observing the death of the red supergiant Betelgeuse, and standing at the edge of the supermassive black hole at the heart of the Milky Way.
We Stand Together installation
Manchester City marks Black History Month with a public steel installation inspired by L.S. Lowry’s matchday crowds and vintage Subbuteo players. Standing on weighted cast-concrete bases, the three-dimensional figures recreate classic terrace moments—running, reaching, and celebrating.
A continuous knitted football scarf links the sculptures, threaded with verses from Manchester poet Lemn Sissay’s The Stadium Speaks. As you walk the display, look out for photographic portraits of eight club members integrated into the crowd, including players Rico Lewis and Jade Rose alongside Etihad staff and matchday regulars.
RHS Garden Bridgewater, nestled in Worsley, makes for a perfect nature escape, offering 154 acres of stunning landscapes and floral beauty. This urban garden features award-winning designs, including the extraordinary 11-acre Weston Walled Garden and the UK’s first authentic Chinese garden. With plenty of community spaces, a play area for children, and a garden centre, it’s ideal for families and nature lovers alike. Enjoy a leisurely visit and a delightful meal in nearby Worsley.
MYTHIC REINVENTION: Celebrating 50 Years of Costume and Craft
Launching on 16th September 2026 and running until 15th November 2026, MYTHIC REINVENTION: Celebrating 50 Years of Costume and Craft forms a central part of the Royal Exchange Theatre’s 50th anniversary programme – ‘A Homecoming’. It will bring the theatre’s extraordinary costume archive to life through a free public exhibition, curated by international award-winning designer Leslie Travers.
Leading up to the exhibition launch, ‘Exchanging Stories‘, a series of live industry conversations, will look back at the venue’s exceptional history across design and craft, exploring the origins of the venue’s unique space and the theatre’s commitment to championing new work and its key role in shaping the UK’s theatre ecosystem.
Manchester’s indie cinema CULTPLEX lifts the coffin lid on a full month of sinister cinema, creepy classics, and terrifying television. The programme kicks off with The Living Dead at Manchester Morgue and packs in a bloody blend of cult favourites, including a 50th-anniversary screening of Carrie, the latest restoration of Christopher Lee’s Dracula, and a Simpsons Treehouse of Horror quiz. World cinema also takes a front seat with screenings of the edge-of-your-seat Korean thriller I Saw the Devil and the original Danish Speak No Evil.
You can also catch the UK premiere of Velocipastor 2, a chaotic bottomless-booze screening of Scooby-Doo 2: Monsters Unleashed, and a Haunted House All Nighter featuring The Shining and Japanese cult oddity Hausu. On Halloween itself, tickets drop to a spooky £6.66, starting the day with family favourite Hocus Pocus and wrapping up with a double bill of Curry Baker’s Obsession and Evil Dead II for one final night of big-screen horror.
Shameless actor David Threlfall makes his return to the Manchester stage after 27 years to take on Shakespeare’s ultimate tragic hero. Directed and adapted by Matthew Dunster, this reimagined production of King Lear serves as the flagship centerpiece for the Royal Exchange Theatre’s 50th-anniversary season, titled “A Homecoming.” Threlfall, who served as the theatre’s associate artistic director in the 1980s and 90s, stars alongside Mercury Prize-nominated musician Nadine Shah, who plays Goneril and composes the show’s original score. The ensemble cast includes Jonathan Slinger as Gloucester, Isobel Akuwudike as Cordelia, Tom Varey as Edgar, and Jason Done as Kent.
Explore Witches & Healers at Portico Library
The Portico Library explores modern magic, ritual, and reclamation in artist Rosie Reed Hillman’s exhibition, Something That Was Ours. Delving into what it means to identify as a witch today, the showcase unpacks feminist themes of wellbeing, aging, and connection to place.
Step inside to see contemporary portraiture displayed alongside centuries-old witchcraft texts and historic pamphlets. Selected in collaboration with practicing healers, the curated pairings bridge archival folklore with modern personal histories, tracing how women continue to reclaim these once-persecuted identities through herbalism, medicine, and magical thinking.
Scare City returns to the abandoned Camelot Theme Park, bringing psychological terror to the ruins. The award-winning live-action experience takes you through a continuous outdoor trail filled with live actors, immersive sets, and twisted pathways across newly unlocked, never-before-seen sections of the site. This year features nine new zones, including Cutthroat & Co, inspired by Sweeney Todd, and the Thornveil Coven, where intruders are trapped in an ancient forest. You’ll also encounter a demonic orphanage and an asylum, while CarniValley returns with a grotesque ringmaster forcing outcasts into a survival game. A new retro diner, Rest Bite, offers a break—but even the food stop is overrun by vampires and freaks.
The family-run Summerseat Garden Centre brings back its indoor pumpkin patch with a fresh woodland theme for autumn. You can wander through displays filled with scarecrows and woodland animals, snap some photos, follow the Autumn Pumpkin Trail, and pick out a pumpkin without having to brave the Lancashire weather.
Alongside the patch, a new pop-up food hut serves sourdough toasties, hot mini doughnuts, and loaded hot chocolates. A handful of specific events run throughout the month too, including appearances from The Lancashire Hawks and Owls, a Magic School, and an adults-only Faulty Towers dining experience.
Get Halloween started at the Trafford Centre
The Trafford Centre sets up an outdoor fairground packed with rides alongside the Big Wheel and Gandeys Spooktacular circus for Halloween, staging acrobatic routines and live stage acts inside a heated Big Top. Inside the complex, family programming takes over the indoor spaces with the Tiny Terrors Trail running through the Main Dome. Orient Way hosts daily hands-on craft stations rotating between trick-or-treat bag making, monster figure crafting, and cookie decorating
Albert’s Schloss Oktoberfest
Manchester’s favourite Alpine pleasure palace hosts a five-week takeover celebrating Oktoberfest with authentic Bavarian biers, hearty Cook Haus feasts, and non-stop live entertainment. Albert’s Schloss stands out as one of the few places outside Munich pouring all six official Oktoberfest brews straight from the tap—Spaten, Paulaner, Löwenbräu, Hacker-Pschorr, Hofbräu, and Augustiner. The marathon party kicks off with a traditional keg-tapping ceremony, launching a daily lineup of Oompah bands, brass sets, wiener-eating contests, and pretzel-tossing showdowns. Between steins, you can fuel up on classic Alpine dishes like Schweinshaxe, Currywurst, and slow-cooked beef goulash, or book a dedicated Bier Masterclass to tour the taps with a resident specialist.
Get ready to hit the streets for a top-rated walking adventure through Manchester. You’ll dive into the city’s best-kept secrets, taking in everything from hidden gems to the iconic street art spread across the Northern Quarter. The route covers major landmarks, including Manchester Central Library, Chinatown, Stevenson Square, and Afflecks. Along the way, the guide points out locations used in major BBC and Netflix shows, as well as spots that double for New York City on the big screen. You’ll also learn about the city’s pivotal role in history, track the humble beginnings of famous local singers, and uncover why Manchester beats to its own musical rhythm.
Campfield Market, a weekly artisan market in Manchester city centre, has expanded into St John’s, creating the biggest weekly artisan market in the UK. ‘Campfield Market at St John’s’ extends beyond the iconic Campfield building and out onto Grape Street, transforming the area into a one-kilometre loop of market stalls, street food and independent retail. Each week, visitors can expect over 100 independent traders spanning street food, local produce, artisan goods and makers, alongside an expanded food and drink line-up.
Internationally acclaimed Manchester artist Stanley Chow is taking over the Arndale this summer with a free art trail featuring 13 of his bold, minimalist portraits—blown up as giant inflatables suspended from the ceiling. The exhibition, titled ‘MCR Made’, transforms the shopping centre into a massive tribute to local icons across music, sport, science, politics, art, and culture. The six-metre installations depict familiar faces like Liam and Noel Gallagher, Marcus Rashford, Emmeline Pankhurst, and Alan Turing. The trail also debuts an exclusive new portrait of suffragette and pioneering MP Ellen Wilkinson.
Manchester’s National Football Museum opens a rare pop-up exhibition showcasing never-before-seen objects from Sir Alex Ferguson’s personal archive, coinciding with the launch of his new memoir, Games of My Life. The display brings the book’s most poignant stories to life through intimate items spanning his childhood in Govan, early playing days, Rangers, Aberdeen, and Manchester United. Visitors can view handwritten diary notes reflecting on key matches, a tracksuit, fan letters, a match ball, a VIP pass, a Scotland cap, and personal photographs.
Manchester transforms into your personal adventure playground with Race Across the World: The Experience. Step into the hit TV show’s official live adventure, where your team navigates the city streets, solves mind-bending puzzles, and manages a virtual budget over 2-3 exhilarating hours. Discover iconic landmarks and hidden treasures across three checkpoints, with optional breaks and exclusive discounts. Your strategy, speed, and teamwork will determine your place on the live leaderboard. Perfect for friends, families, and colleagues, this accessible and dog-friendly challenge promises an unforgettable weekend adventure.
Manchester’s People’s History Museum has unveiled a rare jug commemorating the 1819 Peterloo Massacre. Arriving in time for the anniversary of the historic protest, the everyday object features a map of the exact site where cavalry charged into 60,000 peaceful demonstrators demanding parliamentary reform. Though originally produced on a commercial scale to channel the escalating public anger that followed the tragedy, it is the only known surviving example of its specific design. The piece joins the museum’s permanent Peterloo exhibition, sitting alongside yeomanry sabres, a commemorative handkerchief, and a cane carried by one of the original protestors.
